Live Switching w/HD100

[Brian Chow]

Has anyone tried to switch the HD100 live in HDV? I'm looking into the Edirol switcher that does HD. I will try it for a week next week, just wanted to know if anyone else has tried. Hoping to use it for a couple of tv shows shot live to tape, then a little post later.

Other option would be FCP, has anyone ever tried using Multicam feature with HDV. I know I could post everything but if I can save some time, it'll save a lot of money.

BTW, I'm not on a MAC system yet, just need to know what will work best for my circumstances first.

Thank-you for any of your feedback.

[Tim Dashwood]

Brian,

You should call my dealer in Hamilton. Peter Bauce, 905-522-1200. He can advise you on live switching of HD100. He recently installed a bunch of HD100s at CTS and did some sort of live switching setup. I think he was able to do with firewire, but I'm not sure. He's the expert when it comes to live stuff.

As for FCP and multicam: It works great, but on my system (dual G4 1.2Ghz) I don't have the horsepower to do even 3 streams of HD material multicam, so I had to convert to offlineRT to offline.

[Nate Weaver]

Originally Posted by Brian Chow

Other option would be FCP, has anyone ever tried using Multicam feature with HDV. I know I could post everything but if I can save some time, it'll save a lot of money.

I've done a lot of multicam editing with FCP5, and a little with the HD100 specifically. I can get 8 streams of 720p24 AIC HDV playing in real time on my dual 2ghz. I can do about 4-5 of native HDV before things start to get so slow that I'd rather offline RT the media.

[Brian Chow]

Thanks Tim,
I will call him. I have heard though that firewire would not be an option since there will be a delay. Do you think the new MAC book pro could handle 3-4 streams of HDV?
BTW, I always view this forum and I have to say how nice it is to see people like yourself constantly helping the production community. I'm sure I'm speaking on behalf of many people. Thank-you.

[Stephen L. Noe]

Originally Posted by Brian Chow

Has anyone tried to switch the HD100 live in HDV? I'm looking into the Edirol switcher that does HD. I will try it for a week next week, just wanted to know if anyone else has tried. Hoping to use it for a couple of tv shows shot live to tape, then a little post later.

Other option would be FCP, has anyone ever tried using Multicam feature with HDV. I know I could post everything but if I can save some time, it'll save a lot of money.

BTW, I'm not on a MAC system yet, just need to know what will work best for my circumstances first.

Thank-you for any of your feedback.

If you are talking about the V-440HD it is a VERY nice piece. I saw a demo on it in the winter and for the money, in a live scenario that switcher is a great solution.

[Brian Chow]

Thats the one Stephen,

You're the one that told me about it. Roland will loan us one for the week to try. The switcher is the least expensive thing. Still have to worry about monitors, cameras, sticks, clear coms etc.. Starting to be big $$$. Should be able to make some money off it though since there is no one else offering a middle of the road live switching package.

Thanks for the help again

[Chris Hurd]

And thank you, Brian. You've just made the 10,000th post on this forum. That's a significant milestone. This is the single largest and most popular HD100 community on the web, thanks entirely to folks like you. Much appreciated. And by the way, just to help keep things on topic, I have a brochure here on that Edirol mixer and it looks very interesting. I'm hearing it has quite an affordable price, too. If anyone knows what it retails for, please say so.

[Manny Rodriguez]

the price is going for $12,000

[Jiri Bakala]

Originally Posted by Chris Hurd

And thank you, Brian. You've just made the 10,000th post on this forum. That's a significant milestone.

Hey Chris, what's he getting as a prize? You know like when you are the 10,000th shopper at Walmart?
...:-)

[Chris Hurd]

He wins access to our coveted Private Classifieds forum! Oh wait, he already has that.

[Brian Chow]

Ok, so I have the edirol V440 HD now, 3 hd100's, an HD Cam deck, a br50 deck and a whole bunch of monitors. Everything is on loan other that a couple of HD100's. The goal is to set up a live switching system for a couple of tv shows. These are switched live but there is some post as well.

Here is the question of the day.The edirol V440HD switches without a hitch but just outputs to analog BNC Component, it's great to watch on a plasma but how does one get it into the JVC deck? SD is no problem of course. Just trying to put this system together without going bankrupt.

Even if I get an analog to HD-SDI converter, it won't help. I already have a firewire - HD-SDI converter (on loan as well) that does me no good. I'm sure with the talent out here in these forums that someone might have a suggestion.

Thanks
Brian

[Stephen L. Noe]

Seems like you're missing a piece. The out's on the Edirol should feed the in's on the BR50 or is that your goal? What exactly are you feeding? An encoder for uplink or are you trying to master to a tape format?

[Tip McPartland]

If the Edirol only has analog component outs, how can its outputS connect to the inputS on the BR-HD50? AFAIK those components RCA's are output only. There are SD Y/C and composite ins, but that doesn't seem to be what's being discussed on this thread.

What am I missing here... I'd be stoked to find out that I'm wrong and those component outs will become ins when you push the record button and accept an incoming analog component HD signal and then encode it to HDV and put it on tape!!!!!!!! But I don't think so.

Options besides HDV firewire to get into that deck HD are tough. Firewire to SDI converters are easy to find, because there seems to be a market for going from HDV to SDI for broadcast, etc. But I spent quite a bit of time trying to find something that did the opposite without luck.

I was even referred to a supposed "bi-directional" device by an esteemed DVInfo maven, but when I tried the link he provided, it turned out not to go SDI HD to HDV firewire after all. Of course there are SD devices that go SDI to DV firewire, but again, that isn't what's being discussed here.

Right now, it seems tough to go into that deck at HD quality from a source that outputs anything other than native HDV firewire. I know that you can do it with a full-on Cineform Prospect system or their Wafian device, but I'm talking about a real-time, stand-alone converter.

Well, with NAB coming up maybe somebody will have recognized that there is a market for converting HD SDI down to HDV firewire and will release a stand-alone product, or maybe somebody here knows of something on the market now that I wasn't able to find. I'd love to hear some good news here.

Tip

[John Mitchell]

Yes it seems nothing converts to HDV (plenty of [expensive] devices which go the other way). I'm guessing because it's technically an inferior format to the source (HD-component or HD-SDI) engineers think no one wants to degrade the signal or something like that.

I would suggest your cheapest solution would be to build your own HD Component recorder, using Aja's Xena card, a dual Opteron and Cineform's HD capture codec and plenty of fast hard drive space.

http://www.aja.com/products_xena.html
http://www.cineform.com/products/ProspectHD.htm

Either that or the Kona card with analogue in and a Mac with plent of storage and you can go straight to DVCProHD (built in hardware codec in the Kona).

http://www.aja.com/products_kona.html#lh

Either that or hire a Wafien, or even an HD-Cam deck with component input - I noticed the mixer you're using has dual componet and RGBHV outputs. Or take an Avid Adrenaline with the DNXcel board on location.

[Laszlo Horvath]

John, how much space we need on harddrive for 720/60p recording ?
And what kined of file the Xena record? .m2t?

Laszlo