Film in standard DV or HDV?
 

hi all,

i have a corporate filming coming up, and until now, i've always just shot with my XH-A1 in standard DV. The final output will just be on DVD, but i wondered if there was any real quality benefit to me recording in HD when it would be getting downscaled?

Because of the importance, if i did film i would buy the specific tapes, but i just wondered if anyone records in HD regularly with standard sony premium tapes, and what are the implications or problems in doiing so. I'm sure i've heard before that it can cause regular drop-outs, and a drop out on the HDV affects more frames than normal DV?
Also other thing is - does it use up more tape in HDV (i've been told a standard 60m sony premium tape, i'd only get about 30-40 minutes shooting HDV?) is that the case?

thanks

It depends.

It depends on how critical your shoot is - if an HDV dropout would spoil a one-camera shoot at the most critical point (ring onto the bride's finger, for instance), then you're safer shooting DV as a dropout can be Photoshop corrected fairly easily.

It depends on how critical your client is. Will he notice the difference between footage originated in HDV over footage shot in DV if he's viewing a DVD? In an A/B test he just might, but you won't be giving him this opportunity, will you? He could well be planning to upscale the disc anyway.

Standard Premiums record HDV just fine. The more expensive HDV tapes are 2 mins longer, cost about 5x as much and *may* give you fewer dropouts.

HDV records an hour onto normal one hour DV tapes. DVCAM records 40 mins onto the same tape, but only at standard definition of course.

tom.

Make sure your system is up to editing it with ease also.
It could turn into a bit of a pain when all you ever needed was DV anyway.
The last thing you want to do is downconvert on capture just because its easier
to edit DV. Then you definately would have been better shoot DV first.
Although if there wasnt a lot of footage (say less than an hour) I believe
Aftereffects does a very good downconversion, even though it takes a while.

Unless theres some kind of limitation with your editing software, I would definatly do HD, you can always down scale but you cant go the other direction. I've only had my camera for about 7 weeks and I've never had a drop out. I only use the canon Master tapes. There expensive but worth it.

If its corporate work / paying job then there is no excuse for not purchasing the sony master hdv tapes as you will have budgeted for this in the quote.
shoot HDV edit HDV and downconvert only while rendering.
As Tom said do an A/B test and you will see the diifference
I can see the difference on a large display easily.
just my thoughts.
cheers john

I'd shoot HDV if only for the added leeway it gives you in post. I've often had to crop out part of a picture (boom mike, equipment visible, etc.) and if you downscale from HD to SD then you can do a lot more cropping without a noticeable loss of quality.


J.

Try filming in HD - any subject - then downconvert it from the camera to the editor. Does it give any better result than you're getting from shooting in SD?

Previous posts on this forum have suggested you get better results than when shooting straight SD with this camera. I've only tried shooting SD once with it (because part of the tape had been shot in SD on an XH2) and the results were disappointing.

Other than that, Jacques' remark about being able to crop when editing for SD also make a case for shooting HD.

I tried this with my Z1 (your first sentence Annie) and couldn't see any differences. When you switch any HDV camera to shoot in SD the camera downconverts from the chips to the tape. If you shoot HDV but output SD down firewire, the camera downconverts between tape and firewire. I suspect there are no differences simply because the same downconverter is being used in both cases.

The 'being able to crop' is a blessing, but Edius will only crop and zoom, it won't allow tilted horizons to be corrected as far as I can see.
Are there programs out there that will allow this?

tom.

sounds as though there's a mixed opinion on whether the quality is better or not.

One other thing that might make the difference in this - I have someone doing after effects stuff for me which will go into the edit, and i think that some of the 'template' stuff that they are using for it is only in SD. Would i still be able to use this in an HD edit, or is my question answered now by having to include this?

thanks for the reply's everyone.

Hi Tom,
Avid Liquid has effect editors that allow rotation. You can set key-frames to vary the amount of rotation through the clip and even choose an acceleration curve. Everything you need to compensate for wonky tripods, hand-holding or perhaps create the illusion of being on a boat!

7.2 is the final version of this fine editor, sadly, and it's not yet clear what Avid/Pinnacle will replace it with. The up-side of this is that there are some excellent deals available. I saw it on sale at the Broadcast Video show in London last month for £150, which is less than half-price. Rather like Vegas, it's regarded as a bit quirky and is fiercely defended by a small band of loyal users (myself included!) It's certainly very powerful, and at that price might be the perfect companion for Edius - between the two, I think almost everything would be covered.

HTH

Tom
My comments were based on what I'd read on this forum (including comments like SD on this camera is crap), and my limited experience. The downconversion issue is mentioned in several threads including:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/canon-xh-...onverting.html

Martin - Yes, the opinions are varied. Try both and see what you think. Bear in mind that the quality of what you are watching it on (especially if it is not an HD monitor) may give false impressions. I gather you can upscale SD to include in an HD video, I'm sure someone else will tell you how!

My feeling is that you shoot in the highest quality possible, and that gives you more options later.

If you need to make any jump cuts during an interview you will be better off in HDV: you can zoom in or out to hide the cut and then downconvert to SD. Assuming you are doing the editing.
BTW Like Mark, I use Liquid and am a big fan.
At £150 it is a bargain but the time spent learning it may be wasted if you then have to switch to another NLE.
Therefore even though it works very well it is soon going to be replaced and is, unfortunately, obsolete.
Hopefully the replacement will retain the best features of Liquid but this is far from certan.

HDV Artifacting?
 

I've tried shooting with the XH A1s HDV input via firewire. Looks great, but when in color correct in Final Cut, I get artifacting. Looks like about every 8 frames or so. Looks like a bit of stobing on the colors. I export to Compressor and burn in DVDSP. I really see it in DVD playback freezeframing. Watching on a high quality DLP. I'm afraid to treat any of my video due to this problem. Anybody else notice this? Also, any thoughts on how HDV works in low light compared to SD?
Thanks, Mike

There is no difference whatsoever Mike. Some camcorders that take stills to flash memory aren't so good in low light (they have their maximum apertures restricted in the stills mode) so maybe you were thinking along those lines.

don't forget when you're shooting in HDV you are running it through the encoder into long GOP format .. more compression ... same bitrate is on the tape, but you have compressed the signal to get the HD on there ...

I can't dispute the above that you can pan & zoom within the HD frame if you need to, on the other side, you've compressed your signal quite a bit more and if you are going to produce it in SD, you have to weigh how much you would use that pan & zoom vs. adding more bits to your entire video throughout if you shoot in SD.. so I think it depends on how you value or weigh those two ... if your shots are somewhat controlled, you may value having the 'uncompressed' SD on the tape ... if you think your client would want HD later, then go for HD ... but if you are shooting in HD, then have to either edit in HD or convert to intermediary codec such as cineform, etc. you are adding alot to your workflow that you may not benefit from

also, when you say corporate, I assume most shots are not high motion? If you have any real high motion and you are going to produce in SD, I'd shoot in SD ... if you don't have high motion, that factor goes away ...