HDcam to HDV?

[Miguel Lopez]

Hello. We have shortfilm recorded in HDcam 25p.

The final film will need to be resized to PAL DigiBeta.

Now, in order to edit i could:

- Go to a production facility and pay €5,000 to edit it in a true HDcam video editing software...

- Or order a HDcam to HDV (1080i) conversion for €300. Quality will be of course much worse, but will this be really noticeable once we resize to PAL resolution? The footage contains very slow camera movements, so i guess there wont be motion artifacts in MPEG2.

Also, 1080 is interlaced, but since this was recordad on 25p, i guess this would work as the DVX100, recording progressive images into interlaced secuences.

Color resolution is half in HDV, but i understand that when we resize to PAL we have more or less the same color pixels, rigth?

The price difference is huge. What do you think?

[Ben De Rydt]

What I would advice you to do depends on the unknown factor in your question, i.e. what kind of editing station do you have?

Do you have an HD-SDI input/output and HD monitor? If so, you could choose the HDV route, but I think that if you would, you'd have enough money and storage to rent an HDCAM deck and capture to uncompressed or DVCProHD.

Do you have an SDI input/output and SD monitor? If so, why not let the house transfer the footage to DigiBeta, rent a DigiBeta deck, capture uncompressed or DVCPro50 and print the final result straight back to DigiBeta?

You don't have any of these but you do have a DV-cam and a SD-monitor? Let the house transfer the footage to DV, edit in DV (offline) and do an online edit at the house, either at HD or SD resolution.

As you can see, it doesn't really matter if you have an HDV cam or not, because they're pratically worthless for editing. You won't be able to monitor HDV while editing which makes it impossible to do any kind of colour correction.

[Kevin Shaw]

Originally Posted by Ben De Rydt

As you can see, it doesn't really matter if you have an HDV cam or not, because they're pratically worthless for editing. You won't be able to monitor HDV while editing which makes it impossible to do any kind of colour correction.

On the contrary, it's pretty much the same now to edit HDV as DV, if you have the right equipment. For example, Videoguys is currently selling the Canopus Edius NX hardware/software combo for $1499 with real-time HD component monitoring. If you can get your production house to convert the HDCAM source to the Canopus HQ codec your quality should remain pretty high, and once you downsize to PAL you're going to lose a lot of image quality anyway.

There are other ways to tackle this problem as described in Ben's post, but HDV is a functional option depending on your needs and budget.

[Ben De Rydt]

Originally Posted by Kevin Shaw

For example, Videoguys is currently selling the Canopus Edius NX hardware/software combo for $1499 with real-time HD component monitoring.

Which is functionally equivalent to an HD-SDI card for the purpose at hand. You'll still need an HD monitor for the Canopus combo.

Originally Posted by Kevin Shaw

If you can get your production house to convert the HDCAM source to the Canopus HQ codec your quality should remain pretty high, and once you downsize to PAL you're going to lose a lot of image quality anyway.

I think the key to approach this task is to stop worrying about resolution and start thinking about colours instead. Nobody is going to see a slightly out of focus frame if you're downconverting from 1080 25psf to PAL, but they will notice if your colours are all over the place. IMHO it is pretty impossible to do decent colour correction on a computer monitor. This project, being a short film, will probably need anywhere between some or a lot of colour correction.

I'd try to save money by going whatever route that makes it possible to do the edit at home (with a decent monitor), only to spent it later in quick session with seasoned engineers in the post house.

[Kevin Shaw]

Originally Posted by Ben De Rydt

You'll still need an HD monitor for the Canopus combo.

Yes, but you'd suggested earlier that it's not possible to monitor HDV while editing, so I just thought I'd clarify that. If you're saying it's a problem that most people don't have a decent studio-quality HD display, that's a different issue.