Amadon Amadon
Forum Replies Created
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Dear Walter,
Your comments about the hemi-neon, and about people’s apparent lack of ability to appreciate a product’s merit in relation to its price, are most refreshing. Here’s another point that may seem heretical to some, but which may interest you.
“Imperfect” video is not always bad. Sometimes it is better, functionally, than “great” or “perfect” video. Unfortunately, the marketing hype-crazed mind is programmed NOT to admit that fact. Since every marketing-influenced person “MUST” buy the latest and greatest gear, few people can afford to understand the fact that every tool has a good use — yes, even a cheap or relatively primitive tool. For example, a cheap hammer might pound in a nail quite nicely, while an air-driven nail gun might, in many cases, serve no better. Low resolution video has a certain charm of its own. Such video may be better, for example, than hi-rez video fuzzed up to hide unattractive wrinkles! People will say, “Well, with hi-rez video, you have the OPTION to fuzz or not to fuzz.” But of course, maybe, having spent a tenth of the money, you can afford to take the time to bring out the best from your imperfect video. Otherwise, you may spend all your time earning money to pay for your “perfect” video. Not that any video is anywhere near perfect, of course.
The folly of modern man is to fall in love with an item he doesn’t really need, and then wrack his brains trying to find some dubious rationale for buying it. That’s the cart before the horse, for sure. And, that same fool will buy a product with a “better spec” which may do a much worse job than the lower-spec item he’s got. I must admit, I fell into that one myself. I am the not-so-proud owner of a 1080p LCD monitor that delivers a picture maybe one quarter as good as my Sony CRT. Such are the dangers of tech-idolatry!
Amadon
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Thanks for the input. I come from still photography, where cameras are reviewed long before mass release. Different world. If I made a video camera I knew would impress, that’s what I’d do. But they must have their reasons. amadon
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Kudos for your candor. But in my view, there is ONE advantage to the proliferation of junk — especially junky VIDEOS and MOVIES everywhere you turn. Like you, some people get sick and tired of it. In the long run, that raises the value of the (now relatively rare) good stuff. For example, the other day, I tunred on the television, and got a MAJOR shock: I heard a GOOD guitar player! Incredible! I couldn’t have been more pleased. I began to realize, a genuine craftsman like that will rise up from the mud once in a while. It DOES happen, despite the rabble.
As far as junky and cheap hardware products are concerned: I guess the money men are duty bound play to the market taste, where people want everything for nothing. Disgusting, perhaps, but pure business. I buy the best I can afford. Maybe others do the same. As long as people understand what they’re getting –and what they’re NOT getting–I guess its ok. Maybe your real complaint is that people just buy marketing hype, and are deluded as a result. Fool’s gold, that. amadon
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EXCELLENT! I appreciate all those very’s. SO glad to hear the thing works — and apparently, works very well. I was once given the impression that the camera would be in my hands this month. The engineering mule on Nov. 8 sounds like we’ll be waiting a good while more.
The more I think about, except for the dollars presently required, I’ve gotten quite positive about using a compressed workflow process with the P2 card. In short: Accept the (rather severe) discipline imposed by taking the time to nuke unwanted footage DAILY, and NEVER archive it. Won’t work for everyone, because it’s a big change in the work process. But it DOES have these real advantages:
1. When you make those major cut decisions the day of the shoot, you’re learning stuff at the right time from that process. It keeps you in better touch with how you’re doing.
2. Saves on archive space. I plan to archive to hard drive. Not cheap. In that context, this pre-cut approach makes particularly good sense.
Thanks for the post. Amadon
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I ‘m in the first order stack for the 200 from Fullcompass. But I am a bit spooked about the fact that there is NO indication that the camera can produce good footage — not to my knowledge anyway. I have yet to hear ANYONE, not even a single panny rep, reporting ANYTHING about ACTUAL picture quality. We can see on the ad DVD that the Varicam takes good shots — but of course we knew that. What about the 200? All we have to go on, thus far, so late in the game, is pure theory. I’m wondering WHY a camera like this seems to have had NO beta iterations, no test shots available.
One would think if the camera was close to market, AND could take credible pictures, Panasonic would have been keen to show some stuff. If for no other reason, to create maximum pre-interest and pre-orders. Here’s my question: Why not?
Perhaps the camera has some serious problems the poor engineers are still struggling round the clock to sort out? Or, maybe the camera IS already in final form, BUT its video product is too poor to impress either video buffs OR potential reviewers? In the latter case, it would make marketing sense to keep things under wraps. But I, for one among many, hope THAT’S not the case.
None of the above may apply. It just worries me, a guy with bucks on the line, that the camera is expected soon, and there is ZERO to show of it. Again, Jan: WHY?
Thanks for your excellent contributions on this site and others. You’ve been quite helpful and patient in steering people thorugh the woods. I hope this post ain’t outta line. Thanks again. Amadon
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Got it loud and clear this time. Thanks! And finally, I can see why not too many people pay much attention to that option: Who wants to walk around on the sidewalks with their HD camera connected via firewire to a G5 on a long AC power cord carried by a poor sweating assistant who hopes nobody trips over ANY of those wires, unplugs something, and loses the shot? Maybe in a wedding — no, part of a wedding, you could do that.
So yep — in normal video reality, its back to P2, or firestore. And as usual, the bleeding edge earns its name. You never seem to quite get what you need right out of the box. I suppose happiness is being OK with that. Thanks again.
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It must be a big technical challenge to make a firestore accept data as fast as the 200 wants to deliver it. Otherwise, you would think they would burn the midnight oil and get the darn drive out with the camera, rather than a few months AFTER that. That way, they’d get some market dominance before everybody else got a similar products out. Maybe new bus architecture is the hang up. — amadon
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Thanks a lot for answering my query. Pardon my apparent or real thickness, but your answer SEEMS at times contradictory:
I said: ” . . . you can plug in, as Steve said you will be able to, into a G5 mac with an SATA speed drive, and record til the drive fulls up. The resulting file is then what you edit”
Tothat you replied: “Yes, you can do exactly that. As long as you’re running a capture utility that recognizes DVCPRO-HD data streams (and FCP5 or FCP-HD will do that), then yes, you can do what you’re asking.”
But then, to my confusion, you made a statement that SEEMED to contradict your previous one:
“The HVX can copy the contents of a P2 card directly to an external firewire hard disk, yes. It has to record to P2 first, but once it’s recorded, it can then (by itself) communicate with and transfer files to a firewire hard disk. What it cannot do is record live to a regular hard disk *instead* of to P2.”
Of course, the statements above cause m to ask if you mean, EXCEPT in the case I mentioned (a mac G5 tower running FCP and an SATA drive?
But then, restoring hope to my previous high level, it seems like this last statement of yours returns full circle:
“FCP already supports capturing live firewire streams. So if you’re willing to be cabled to your mac tower, you can be shooting HD straight to your computer immediately — you don’t even have to have P2 cards or a FireStore or anything, just plug in and go.”
Thus, I remain, in my way, confused. But here’s my secret. I’m getting this camera this month, and can’t afford the card for another month or so.
Anyhow, I got most of the distinctions you made. Thanks again.
And thanks for your patience with a novice brain
amadon
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As is the case in this thread, everyone is wondering about backing up from P2 drive to hard disk — if htat is POSSIBLE. Panasonic rep Steve Johnson succintly said: “The AG-HVX200 will output (usb-2, eee1394) just about anything (720P 1080i 480P)-> to a firestore or to a laptop computer for instance, make sure it has the speed to keep up though.” AND much FURTHER — and in my view, more importantly– he said that the 200 can output/record DIRECTLY to a hard drive that can keep up with the data rate. Is tha true?
If it IS true, then the whole situation is different than anyone seems to know. In THAT case, you can plug in, as Steve said you will be able to, into a G% mac with an SATA speed drive, and record til the drive fulls up. The resulting file is then what you edit, as well as being your archive. Hard drives are now avaliable from places like Staples or Tiger for 50 cents a gig or less. That makes ardiving huge video files not TOO TOO expensive — just expensive. Meanwhile, down in the trenches, it seems like half the people are expecting the P2 card to be an archive media— which you seem to be trying to correct as fast as you can — and the other half are worried about whether the P2 care can be backed up to a hard drive AT ALL. This seems strange, taken as a whole. But as I say, much more strange, if what Steve said aboutr direct recording to hard driv is true, is the fact that people are completely unaware that the 200 may record DIRECTLY to a superfast drive. The thing there is, MANY shoots have ac power on hand. Not everybody is trying to climb Everest with video cameras! For my money, it is perfectly acceptable to decidate a mac tower to the shoot, and let it record away. Is everybody missing that point, or does that wonderful possibility simply not EXIST?
Amadon