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P25 versus P50
Bovine Colleagues,
delighted there’s a forum for discussion of camera questions.
At the moment, I’ve an issue about shooting formats — but first
a short note of self-intro / background.
I purchased a Panasonic HVX200 in Beijing, on the way to India.
I’m now located, long-term, in Bhopal (near the geographical center
of India), doing some documentary and experimental video work while
studyin Indian classical music (plus the Hindi language, etc.)I’ve mainly been shooting in DV mode, but lately did a small project
on hire, shooting in DVCPRO 720P to P2 cards. I ran into what seems
to me a weird problem about the format selection — indeed, I wonder
if there is a little glitch with my camera.I should point out, I’m using a PAL version of the camera.
For shooting foremat, I selected “720P / 25P.” The onscreen data included “25P” — yet when I shoot in this mode, and look at the clips with the P2 Viewer, the metadata identifies the clips as “p50” not as “p25.” Furthermore, the total amount of shooting time I have for my two P2 cards (i.e., 17-18 GB total) is 17 minutes!
For my client, I had prepared the following summary of available formats, based on info in my HVX200 User’s Manual. [This user’s manual (which I got from a PDF on the Panasonic website — no printed manual was provided for me by the official Panasonic dealer in China) is evidently for the NTSC version of the camera.] Here’s the summary I prepared:
<< A) onto mini-DV tape -- 1) DV 25 (525 lines of resolution) -- [63 minutes per professional mini-DV tape] B) onto P2 cards [or certain other media -- there's a 100-GB device called FireStore that can be used, and it should I believe also be poss. to shoot direct to a laptop, but I've not yet worked out the methodology for the latter option] -- 1) DVCPRO 25 (720 lines of reslution, 2 channels of audio) -- [approx. 32 min. per P2 card = 64 minutes on my two cards] 2) DVCPRO 50 (720 lines of resolution, with four audio channels -- two on-board plus two external inputs) -- [approx 16 min. per P2 card = 32 minutes on two cards] 3) DVCPRO 100 = "DVCPRO HD" (1080 lines of resolution) -- [approx. 8 min. per P2 card = 16 minutes on two cards] Additionally, the User's Manual lists these two other shooting options: 4) "DVCPRO HD (720p / 24pn)" (720 lines of resolution) -- [approx. 20 min. per P2 card = 40 min. on two cards] 5) "DVCPRO HD (720p / 32pn)" (720 lines of resolution) -- [approx. 16 min. per P2 card = 32 min. on two cards] >>
So — slightly contrary to the above — I was selecting another format, called “720p / 25p” and was, however, ending up with a format called “720p / 50p.”
/ / / /
First question: what actually is this “50p”? The framerate is evidently still 25 frames per second (standard PAL frame rate). So I’m confused what the 50 refers to, unless it’s a question of so-called DVCPRO-25 versus DVCPRO-50 versus DVCPRO-100. Can someone point me to an explanation about 50p per se?
2nd question: if I select 25p, and my camera generates a 50p clip, — and if I select a format that should give me 34 minutes of total shooting time (on two P2 cards), and the camera only gives me 17 minutes, I assume these facts are correlated. I assume that for some reason, my camera is not shooting in 25p mode. Why would that be? Is it possibly / probably a camera glitch? I bought the camera in January 2007, so am still within warranty. For filmmakers based in India, where does one find a Panasonic repair center. I suppose the nearest one might be in Japan? 🙂
Any illuminations of the above quandaries would be appreciated.
thanks!
Daviddavid raphael israel
(in bhopal, india) -
4 Replies
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ps — small correction. I have two 8GB P2 cards = 16 GB total. 🙂
As said, the total shooting time I’m getting for that is 17 minutes,
when I select “720p / 25p” — though the shooting time should be
approx. double that amount. (Tentative conclusion: it appears that
my camera is incapable of shooting in 25p, only in 50p.)david raphael israel
(in bhopal, india) -
I am not that familiar with the PAL version of the HVX but from what I understand you have a choice in shooting 720p, some of which are; 720/50p: 720/25p or 72025PN. When you use the 25p mode it is actually recording each frame twice and laying down 50 progressive frames. The reason behind this is the EBU has chosen 720/50p as their preferred broadcast format. If you want to achieve the maximum recording time on the P2 cards in 720, then youo need to select 720/25PN mode as this will only record 25 distinct frames per second instead of the duplicate method used in 25P.
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Thanks Frank —
in effect, it sounds to me like you’re saying
that with the PAL model of this camera, p25 is
actually a form of p50. So is the difference
between selecting “p25” and “p50” then simply
a difference of audio-track options? — since
the “p50 per se” format allows 4 audio tracks?I wonder if Panasonic makes a User’s Manual for
the PAL camera per se? Presumably such a
document would more correctly describe the
actual camera I have in hand. I’ve not been
able to find such a manual online. If anybody
happens to know of a link for it, I’d be obliged
for the info.With thanks again —
cheers,
d.i.david raphael israel
(in bhopal, india) -
Panasonic has this European Union support site. The downloads are at https://www.hvx200.eu/support_downloads.php?lang=en
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