New Feature shot on HD-110
 

I posted this in another thread, but someone suggested maybe I start a new thread, in case anybody wanted to swap production stories, tech stuff, tips, etc., on using the HD-110.

http://www.myspace.com/inhospitablemovie

Thanks for checking it out!

[WARNING: Gory Images]

Stephen, Looks like a lot of great work there-Please share some details---camera settings, scene files, lenses/adapters. Any photos of your rig?
What post details/sytems used. Your experience and impression of the JVC in general. Stuff like that...Thanks!

We shot up in the desert near Lancaster, the camera Settings were pretty basic, I didn't delve into anything really, just used cinelike gamma settings and shot 24p, tried to worry about the lighting I guess more than the camera settings. I think it just looks beautiful. I shot my last film with a rented Varicam (the rental cost twice as much as buying the JVC), and think that this footage (when lit properly!) can easily match up to that look. I used just the standard lens on the camera, and the JVC wide angle converter alot, especially when on glidecam always.

Post was a little sticky getting things underway, since my final delivery is gonna be NTSC, I wanted to cut on my favorite edit sys of all time - Discreet Edit on Targa 3000. But since it's so picky about sync, and the JVC BR-HD50 deck doesn't have reference, that didn't fly. So then I fell for the Avid bs and thought do it in HDV, but no support as everyone here knows. So I am just using Avid, capture through the deck, letting it downconvert into a 30i project and will just online it there at 1:1. If going to the HDV is ever necessary I don't know where I'd go, maybe Premiere? I have Pro 2.0 and it captured an HDV test flawlessly, but I'd need to get the rtx2 board to really be able to work and see what I'm doing. And I just hear bad things about Pro's long form memory management, but maybe it wouldn't be so bad with the rtx2 board handling alot of processing.

I absolutely love the look of this camera, I tried all the HDV's out, and thought this one had the most film-like look. Can't wait to try a 250, and PL mount lenses.

HOWEVER, I have had nothing but problems with the camera after the shoot. About 2 weeks after the shoot wrapped, I started getting dropouts all over playback (as I've noticed posted elsewhere on this forum). I took it to JVC, who has been superquick and responsive. They replaced the mechanical assembly of the transport. I went and shot some pickups for the film and the 1st 5 minutes of one tape would not play back at normal speed (just happened to be one entire setup contained in that 5 minutes :(. You could fast forward or reverse and see an image but it would not play normal speed, not from the camera or deck. I also had a dead pixel which cleared just fine through that hidden function to clear them.

So then they replaced the mainboard on the camera, and now that I'm done shooting my film, the camera works perfectly. My partner shot another feature with it right after the mainboard was replaced and his footage over 21 days is basically 99% perfect.

But my footage as I start to go back to online, has the massive dropouts interspersed throughout. So I am currently trying to figure out a way to get my footage in cleanly as I online. I wonder if the camera's original mainboard was just screwed up from the beginning. The dropouts are different every time it's played back. I played back one 3 second shot 12 times, and on that 12th time it played it cleanly and I got the shot captured. But I can't imagine how much pain I'm in for if I have to do that for the roughly 30-40% of the film that has these dropouts.

I'll be talking to JVC about this in the coming weeks for sure, but if anyone has a similar experience and/or solution or suggestions, let me know. Thanks!

Holy production value! A bus driving to a castle?!!! Why don't we have castles around here?

Excellent work, Stephen. I can't wait to see your complete movie -- and it has absolutely nothing to do with the hot chicks in it!

I am in the market for a camera to shoot a feature myself. I'll be making that purchase in a week or so. My first choice is the JVC GY-HD110U. I am also considering the Canon A1. Why did you choose that particular camera? And did you downconvert for the edit or did you edit in HD?

Finally... What do you recommend in the way of a light kit? Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

As I mentioned in my post above, I thought the JVC had the most filmlike look to it of all the current HDV cameras. I downconverted for the edit to work in Avid since it still won't do the 720p/24.

Lighting wise, we were pretty low-budge and lean, a few 650 mole Tweenies and a few 300w Betweenies, a 1k broad and some wonderful foam core. Noticed more of a harsh video look creeping in when using the lights unbounced or gelled. The few days of nite shoots we did, we rented an hmi package, a 4k, a 1200 and a 575, then filled with our Tweenies.

Looks pretty good but the sound sometimes gives it away as an indie.

Am curoius to see the final version.

Did you use the stock mic by the way?

I think u might just be hearing less than brilliant audio on the internet file, cause the audio quality is great. I'm not that indie to use the onboard mic :) We used Sennheiser ME66/67 and AT835b shotguns and lavs, DAT backup as well as camera feed. So sound quality is pretty good.