The gigantic "which camera should I buy" thread!

[Frank Fulchiero]

Originally Posted by Philip Williams

Optura 50 or Optura 60. Headphone support, mic input, manual audio and even a focus ring on the lens. IF you can find one, I just checked eBay and couldn't find a singe unit. Dang.

Thanks for looking, anyways. We need 12 of these.
I may have to settle for just mic in, and hope the students remember to turn on their external mics, but I hate flying blind.
Now looking for sub-$500 miniDV with mic in, no luck yet.

[Philip Williams]

Originally Posted by Frank Fulchiero

Thanks for looking, anyways. We need 12 of these.
I may have to settle for just mic in, and hope the students remember to turn on their external mics, but I hate flying blind.
Now looking for sub-$500 miniDV with mic in, no luck yet.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...Camcorder.html

$236.95 with mic input and 35X optical zoom (!!). Probably not a spectacular image, but its hard to argue with the price :)

EDIT
You'll need to get some of those $12-15 accessory shoe arms for these, no shoe on the cam.

[Frank Fulchiero]

Ah yes, I was writing that an accessory shoe would be nice, while you edited.
Thanks again.
I'm still going through all the manufacturer websites to see if I can find a camcorder with a shoe and a mic input.
Otherwise the camcorder would be fine for student projects.
Would be a wonder if it lasted a year.

[Ervin Farkas]

I wonder how long will B&H wait before they develop a web tool for camera search... where I would choose my price range and the specs I need, to bring up the available cameras, a comparison chart, etc. All the needed data IS ALREADY in their database anyway...

It would become an incredible sales help for them, and an easy way for the videographer to shop for the camera that fits his needs.

[Jim Andrada]

I'm trying to get an idea of what camera would be good for doing a fair amount of green screen work (not interviews, though), I also want 30p. 24p would be a nice to have, but not essential.

I've heard that some form of HD is better than DV for getting a good key, but am confused by all the different versions of HD and wondered if there was any particular version that would or would not be good for green screen.

I'm thinking of something up to around $5k or so.

For example, would something like the JVC GY-HD110 be a reasonable choice or not?

Suggestions/comments appreciated

[Heath McKnight]

The JVC HD110, the Panasonic HVX200 and the Sony V1u are great places to start. The V1u is around $3700 or so; the Canon A1 is around $3500 and does 30f, 34f and 60i.

heath

[Bill Pryor]

Any of the 1/3" chip HDV cameras would be fine--it's more important which one you like the best. Chroma keying is all about your lighting and keying software (I'm getting good keying with dvgarage's dvmattepro in FCP).

[Heath McKnight]

Just a note, the V1u has three 1/4" CMOS sensors but my colleagues and I have found them to be just fine for keying, etc.

heath

[Bill Pryor]

I've even got good keying from a little Sony 1/4" chip camera, the old TRV900. I know one in-house group doing lots of keying with a little Sony A1U. Lighting, software, and the willingness to fool around with a clip over and over again to get the key right--that's what it's all about. People used to be fond of saying you couldn't key DV. Then when everybody started keying DV in an acceptable way, HDV came out and the naysayers said you couldn't key HDV, and the same thing happened--people key it every day. It's not as good as Hollywood keys from uncompressed HD, and nothing else is either. But you can make it very acceptable if you do it right.

[Jim Andrada]

Thanks for the responses!

As I understand the Canon 30f it's really an in camera interpolation as opposed to true progressive scan 30p. Is this correct?

Also, is it the case that HDV is better for keying due to more chroma information than DV? I've seen a lot of posts complaining about keying problems or blockiness when keying from DV.

[Bill Pryor]

No, the Canon 24f and 30f modes are true progressive scan images. They are derived from interlace chips, but it's not an interpolation thing as the Z1 does. There's a Canon white paper about this as well as zillions of posts on this board. There are no deinterlace artifacts, no pulldown--it's a true 24 frames per second, no funky pulldown judder. I believe Sony's XDCAM HD cameras use interlace type chips too and end up with true 24p (is that correct?). The advantage of this is that you can shoot 1080i if you want, as well as 24p, 30p. The measurebators (thanks to Chris for that wonderful word) say Canon loses a little resolution in the progressive mode, but you will never notice it without a very good side-by-side comparison between the two modes from the same camera. It's already the highest resolution camera in its class, and a little loss in that area is meaningless, from what I've seen, including all that I've shot. In fact, recently I did a week shoot for a guy using the 60i mode, and I didn't see any difference at all between the 24p stuff I shot of a similar subject, except that the 24 fps footage looked nicer to my eye. He couldn't tell the difference.

Most keying software today takes care of the early DV keying issues. Presumably HDV could possibly be a little bit better in that regard, but I doubt it's anything you'll notice, although it might be just a little easier to get a good key than it is with DV. There are no short cuts in chroma keying--if you don't light it right and work with your software, you won't get good keying no matter what you use. You also have to have a large enough studio to keep the subject 12 feet or so from the background to avoid green reflections off his shiny spots. The farther away the wall is, the easier you life will be.

[Jim Andrada]

Found this on another web site - it purports to be from Canon re frame mode. They say it is indeed interpolated.

I had found a really good explanation once but can't put my fingers on it at the moment - it also mentioned interpolation

<<<The GL-1 does not have a progressive scan CCD chip, instead it features an Interlaced Scan CCD. The Normal Movie Mode captures two fields (odd and even), then interlaces them together for playback. The time delay in scans creates a loss in vertical resolution and decreased sharpness of the still images. In contrast, the Frame Movie Mode captures 3/4 of a frame and interpolates the other 1/4 at the same point. Since both scans are effectively taking place at the same time, vertical resolution is 1.5 times higher. This produces high quality still images, but not quite the level of a camera with a Progressive Scan CCD.

Thank you for your inquiry,
Canon USA>>>

I also found the following link

http://www.bealecorner.com/gl1/res/gl1res.html

where he filmed a test chart in interlaced and frame mode and the frame mode was softer. Of course, in the case of a fixed camera and fixed target, as he pointed out, the interlaced mode is the same as true progressive.

Interestingly enough, he says that the frame mode test showed no flicker on a video monitor when paused, while the interlaced mode did show flicker in the areas of fine detail. Which is leading me tho wonder whether this was one of the reasons that Canon opted for frame mode ie to miimize flicker on "stills".

The reason I'm trying to really get clear on all this is that I want to use the video for match moving and I was told by the guy who developed the package I have (Syntheyes) that I would get the best results with progressive scan. He said that while it would work with interlaced, the tracking quality would be significantly improved with progressive scan

[Greg Boston]

Jim,

You are pointing to articles referencing the 'older' cameras. The 24f and 30f being referenced apply to the XLH1 and the newer XHA1 and XHG1. The XL2 uses true native progressive imagers so that camera is labeled as 24P and 30P.

Bill,

The XDCAM HD uses true progessive chips also. It does 'progressive segmented frame' which is true progressive capture. Then the frame is broken into two fields that have no time differential like true interlaced would. This allows the material to be processed and stored with the same signal chain and storage media as 60i.

-gb-

[Bill Pryor]

Thanks for the clarification on the XDCAM, Greg. I was hazy about that and obviously wrong.

The Canon issue has been beat to death. I'm gonna drop out of this discussion. The end result are progressive images at 24 fps, that's all I care about.

[Jim Andrada]

Greg,

Thanks so much for the clarification.

I think if I've got it right, the label "30f" would refer to the sort of progressive interpolated in camera mode and the label "30p" means really progressive.