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Shane Dillon
August 2, 2005 at 3:23 pm in reply to: New Varicam

Will the ‘new’ formats tapes be compatible with the existing VTR’s or will there be a new model for that too?
Shane Dillon
July 27, 2005 at 5:25 pm in reply to: Time code

Here is a white paper Quantel posted a while ago.
Shane Dillon
July 4, 2005 at 5:02 am in reply to: Off line using DVCAM ?

As Chris said, the dub to DVCam should be fine, providing the camera was recording ‘normal’ speed.

If the camera shot variable speed (ie. anything from 4-60 fps) a straight downconvert won’t help you. You may need a Variable Framerate Recorder to make those tapes.

Where I am we have to record all the variable framerate material into a Quantel eQ, then make a new master and downconverts from there. That is the only way we have been able to make the offline to online process work.

If all is shot at 24, 30, (or 60P) you are fine with straight dubs, if not be careful!
Shane Dillon
June 21, 2005 at 1:55 pm in reply to: Panasonic Varicam:- It’s not that great is it?

Hi,

I got the information from:

Michael Gee (Panasonic US) and Brad Fisher (sales rep. for Panasonic working for Professional Video and Tape, Inc in Oregon). They also go a guy from Panasonic in LA involved but I can’t remember his name.

Thanks,

Shane
Shane Dillon
June 20, 2005 at 5:53 pm in reply to: Panasonic Varicam:- It’s not that great is it?

Hey,

Is that the Michael Bach from New Zealand? If so HI!

Thanks for the info about the FRC, I think you know more than the Panasonic boys over here. Though it does still sound crazy that you sometimes end up using Sony HD SR dubs as your masters for offline to online.

I love the eQ, and think it is the best tool for HD longform by far. I still think, with longform and films anyway, that there will still be an offline process. For commercials I think the process will disappear maybe.

Final Cut is a great tool, but no way does it have the toolset of Flame or eQ, hense there is the need for big projects to use those systems.

I still think Panasonic need a VTR that can be used for offline purposes even when Variable framerates are used. I mean come on, isn’t the whole FRC box (which isn’t made anymore by the way) a bit of a cop out?

By the way Michael, did you see the farce of the US Grand Prix this weekend?
Shane Dillon
June 20, 2005 at 5:42 pm in reply to: green screen with vericam

24 or 30 ? it depends on what your final deliverable format will be. If you have the choice, go for 24fr as it it less frames to ‘paint out’ if you have to rotoscope.

My other advice is to try and make sure that what you are shooting is as far away from the background greenscreen as possible and is backlit seperately if possible. If you have too many different shades of green displayed, when you key, the compression really shows up.
Shane Dillon
June 19, 2005 at 4:36 am in reply to: Panasonic Varicam:- It’s not that great is it?

Did Panasonic actually make one with an SDi output?

We contacted Panasonic a while ago and the FRC is no longer manufactured anyway. But as far as the Panasonic sales engineer on the west coast knows, the only ouput is HD from a FRC. If he is wrong I would like to know, as this could be a solution for us.
Shane Dillon
June 18, 2005 at 5:21 am in reply to: Panasonic Varicam:- It’s not that great is it?

Wow the Kona 2 card sounds like it could solve a few problems.

So how does it work?

The Panasonic VTRs and the Frame Rate Convertor only spit out flagged frames in HD, so does the Kona 2 card downconvert these and spit out SD with the right framerate?

Looking at the AJA website it doesn’t say it does, but if it works I may have to buy one.
Shane Dillon
June 17, 2005 at 11:37 pm in reply to: Panasonic Varicam:- It’s not that great is it?

Hi Rob,

The eQ has never had a problem with Varicam, as it was the first system to support it. I was the person that done the betatesting. The problem in Arizona was that the Avid could not read the flags for variable framerate, as it only records via SDi, and the 1200 deck cannot do an insert edit at all. The only deck that can do an insert edit is the 1700 (or the old 150) but it doesn’t have a firewire output.

If you look at all the movies being done in HD, how come none of the major studio use the format? I mean ILM (StarWars), Warners, Troublemaker(Sincity and Spy Kids)etc. all tried all the cameras, and all chose the F900 and F950’s. I really couldn’t name a major studio that shoots in Panasonic Varicam.

Of course, we take on any jobs here. That’s why we have all the VTR’s and formats. It is just that when ever we do Varicam jobs (that have used the variable framerate function) there are compromises that have to be made.

We HDV here too (including cameras) and that really is HD compressed to within an inch of its life!
Shane Dillon
June 17, 2005 at 9:25 pm in reply to: Panasonic Varicam:- It’s not that great is it?

The problem is, the flags for variable frames are only on the HD output and not the SD. The firewire does output the flags, but you suffer interms of quality, and you then don’t have a Timecode reference to get a proper list.

We have Automatic Duck here, and it doesn’t help with the simple Offline to Online problem.

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