720p24 4:2:2 mastered to HDCAM
 

Has anybody uprezzed jvc hdv to HDCAM and seen it in a full theatrical projection? Look okay?

Yes, we have but 720p/25 to 1080/25PsF on HDCAM. It looked fantastic but it also rather depends on a good grade and decent camera work! Poor low light performance from the ProHD cameras really stands out on the big screen, as one would expect. We have also screened a720p uncompressed timeline direct from the edit suite to a native 720p projector for comparison and this looked better than the HDCAM transfer - as one would also expect.

Forgive my ignorance here but would I be right in saying you would record directly from the JVC HDV tape to a HDCAM tape, or perhaps transfer a HDV timeline/sequence back to (in this case) HDCAM tape?
I guess you could hire a HDCAM for a morning and have some kind of theatre material in your hand?

antony, did you initially record the 720p25 using component 4:2:2 colorspace or just the HDV 4:2:0? And is the mastering to HDCAM expensive?

In both cases HDV 720p/25 to tape in the field; cut SD on Avid; conform native HDV1 to FCP; grade and finish on uncompressed 720p/25 timeline; cross-convert on lay-back to 1080/25PsF HDCAM via HDSDI.

Mastering to HDCAM in this way is very easy if you know what you're doing and very cheap if you have most or all of the kit you need. Otherwise, you'll need to go to a facility house with proper FCP set-ups. Most post houses in London have FCP in their brochure but it's usually a small back room without decent I/O hardware - they're using Symph Nitris mainly. A competent FCP HD online house in London will charge £200-£300 per hour. If you already have a grade 1 or similar, scopes, legaliser, cage and an appropriate I/O board, you can hire the HDCAM deck for maybe £150-£200. I expect all these costs would be less in the US and Canada.

Of course, you'd get better results if you could use the HD250 and capture your initial footage via HDSDI to a better codec in the first place - such as ProRes, uncompressed or a higher bit rate mp2 variant. Personally, I wouldn't bother with component analogue HD on the other cameras for a bunch of reasons.

David - having your film on HDCAM certainly doesn't give you a proper theatre-ready master. Most cinemas in the UK at least struggle to cope with anything other than 35mm print. Too many projectionists don't have a clue about video technology and I've seen them get lost with hired HDCAM decks. There are very few venues even in central London that are capable of screening from HDCAM in a competent fashion - sad but true. Many don't even have HD video projectors, which rather defeats the object. If you want a trouble free screening you either have to sort everything out yourself from HDCAM or bring a 35mm print. I don't know how this situation differs in North America but I expect it's similar.

We've had the best screening results from direct output from the uncompressed FCP timeline into a native 720p projector. Remember that picture quality will suffer somewhat with HDCAM compression and the cross-conversion process.

^^Thanks Michael. It's certainly not like I have anything ready to present in a theatre setting but it's always good to try and understand the options. Perhaps then, for me, the uncompressed output might be the option to try in the future, although I can only capture (via the HD100) FW800 HDV direct to FCP5 rather than HDSDI to ProRes in FCP6.
Tis indeed a shame about the cinemas lack of embracing such technologies but then again most of the smaller cinema houses (which you might expect to adopt these things) are sadly closing by the day (cinecity in my village of Withington South Manchester - the 3rd oldest cinema in the uk - has this week commenced with demolishment...but I digress!).
Cheers.

I would love to "hear" those reasons as I get fantastic results from direct component all the time.

Yes, of course you can get good results with component analogue.

For us component analogue is no use because it's forbidden by the client/broadcaster - pure and simple. Also, all the while there's HDSDI on the 250, I wouldn't fuss with analogue conversions that are not necessary.