Advice Needed
 

I am considering moving up to the HVX200 to take advantage of the P2 recording ability. I hate capturing from tape and like the integrated P2 approach vs. the add on Firestore. I currently shoot DV/25 SD and edit using Adobe 6.5 with a Matrox 2500 card. I also am favoring the HVX200 because of its HD capability which I want to eventually move up to in about 2 years.

I noticed the HVX200 will only record to tape in SD mode. Does anyone know if recording in DVC/PRO (not 50) mode would be compatible with my existing editing setup? If not, then what would a cheap alternative.

Also what would be the expected recording time on an 8gig P2 card in DVC/PRO mode (not 50)?

Thanks.....

Hi Mark,

You should run, not walk, to my P2 Card Recording Capacities chart located at:

http://www.p2info.net/articles/misc/p2cardcaps.php

There you'll see that recording in DVCPRO will yield 32 minutes per 8GB P2 card, or in other words just over an hour if you're using both card slots on the HVX200 and the two 8GB cards that are bundled in the HVX200 package that Panasonic will offer for just under $10K.

As far as Premiere 6.5 and the Matrox 2500 being compatible with the DVCPRO format, I'm not really sure, but it shouldn't take much research to dig up that info.

i have an inclination that the dvcpro codec is only on the Digisuite range of matrox units... im using on old dual p3 550 with 512mb ram and a digisuite and it kicks butt.. ten again teh digisuite is doing all the work.. so the host machine doesnt have to be the be all and end all...

at the moment ur next option is the Axio, which again for pure grunt, is an absolute must, however, much cheaper than that, is Edius NX or SP which also support these formats. from from here, u need to switch to Edius... i personally dont like that NLE... its too convoluted for simple tasks..

another option is Liquid 6, or you can get the DVCPro codecs from main concept and plug them into Vegas...
this stil wont give MXF file support however... yet at least..

best thing to do is head off to matrox and check out their DVCPro support.. if u cant find anyting there, send an email to their support team as ask if its possible to run dvcpro codecs within the rt2500.. i honestly doubt that youll get your "realtime" performance, considering all these "realtime" options are codec specific..

DVCPRO, in NTSC, is bitstream compatible with DV. I am pretty sure Matrox offered DVCPRO compatibility back with the RT2000. DVCPRO50 was reserved for the DigiSuite, but I think straight DVCPRO is compatible.

If you're shooting to P2, and you're in NTSC territory, I don't think there's going to be any difference between a P2 recording of NTSC DV and a P2 recording of NTSC DVCPRO25. Should be identical.

In PAL it's a different story; DV is 4:2:0 in PAL, whereas DVCPRO25 is 4:1:1. So there it would make a difference.

But in DVCPRO25 in NTSC it should be the same as DV. Which means you could just choose DV mode and not even have to worry about compatibility. The main differences between DVCPRO25 and DV had to do with the tape it was recorded on, and also with locked audio (but the DVX supports locked audio in DV anyway, and I would expect the HVX to do so as well). So that would make the primary difference between them the tape format; and since you're recording on P2, that nullifies that difference. So: if you're NTSC, just record DV and you'll have full compatibility.

"In PAL it's a different story; DV is 4:2:0 in PAL, whereas DVCPRO25 is 4:1:1. So there it would make a difference."

It certainly does make a difference...
4.2.0 Does look very DVish, being that its the native compression factor for it, but when compared to DVCPro25, you can definately tell the difference betweek the two with regard to colour reproduction and bleed through. Also Chromakeying is much more precise and less prone to bleeding as compared to standard DV.

for me, the P2, will be primarily used to shoot dvcpro50 SD, however im also of the idea of shooting DVCProHD 720p@50p and rescale back down to SD simply for the storage factor of 720p vs SD DVCPRO50..
This would allow me to do full res reframing for SD delivery, and later on, when a client needs 1080, i have that option as well..

thats teh beuty of this camera, its pretty much a future proof investment..