John Frey
Forum Replies Created
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I have a new Sony A65. Whenever it is connected to an HDMI monitor, it does send audio to it whether it is recording or not, but only when in the dedicated movie mode, not in S,M or A mode.
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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The cables do not work as there is no conversion from digital to analog. I did recently find a couple of boxes that do the conversion, but they are approximately 8 x 6 x 3 and require DC power. You would also have to add a pad to convert the line level L + R audio to a headphone level connector. This could work on a tripod shoot, but would be pretty cumbersome handheld on a rig. Here is a link:
https://www.amazon.com/HDMI-Composite-S-Video-Converter-3RCA/dp/B0047PDBP0/ref=pd_sim_e_1
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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Peter, thanks for the video. A reminder of a great cast of wacky characters!
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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I carefully built the last 4 edit workstations for our studios and they continue to work just fine. Selecting the correct components is the key. If you are not able to put it together yourself, find someone that can – meaning, they have the experience, will follow your plan and will not insist on supplying the components. Go online and begin to line up the components that you will need. Don’t skimp on the case, power supply and cooling. Make sure you do your homework and check for compatibility issues. Buy a copy of the 2012 January issue of Maximum PC magazine. Very good illustrated articles on building your own powerhouse PC system. You can save a huge amount of money this way which lets you spend more on better software. Windows 7 is rock solid and Adobe’s Creative Production Suite is great. Do your homework and go for it!
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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I shoot speedway motorcycles along with other motor sports, including motocross. Over the years, I have lugged large Betacam units around, and then DV Cam. When HD became affordable, I waited for awhile for recording formats to stabilize and then purchased both small format HD cams and DSLRs as well. I do a lot of night shooting handheld and needed some way to capture the moment without always involving an additional camera operator. In addition, my current project requires a lot of footage that will be edited as slo-mo. That means full 1920 x 1080 60p – 1080i does not cut it!
I built 2 custom rigs out of aluminum alloy with 1 cam on top following the action with a remote zoom linked to the IR receiver on the front of the camera via a Toslink cable. The other camera is a DSLR shooting the wide shot at the same time. I wanted something light and compact for the primary camera. The Panasonic TM700, now superseded by the TM 900, is the little giant killer. Amazingly good, fast lens and super picture quality. You will find tons of happy users praising this little jewel on the internet. I have replaced the Panasonic GH2 equipped with a Nikon 1.4 prime with a new Sony A65 with a 1.7 Minolta AF prime. The Panasonic could only do 720 60p, and 1080 24p is not appropriate. The Sony A65 has been working out great, as it’s 1080 60p and clean ISO’s, OLED viewfinder, etc. are exceptional. This coming winter season is daytime, and I will be trying my 2nd TM700 in place of the DSLR. It will be set a little wider than it’s mate, but will still zoom along as it will be getting the same Toslink remote treatment. I know that the TM does not have the usual controls, inputs, etc., but I have worked around that. It does have full manual controls available via touchscreen and/or front ring, and it has full manual audio settings as well. It is nice to always have 2 versions of the same shot to work with in post. By the way, B&H has an incredible sale on the TM900 for $597.00 that ends tomorrow! Here is a link to photos of the rig in it’s early stages. Good Luck.https://www.digitalwestvideo.com/content/field-production
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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I fully agree, David. I have spent the last 30 years prepping backgrounds for talking heads using broadcast video cameras. Now that I also use DSLR equipment, the temptation to adjust for a super shallow depth-of-field is there. Unfortunately, I think a lot of young videographers go ‘shallow’ because they can – it seems so ‘film-like’! Set design and lighting skills sometimes take a back seat.
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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I fully agree. Our GH2 cameras have been great, and we use a variety of Olympus and Nikon manual lenses with them. We bought the Sony A65 as we need 1080 60p to match our other cameras on an action sports project that will be highlighting Slomo. The GH2 only does 720 60p. I would not be overly concerned about very high ISO settings. In the real video world, you will be needing proper lighting gear, so keep that in mind when budgeting for support equipment.
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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Our Panasonic Gh2 cameras had been our favorites until we purchased the just-released Sony SLT-A65. We have been testing it over the past 3 weeks and the results validate our purchase. Sony has used some new technology on this unit. It has a 24 megapixel APS-C sensor, implements the AVCHD 2.0 standard and will record stellar 1080 60p and 24p. It has a crop factor of 1.5, in-camera image stabilization, and will use all of the Sony and Minolta Alpha mount lenses. We picked up 4 additional excellent Minolta autofocus units via Craigslist locally for $150.00. This camera has an OLED viewfinder which is simply amazing – we do not have to use an add-on viewfinder loupe – it’s that good! Also, the articulating viewfinder is the best one that I have experienced on a DSLR. In addition, this camera takes great stills! We got ours from B&H for $900.00, which included a pretty good 18-55mm kit lens. This camera is a little bigger than our GH2s, which for us, is a plus.
For an additional $500.00, you can purchase the slightly larger SLT-A77 which sports a weather-proof magnesium body, extra controls and several technical extras. Here is a link to a recent review.
https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sonyslta65/
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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Output to BluRay, not DVD. But then, BluRay does not appear to be in the Apple scheme of things.
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore
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You may want to look for a used “DVHS” deck from JVC. I have one since buying it new for our studio years ago. For most VHS source tapes, it puts out the best playback signal of all of our source decks, including pro edit decks. There are several tweakable settings in the menu that you might try as well. Try Ebay.
John D. Frey
25 Year owner/operator of two California-based production studios.Digital West Video Productions of San Luis Obispo and Inland Images of Lake Elsinore