New Panasonic HD Camera

[Shane Ross]

Sure that hey just aren’t going to be showing off a working model of the HVX?

Shane

Alokut Productions
http://www.lfhd.net

[Gary Adcock]

[Charles Binn] “I just heard from a Panasonic Dealer that a new HD camcorder from Panasonic will be shown at NAB 2006.”

Jeff Merritt has been very vocal about any new varicam version at NAB this year
https://forums.creativecow.net/cgi-bin/new_read_post.cgi?forumid=120&postid=855734

Gary Adcock
Studio37
HD and Film Consultation
Chicago, IL USA

[Scot Olson]

Having already had a demo of the Sony F350 XDCAM HD, knowing that Thomson will show the GVG Infinity camera at NAB and thinking back to NAB 2005 where Panasonic had showed a mockup of a P2 HD camera, I found Jeff’s comments rather hard to believe. Now read this report on some of Panasonic’s plans for NAB 2006.

https://www.studiodaily.com/filmandvideo/currentissue/6080.html

I suppose the AJ-HPC2000 is not necessarily the next “Varicam” but I still find Jeff’s comments in the post you reference as less than candid.

Scot Olson
KAET-TV
Phoenix

[Tony]

I was present at a recent Varicamp when Jeff did indeed verbally tell the audience that “no new Varicam” would be shown at NAB 2006.

He did not mention a new P2 HD camera but now that the word is out on a forthcoming P2 HD camera I would expect the price of the existing tape Varicam to drop in price one day in anticipation to get potential customers interested in the P2 line.

It looks like Panasonic is trying to beat Thomson to the punch by showing the P2 HD camcorder before Infinity launches.

At long last now higher end HD camera gear will start to drop in price similar to the HD video card wars that have been taking place in the last few years.

Tony Salgado

[Rune Hansen]

I’m quite sure this is the “box” camera with no recorder, the AK-HC1500 which was just announced and which is indeed posted as a news story right here on the cow: https://forums.creativecow.net/cgi-bin/new_read_post.cgi?forumid=105&postid=855578

Basically it’s a Varicam without a recorder from what I can judge, although it outputs a 1080 signal (the CCDs don’t look to be that resolution though).

Oh, list price of under $20k. 🙂

–rune

[Kevin Lang]

If you would care to notice Jeff Merrits comments were there is no new Varicam which is absolutly a true statement meaning there will be no new Varicams as in end of the line, however there is the new P2 HD with a different name that will be replacing the Varicam!

[Rainer Bergomaz]

And in May the varicam price will drop. I’ve heard rumors of more than 40%.
Charles

[Tony]

Kevin,

You are correct Jeff did not discuss any new models at the Varicamp where he made the original comment regarding no new Varicam models to be revealed at NAB 2006.

Tony Salgado

[John Sharaf]

I’m going to venture a guess that this new P2 HD camera will not have variable speeds nor 24p; I think it will be positioned to compete with the HD entry level cameras like HD-XDCAM and Infinity in the television news market. That may be why we do not see a “Varicam” nameplate on the body.

The full-on P2 Varicam will come later, when the card-media costs come down and the per card capacity goes up (to at least 16Gb) and will include (still my guess) D5 recording in addition to DVPRO100.

In any event, I think that the tape-based current model Varicam still has legs for all who do not need tapeless ingest and who might prefer to archive their master on cheap tape. This would include low budget filmmakers and documentarians.

Finally, a portable P2 recorder could effectively extend the use of the current Varicam (as long as it will take an HD-SDI input) and provide the best of both worlds, namely simultaneous archive on tape and instant ingest on P2 card. It will really be determined by the form factor of the P2 card recorder. Hint, hint, hint!

JS

[Gary Adcock]

[john sharaf] “The full-on P2 Varicam will come later, when the card-media costs come down and the per card capacity goes up (to at least 16Gb) and will include (still my guess) D5 recording in addition to DVPRO100.”

I was just thinking about 5- 8gig cards giving the user 100 minutes of continuous recording @720p24
low light capabilities, interchangeable lenses.

Gary Adcock
Studio37
HD and Film Consultation
Chicago, IL USA