I think I read in that article that Frank wrote that FUJI makes tapes for PANASONIC. If that is so, then those tapes would be dry as well. Right??

Tustin, correct, there's only really a few manufactures that make different tape, but they are marketed under different names and crap...

Fuji would make the tape according to Panasonic's specifications. And I don't know if Fuji makes all of their tape and all of the time or some of the time. Right now, Fuji may not even make any tape for them. I say this because I got that information a few years ago.

A few years ago, regardless of labeling, MiniDV tape was either Sony-style or Panasonic-style. Both were "wet lub" formulation. The eraly days were the era of the incompatable lub issue, which was resolved between Sony and Panasonic when Sony had the convenient tape factory fire that made MiniDV tape very scarce for a while. And presto, the incompatible lub issue swas mostly resolved. (But characteristic wear deposits may still present an issue when changing tape brand.)

Then Panasonic added their dry lube tape as a premium pro tape, so Panasonic offers both types of lub tape now. AS I recall the reason for the dry lub was to ensure compatability with the lub used on their DVPro tape and playback products that can play MiniDV as well as DVPro.

One thing seems certain, there is no concensus on tape brands except to stay consistantly with one manufacturer. I used a cleaning cassette following instructions for 10 seconds. Ran a 15 minute test yesterday with no pixelation or drop-outs. Hope that continues.

The Panasonic tapes sound interesting especially if they're making them for Canon. I've got to much invested in Sony right now but may switch next year.

By the way, the images from a GL-2 are stunning and regardless of geometry and CCD arguments, you can achieve shallow depth of field with a little practice.

Thanks to all,
Bob