Latitude?
 

This question is for folks who own the GY-HD100.

What's really important for me besides the resolution is the camera's ability to record a wide tonal range and color spectrum. In addition to High Def work, I'd like to use the camera for stylized SD work, commercials, promos, and such. I want to get as close as possible to the look and feel of film.

We know that this camera will emulate film motion.

So the big question is, does this camera record a wider tonal range and color spectrum then the DVX? Does the look get you closer to film not just from a resoultion stand point, but from capturing tonal information?

When I transfer film to SD video, I am amazed at how much information is recorded. To me, this is a very big part of getting an aesthetic feel.

If the HD100 can't capture highlight and shadow detail better than a DVX, I'm not sure is worth purchasing for the extra resolution alone.

Thanks in advance,

Dave Dessel
Director/Cameraman/Editor

You can see a comparison that Nate Weaver did, shooting the same scene with the DVX and the HD100. While the clips weren't individually identified, it looks pretty obvious as to which is which -- and it looks like the DVX captures significantly more latitude than the HD100.

The clip is posted here on DVInfo -- actually, it's a DVD image that you can download and burn to view on your own TV. The thread is:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=50633

It is pretty much axiomatic that smaller pixels = less latitude. The HD100's pixels are about 1/3 the size of the DVX's, therefore one could reasonably expect the larger-pixel DVX to exhibit wider latitude than the smaller-pixel JVC. Of course, the JVC is delivering nearly 3x as much actual resolution too (and more than 3x when considering 16:9) so there are tradeoffs.

But if ultimate dynamic range is your main concern, a high-def 1/3" camera is likely not going to deliver what you're wanting.

Well the 'true-ness' of its 16/9 and the progressive recording make it a lot film-like already. There are reports the HD100 would even display the same or even better latitude then the DVX when shooting in SD (you can see screenshot of that on dvxuser.com, I believe)

After having time to tweak black stretch, gamma, and knee since that test, I've gotten what I believe to a bit more latitude out of the camera. Even if I haven't gained more real latitude, I've definitely achieved softer images that APPEAR to have more latitude.

After tweaking -- I've found the HD100 to have more latitude than any other 1/3-inch CCD camcorder I've worked with. By latitude, I mean in a very bright Las Vegas day, everything from sky, to white/colored objects, to black cloth in shadow is captured very much the way the eye sees it.

What's nice is that after being setup -- simply pressing AUTO on the lens get's your exposure spot-on. Nothing soft about them. Very sharp!

Am trying to get the same results in the reverse situation -- hi-contrast, night street situation.

I didn't mean soft as in focus...I was talking more about the harshness I had seen in the DVX vs. HD100 clips I did a little while back. In those clips I think I proved my point that the HD100 did indeed put more resolution to tape than the DVX, but the DVX overall was more pleasing.

I'm definitely now getting more "DVX-like" images out of the camera, in addition to the way higher resolution.

Here's a still from something I just shot out the door of my office. Remember this is full on sun at sunset coming from frame right, everything that's dark is in true shadow:

http://homepage.mac.com/nweaver/.Pic...00Latitude.jpg

Thanks
 

Thanks everyone for all of the very helpful feedback. The camera sounds very promising, indeed. The still Nate provided demonstrates very impressive latitude.

This camera is a serious contender for me for the following reasons.

24P
Latitude
True Shoulder Mount Design
Lens Interchangeability
No Archival Issues as opposed to P2
Works with the Firestore FS-4 (I have 3)

I'm going to my dealer for some hands on-testing.

-Dave Dessel

Nate your pix shows exactly what I found in Las Vegas. You get everything from the brightest white -- deep into shadow. This is at least as good as I've seen from 1/2-inch CCD.

Nate, it is nice to keep posting pictures that continue to hone the picture quality via settings adjustments.

It'd be nice to have a thread dedicated to the progress of the picture quality as you have learned more about the camera and also to post some SD card files for others to try. Keep up the good work amigo..

I agree wholeheartedly. Who will be the first to share some card files here?

Chris,

I've been keeping track of my various "recipes" and will post something within a week. I plan to do some controlled tests of the various gamma curves and track the differences on a waveform monitor. It should be helpful to create a database like this and to visualize the curve options (on the HD100, DVX and XL2.)

Thanks for offering server space by the way. I'm doing OK right now since Steve Jobs expanded the .Mac space for free to all members. I now have 2Gigs, but the m2ts fill it up quickly.

Tim

Honestly, the biggest step came via Tim with his Cine gamma/min setting. He's doing the real work here.

That Las Vegas shot looks really good. Also take into account that in a movie setting you'd probably be using light bouncers or sun blockers, so it would look even better.

An SD card library... now that's a great idea. Even newbies that don't know much about the camera will be able to get a 'DVX setting', '16mm mode', etc.

Here is a scene file I like on Panasonic (I call Butter).

Detail Level -3
Chroma Level +4
Chroma Phase +1
Color Temp -3
Master Ped -4
AE Shift -3
Skin Tone DTL ON

This puts the camera in Magic Hour during the day. WhatI'm getting at is, have you come up with some specialized settings or are you working on getting max lattitude?

I'd like to see the saturation pushed up a bit, detail down and contrast up a bit. Not to the point of overpoweringly vivid but enough so that the color stands out.