need help. Mixing betacam with HD100
 

We need to use an HD100 as a B camera on shoot with a sony d50 betacam with 2/3" ccd's. What is the best way to do this? Presumably we'll shoot 30p HDV and downconvert in post? What other settings/recommendations?

How much of a fall off will there be in image quality? Is this doable?

If your Betacam footage is going to be NTSC 60i, I think your best choices would be either HDV-SD60p or DV-60i for the HD100.

Really? what's the science behind that? I thought downconverted HDV was always the way to go for the best possible SD--all them extra pixels were supposed to carry extra color weren't they?

I have to disagree with Earl on this one. But it really depends on what you want to match up. The motion signature of 30p will be different than the 60i of Betacam, but the color information of down-converting HDV to SD will more closely match the Betacam. If it were me, I'd probably put the Betacam into "frame" mode (if there is such a thing) and record the faux 30p similar to a Canon XL1 and match them that way. Otherwise, the HDV60p or SD60i will be your best bet to make them match in terms of motion.

I'm not concerned so much about motion signature, we're shooting food! but I am concerned about color. Once upon a time I did a AB comparison with said betacam and a DVX100. The DVX100 looked positively sick by comparison. Anemic, weak, all worn out sick.

Chad are you suggesting a downconvert in the NLE?

That's interesting what you say about the DVX & betacam comparison. A lot of us prosumer 1/3" people tend to think that cameras like the DVX are the shiz and as good as any other SD camera ever. It's nice to know you actually do get a huge improvement in quality with 2/3" chip and a few more thousand $$$.

From what I've seen, taking your HD master and going directly to DVD will get you the best quality and definition (assuming your final output is a DVD). Otherwise, yes, converting in your NLE to an SD 4:2:2 or 4:4:4 codec will be better than shooting straight SD.

The AB test of the DVX was actually an ABC test of Betacam, dvx, and pd150. It really wasn't much of a comparison, the difference was huge--as it should be, it's a 25,000 camera.

My rationale is based on temporal compatibility. A 60p or 60i format will match the Betacam better (which is NTSC 60i), whereas 30p will look noticeably different. That is, of course, if you plan on leaving the Betacam footage in that format (rather than deinterlacing it later).

Colour and resolution wise, I believe the JVC's HDV-SD60p will look just as good as 720p60 (which the HD100 can't record) downconverted to 720 x 480. In my tests I could see no discernable benefit from shooting HDV-HD30p and downconverting later.

But I highly recommend getting hold of both cameras and running some tests yourself first to confirm what works best for your particular situation.