Daniel E
Forum Replies Created
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Michael,
Assuming that all the P2 cards were 4 GB you were still way under what I estimated would be necessary to be comfortable for just about any shoot I could think of doing. Depending on the frame rate you shot you could have been looking at only 20 minutes per camera before you needed to recycle. Even with the added P2 cards. Of course all this is hindsight for you and your crew now.
When I would proposed this issue to various people who were promoting the P2 workflow they often would dismiss my concerns or compare it to changing magazines on a film camera. This is why I think P2 is a lot more expensive a solution than people are comprehending. Changing film magazines doesn’t mean you have to erase your original to keep recording new images. As an example most people shoot film with at least 3 or 4 magazines per camera so they actually have more time to replace the film in the mags than you did with the P2.
Many times during productions I design in redundancy so I can timeshift tasks in order to keep the production going. One P2 Store per camera would have been the first thing I see being added to your list. Each camera pretty much needed the capability to record half a day before recycling any P2 cards. Not seeing your script and knowing the way you wanted to work then the people who added up the time it would take to transfer footage and to recycle the P2 didn’t arrive at the correct number for your shoot.
Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to have been a way to rescue you from this. If it was film or video tape you could throw more money at the problem. P2 cartridges are in short supply so you probably couldn’t have gotten enough delivered to handle your problem in time.Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
Sorry to hear your tale. This is one of the reasons why I think people have underestimated how many P2 cards they would need to handle a normal workflow. Considering you were doing a feature which usually has shorter scenes and set up time in between your production is an example why much larger capacity P2 cards are needed. Of course there are several other ways of recording the siganls from the HVX-200 and you probably should have learned them. Recording to a computer and recording to the now released Firestore sound like options you desperately needed.
Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
I did something similar with my XLH1 to a DSR-45 a couple of weeks ago. If you are going out from the XL2 with Firewire you might see noise on the output of the DSR-50. I haven’t figureed out why but my DSR -45 doesn’t like to output E to E certain firewire signals live. So far it has happened with an Avid firewire output and the Canon The recordings seem fine and it might be related to the 24 I was doing in both cases. The composite output would breakup while the monitor on the DSR-45 was completely stable. The recordings seemed fine but I needed a stable output so I went in Component. Not quite as clean but it was acceptable. I would test the system with a monitor on the output of the DSR-50 to see if it works
Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
1)Vertical Resolution does drop in 24F HDV. Still seems sharper than Sony, JVC or Panasonic
2) Pull down can be either 2:3 or 2:3:3:2 in DV. Menu setting. HDV is 24F, 30F or 60i so there is no pull down recorded. Not sure which one gets added to NTSC playback in HDV.
3) JVC and Pansonic have same size CCD’s just fewer active pixel elements
4) The Canon HDV 24F is very useable but you need to use the camera to play it back if it is on tape. If you are recording the camera live from SDI to disc then you have a different workflowExpect you will want to buy a new lens and viewfinder to use the XLH1 to its full potential. Since these haven’t been released yet it is a bit of a gamble as to when the system will reach its potential. Maybe we will know more of a timetable at NAB
Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
If you are shooting HDV you don’t need a HD monitor if you don’t mind looking at standard def downconvert from the camera. Some people insist on HD monitoring but it depends on the situation as far as I am concerned. You can miss things in the downconvert and it helps to have a real 16×9 monitor snce HDV is 16×9 only.
Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
Sparky,
You are correct. Give yourself a cigar. This has been discussed on DV.Com and you are not crazy.
Canon seems to not understand that auto focus is not a substitute for manual focus while zooming. There is a way to preset two focus marks and zoom by the way.
If you are using the current lense this seems to be an undocumented feature.
Can’t wait for Canon to come out with a new lens for the XLH1? The manual lens made for the XL2 is not bad on the XLH1 according to reports.
Please bring it up to your rep. Maybe they can reprogram something and disable this feature.Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
You might have to check your menu settings on the XLH1. Disconnect the camera and check to see if the SDI is turned on and to what format. Reconnect after the settings are confirmed.
Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
Mark,
There may be a menu item or a switch on the deck for remote control. I haven’t seen a manual for this unti so I can’t help you more.Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
Bobby,
I think you should be blaming HDV a little more in this. Many people are having trouble with Batch digitizing in HDV. The timecode doesn’t act as reliably as DV for some reason. I have Final Cut 5 and I can’t reliably put an in and out point on a clip and they tell the computer to digitize it. Half the time it doesn’t find the in point. This is more reliable of I stop the tape and mark the in and the same for the out.
This leads me to believe that I can’t re import footage reliably after editing in a low rez mode with HDV. My best practice recommendation is edit at full rez or with full rez copies in a format which we knows works like DVC Pro 100 or HDCAM. The HDV is for acquisition for the moment.Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com -
Bruce,
I think you are adjusting the color matrix with those settings. If those are the numbers you have checked out and they work for you that is great. Storing them is also great. Have you ever had a shot where the look was not quite what you wanted in the field?
The kelvin dial adjustment on some of the cameras is another way to reach a look. What I like about it is you can change the white balance of the camera overall in 100K increments and toggle between many different small adjustments. It is hard to store that many presets. It works in tungsten and daylight and anywhere between.
Yes, the F900 has very powerful adjustments inside to create looks. I just like to keep things simpler for some things and tricking the white balance in a lot of situations is harder than dialing in a specific color temp.
The F900 was pretty much designed before Sony added this feature on some of the cameras. Maybe they will include it on the new one coming out.Daniel Epstein
Gold Teleproductions, Inc
New York, NY
http://www.goldtele.com