Kevin A. Sturges
October 31st, 2002, 03:54 AM
I spend a great deal of time most days of the week digesting all the posts I can in this forum. Recently, I had the good fortune to get a good price on a 38 inch,16/9 high-definition monitor. I acquired it primarily for use as a monitor to test the quality of my video editing. This TV has a resolution that is nearly ten times greater than a normal television, so whatever you see is the honest truth of what your video really looks like.
I was shocked ( though not surprised) to see just how crappy my digital video looks on it. In fact, I now believe that all standard DV cameras, no matter how expensive, will look like crap on it. How many countless posts have I read in this forum with people dancing on the head of a pin, splitting hairs about the difference between a Sony TRV 950 and a Panasonic DVX100? Why doesn't everyone here admit that either single chip, or three chip, they all put out just about the same awful image quality. With the advent of high-definition television, I believe that in the next couple of years all of the current, expensive camcorders that are on the market will be delegated to the bottom of the junk drawer.
When I turned my HD TV on and discovered that there are at least five high-definition channels broadcasting content that I never knew existed before - my jaw absolutely dropped when I saw the quality of high-definition video. I'm ruined! There is no going back now: the detail is so amazing, it looks like a projected 35mm slide.
I have a Ricoh RDC-7, 3 million megapixel digital still camera that I bought for about 700 bucks a couple of years ago. When I transfer the stills to my video editing software, and write them to a DV tape they look totally fantastic. They look very close to the video footage I've seen in high-definition broadcasts. I have often wondered why a camcorder that costs several thousand dollars more, takes footage with such abysmal quality that barely holds up to a cheap WebCam. Because of my experiments with transferring high-quality still pics to DV tape, I know the medium is capable of so much more. I have finally managed to afford climbing up a revolutionary cliff, just to realize the vast uncharted territory that I now have to to start out conquering all over again.
I had suspected that camcorder manufacturers have known this all along from day one, and have held back on the technology just so that they can control the market. Knowing that HD was right around the corner, they have played the game long as they can selling people expensive camcorders that tout "new" features like bluetooth technology and sub-par still pictures. Go to your local Best Buy, or Circuit City and the shelves are now filling up with affordable HD ready TVs. Once people experiance the incredible image quality, it will create the demand for a whole new market of camcorders and storage media to support it. After all the time and money I've spent building a quality DV editing and shooting station for myself, I now don't even want to look at this stuff!
I know I am probably going to create a firestorm here with these comments, and actually that's my intent. With rumors of JVC introducing an affordable consumer HD camcorder next year, I am drooling all over myself just thinking about getting my hands on this technology. Let's start pushing Sony and Panasonic to jump in and give us what we want. HD is here to stay and its here now. I want to know everything I can about it, and about how I am going to be able to edit and transfer this stuff with a computer. What does everyone else have to say about this?
I was shocked ( though not surprised) to see just how crappy my digital video looks on it. In fact, I now believe that all standard DV cameras, no matter how expensive, will look like crap on it. How many countless posts have I read in this forum with people dancing on the head of a pin, splitting hairs about the difference between a Sony TRV 950 and a Panasonic DVX100? Why doesn't everyone here admit that either single chip, or three chip, they all put out just about the same awful image quality. With the advent of high-definition television, I believe that in the next couple of years all of the current, expensive camcorders that are on the market will be delegated to the bottom of the junk drawer.
When I turned my HD TV on and discovered that there are at least five high-definition channels broadcasting content that I never knew existed before - my jaw absolutely dropped when I saw the quality of high-definition video. I'm ruined! There is no going back now: the detail is so amazing, it looks like a projected 35mm slide.
I have a Ricoh RDC-7, 3 million megapixel digital still camera that I bought for about 700 bucks a couple of years ago. When I transfer the stills to my video editing software, and write them to a DV tape they look totally fantastic. They look very close to the video footage I've seen in high-definition broadcasts. I have often wondered why a camcorder that costs several thousand dollars more, takes footage with such abysmal quality that barely holds up to a cheap WebCam. Because of my experiments with transferring high-quality still pics to DV tape, I know the medium is capable of so much more. I have finally managed to afford climbing up a revolutionary cliff, just to realize the vast uncharted territory that I now have to to start out conquering all over again.
I had suspected that camcorder manufacturers have known this all along from day one, and have held back on the technology just so that they can control the market. Knowing that HD was right around the corner, they have played the game long as they can selling people expensive camcorders that tout "new" features like bluetooth technology and sub-par still pictures. Go to your local Best Buy, or Circuit City and the shelves are now filling up with affordable HD ready TVs. Once people experiance the incredible image quality, it will create the demand for a whole new market of camcorders and storage media to support it. After all the time and money I've spent building a quality DV editing and shooting station for myself, I now don't even want to look at this stuff!
I know I am probably going to create a firestorm here with these comments, and actually that's my intent. With rumors of JVC introducing an affordable consumer HD camcorder next year, I am drooling all over myself just thinking about getting my hands on this technology. Let's start pushing Sony and Panasonic to jump in and give us what we want. HD is here to stay and its here now. I want to know everything I can about it, and about how I am going to be able to edit and transfer this stuff with a computer. What does everyone else have to say about this?