setting for Sony HVR V1U
 

I just got my HVR V1U, any camera setting preferences?

PLAY!!!!

i asked a couple of friends for settings - that was their reply, and i have to say. you'll find what suits you and the situation much easier than someone telling you their settings.

leslie

Engage ND2 and let the darkness creep up around you...

Sorry. "Interview with a Vampire" is on and it's making me melodramatic.

Like Leslie says, there is no substitute for experimentation.

If you haven't used a professional camera like this before, you might be particularly interested in the Knee and Black Compensation controls. You can make darker scenes have a very clean black with Black Compress. Black Stretch brings up the shadows in very high contrast scenes. Knee set to Low will make highlights go more smoothly toward overexposure instead of clipping sharply.

Reducing default sharpness a notch or two helps reduce the harsh "video look" a bit.

Progressive mode allows different (namely longer) exposure settings to work without reducing framerate. Try 30p with 1/30th shutter for low-light scenes.

First of all, try to always keep the aperture wider than 5.6 (do it manually, or if you prefer auto exposure, set Aperture limit in the menu). Also, set your shutter speed to 1/60th sec (time for expreimenting with other speeds will come later). In bright sunshine, to keep these values and avoid overexposure, you may need to engage the neutral density filter (ND1 or ND2). But even 1/60th shutter speed will not prevent some movement jerkiness (or stuttering, especially in progressive), so avoid too fast panning, tilting and zooming - just try to keep it steady. You will be pleased with results!

As to the other settings - well, they are very much dependant on your own taste. I personally use cine gamma 1 and cinecolour on. If you have low contrast scenery, compress the blacks and set knee high; in a more contrasty surroundings stretch blacks and set knee low. These are just the most important and general guidance.

Thanks everyone!
The time is little too tight for me.
I'll shoot a documentary film about some China's underground markets in a few days, so proper low-light setting is demanded, somehow, the noise of low-light image always bother me.

Limit your gain to 12db or you won't like the results. In dark scenes, engage Black Compensation:Compress if you want to reduce the appearance of gain noise in the blacks.

There is software at neatvideo.com that is supposed to do a good job of reducing video noise. I haven't tried it yet, but a user here gave it a good review. I plan to try it out.