More thoughts on the Demo – HD Expo in L.A.

[Mike Schrengohst]

The DVD demo I received for the HVX200 has a WMV HD version of the video. You would think all the videos playing would be from some sort of HD source? Does anyone know who edited the HVX200 demo?? Looks like they used FCP??

[Brian FitzGerald]

I wasn’t at the Expo but I really, really feel your pain.
Ever since 16 x 9 hit the scene (and now HD) it ASTOUNDS me how poorly the public, but more particularly the video SALES community, displays/perceives this new technology. I cannot get over going into Best Buy or Ultimate Electronics and seeing absolutely pixelated, distorted crap displayed on these $12,000 TV sets (well ok, they are getting ‘down’ to only $3,000 now) and trying to sell it to people as “high definition”. I mean in my studio I’m staring at a 2 year old analog Sony Trinitron monitor many hours a week doing my SD TV editing and most of the time my signal from a DVCAM camera is far better than what they are trying to sell people HD on.
Another thing… People just can’t get it in their head that you DON’T want to stretch a 3:4 image horizontally to fit the 16:9… For some reason horizontal letterboxing in a 3:4 set is OK but they cannot conceive of putting the black bars on the left and right. They think it is good to use that whole “wide screen” regardless of the OBVIOUS distortion. Talk about the old joke of TV adding 15 pounds to your physique! This horizontal stretch phenomenon is like adding 30 pounds and then going to the side show and looking at yourself in the crazy mirrors. You see it in all the “sports bars” because for the most part they are not pumping “true” 16:9 SD or HD so they stretch the 3:4 stuff to fill the frame. It looks horrible and NOBODY SEEMS TO NOTICE. I have sat at business lunches (with TV media Reps by the way) and commented to the “professional TV people” at the table how distorted the TV pix are on the screens we are looking at and I get looks of almost total incomprehension. Believe me, you don’t want to try to explain how “SD TV is 3:4 and it does not naturally fit in a 16:9” by drawing on a napkin or using toothpicks or whatever… They just don’t get it. Sure, they aren’t “tech” people but they make their living selling airtime and don’t even realize what they are seeing…
To be charitable, non-professional people do say stuff like “I don’t see what the big deal is about this HDTV… It doesn’t look any better to me” so I think they have an inkling that something is amiss but they just can’t wrap their brains around what it is.
I was at a client’s house 2 days ago because he wanted to show his wife and family a spot we had just finished and he is real proud of his new $5,000+ plasma HD TV DVD VHS TiVO, etc. rig… So, he starts showing me all these “digital” channels that Cox is flogging and the signals from one network to the next are WILDLY different in resolution (if I can use that word). Then – horrors – he takes the VHS I brought to his store (the one that we always look at on a little 13″ SDTV) – and sticks it into this tower of machines he got from Ultimate Electronics. Not only was it stretched horizontally but due to some mysterious signal processing that has me baffled still the colors available went down to about 256 (like the old computer monitors) and “real people” looked like cartoons or rotoscopes. My jaw has dropped in stunned silence but nobody else in the room seemed to notice. I mean it was kind of a “cool effect” but really not what I was going for… But, hey, ‘Momma didn’t raise no fool’ so I just keep my mouth shut (23 years in the biz teaches you a few things…), played along and everybody likes it. They are just arguing over the way the baby grand daughter closes out the spot.

In closing, (and most of the kidding aside) I think there is something deep going on here that has to do with basic perception. I have thought about it for many years. I won’t go into it any more here but suffice to say “We All Don’t See Things The Same Way” (and this is only tangentially concerning TV…)

Now that’s a rant… (lucky for you, you only got a small fraction of it…)

Brian FitzGerald
FitzVideo.com

[Blub06]

(he starts showing me all these “digital” channels that Cox is flogging and the signals from one network to the next are WILDLY different in resolution)

So this is the TRUTH! It dawned on me two years ago and has been confirmed several times since, many people simply don

[Mike Schrengohst]

“Of course one big problem is that lots of people DONT EVEN SEE the issues.”
I finally bought a Toshiba 52″ DLP. I get about 10 HD channels. Discovery HD and INHD are fantastic. After you see the shows you get to see them over and over. These channels need more content. Good content. I cannot even watch regular TV anymore. My wife does not understand what I am talking about. I had a client over the other day and he said watching my set was the first time he had seen such good quality. I fired up the PC and showed him WMV HD playing off my laptop. He wants to produce his next trade show video in HD. I remember when DVD was new. I pushed and pushed my clients,
I have not made a VHS dub in over a year. It will take an effort on the part of producers to push and make it happen. That is why I am Awaiting the Arrival of the AG-HVX200 with great anticipation!

[Lars Wikstrom]

I must say that after reading so much about the camera and it’s fast approching release date I am starting to have my doubts. I do feel the camera will be ground breaking, but I feel it will be the second relase of this camera that will be great. The DVX-100 had some issues and with lots of feed back and a year later the DVX-100a was relesed that addressed some problems. I get a little worried when there demo video they release isn’t even shot with the camera. What also throws me for a loop is they just released the DVX-100B a couple of weeks ago. I would think they would wait until the HVX200 and sell that as the new camera and not build another DVX camera.

So I think I will be waiting for the second release, the HVX200a before I sink 6 grand and another 4 grand for memory cards. I want that camera badly but I don’t want to be part of the first mass testing group with so much unknown about this technology, a release date next month and no one I have heard has seen test footage from it.

That’s just me though : )

Cheers, Lars

[Randall3]

‘What also throws me for a loop is they just released the DVX-100B a couple of weeks ago….’

It’s the not the timing of release – it’s the lack of P2 in the DVX100b that puzzles me. That would have been a good move on Panny’s part. Just my opinion – but converting studios to P2 should start with DVPRO25. Maybe they thought that move would steal some of the HDX200 thunder – who knows?

[Jan Crittenden livingston]

[doka15] “The DVX-100 had some issues and with lots of feed back and a year later the DVX-100a was relesed that addressed some problems. I get a little worried when there demo video they release isn’t even shot with the camera. What also throws me for a loop is they just released the DVX-100B a couple of weeks ago. I would think they would wait until the HVX200 and sell that as the new camera and not build another DVX camera.”

Hi,

First your assessment of why the DVX100A became a reality is really incorrect. The original chipset became impossible to get and so we had to design a new camera, so with the opportunity to do so we changed some things that customers had asked for, and change the DSP because we had to. The DVX100B is based on the fact that it had to become RoHS certified in order to continue to sell into Europe, and in so doing, why not add a few features to the camera that weren’t there before. As far as not introducing the 100B at $3995 and teling everyone that they had to cough up $5995 in order to buy just a DV camcorder seems to assume that everyone has $2000 at their discretion. We don’t happen to think so.

Best regards,

Jan

Jan Crittenden Livingston
Product Manager, DVCPRO, DVCPRO50, AG-DVX100
Panasonic Broadcast & TV Systems

[Noah Kadner]

To amplify Jan’s statement, I still shoot regularly on my original DVX100 (not a nor b) and it rocks. So the idea that you’ll be a guinea pig or not get the best cam by choosing the initial version is simply not the case with Panasonic. Can’t speak for every company in that arena of course…

Noah

[Blub06]

The nature of tech is that it evolves. You can wait for the next ipod, computer, car etc the next is always just around the corner. Did you know that HD will be supplanted by UHD (Ultra High Def)? They are already testing UHD, Sony has a system as do others its a 4k system. Should we all wait?

My inclination is to dive in. For $6,000 its a steal. No one is waiting for UHD when HD is just now breaking upon us. The 100/a/b are iterations one to the other. Those cameras were Panasonics first attempt as reaching that brand new market, the indi film people who were actually shooting video and wanted to do it at 24fps. As they learned, they (Panasonic) changed and improved the thing, a natural evolution kind of thing. The same will happen with the 200, the camera should be paid for several times over by the time the next one comes out.

I can only speak my mind.

Chris

[Graeme Nattress]

So think of the HVX200 as the DVX100c on steroids?

Graeme

– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects and Standards Conversion for FCP