Barry, thanks for the highly interesting samples.

Does the XL2 have the same property as XL1 that the power is automatically switch off if the camera is not used for a while? If so, is it possible to bypass this feature?

A little offtopic...
i noticed the codec used on this clip was dvcpro50. Is there any quality benefits to using this codec to the normal quicktime dv one?

Lauri

Just like the XL1S, the XL2 has a "VCR Stop" feature which will bypass the automatic shutdown if you want it to.

You guys (sorry laurie), I mean, you all, were busy last night.

Kevin,

the codec was dvcpro (not dvcpro50). I'm not an expert in this, but I think this is just the standard DV codec.

Greg- as marty suggested, I just zoomed in to fill the same horizontal area. (I left the camera in place). As you suggested, if I had left the camera alone, then we would have more info on the sides. (but the center info would have essentially remained the same). I wanted to show the resolution increase of 16:9, so I did it this way...I guess if you wanted to show the wider angle of view, you would do it the other way.

As for getting it to run in FCP without rendering...you might try opening it in quicktime and taking the stretch out of it...I don't know if that will do it or not. FCP does have the automatic 16:9 preview, but I don't think the QT player does, so I added a preview stretch in QT so everyone could see it in 16:9.


Antoine--can you send me your dvx100A for the test?! :)

Greg B -- I was 6-8 feet from the gull, I think I was at 20x.

I'll see you all in a few days.


Barry

Barry,
Do you think you could post a few images that are shot in better light? what I mean is better color. I am experiencing poor color with the XL2. The footage I shot of the hawk in the tree reproduced the greens horribly...very muted and flat. IT looked like a horrible overcast day on tape but in the real world it was bright and sunny. Also.....I know it's not a scientific measurement, but I shot footage of my almost 3 year old daughter in my living room which has one incandescent light. I white balanced on the white wall as I have always done with my former DVX and shot 1-2 minutes and the colors are way off! And the image seems incredibly soft.

I even showed the footage to my wife and she thought the color reproduction and the overall softness was terrible! She mentioned that it looked like when I used to use a Canon ZR10 for filming my daughter. I had the XL1, The DVX100 (non a) and now this and so far something seems wrong! I have read the manual thoroughly and didn't miss anything obvious.

All of my footage has that lack of real color that your beach footage has. YOu mentinoed it was the time of day or whatever that actually caused that and I understand. But I have been in broad bright daylight and the colors just don;t Pop! And sometimes seem wrong.

Please advise....

Thanks

Since sound is 70% of what you see, what about the sound quality on the XL2 vs. the DVX?

Sound Quality and Low Light ( a newbie's thoughts )
 

Well, this is my first real camera, ( upgrading from a sony hi-8 ). I found the sound almost spooky! I was listening on headphones, and for lack of a better term, it almost sounds like surround sound.

The only downside however, is that I have to learn consideration for factors such as: "air conditioning". Normally your brain ignores such ambient sound. The XL2 considers it the soundtrack :-) And records it in all it's noisy glory.

One other note for guys like me, that are upgrading from older, or greatly inferior technology:
The low light performance of this camera is stunning. It reminds me of the first time I used an slr camera as opposed to the point and shoot type.

Barry,

You are being a big help posting that footage. Any chance you can post a DV clip without the QT stretch? I would love to see the raw 16:9 so I can get it to work in FCP properly.

Thanks.

Greg

<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Gipson : Since sound is 70% of what you see, what about the sound quality on the XL2 vs. the DVX? -->>>

WTF does that statement mean? I guess I could look it up, but sound is 0% of what you see :) Do deaf people have poor eyesight?

Our audio forum host, Grammy-award winner Douglas Spotted Eagle, has often been heard to say that audio makes up about 70% of the visual experience. According to him (and I'm inclined to believe him), sound is about 70% of what you see. Hope this helps,

Tony: it is just that sound adds a lot to the images we see.
Watch a movie without sound and it will quickly become quite
boring in most of the cases (yes, I know we had a silent era).

The most often complained things about in an indepedent movie
production is bad audio (#1) and camera instability (#2 on the list).

Nothing will make a good movie bad faster than bad audio. I personally feel that the thing that makes bad independent films stand out more than anything else is bad audio. I don't care if it looks like crap, well, I do, but a cheap dv camera shot movie, that has some great "in your face" sound and a killer sound track will do much better than a Varicam shot high budget thriller that has echo"y" audio and horrible soundeffects coupled by a sucky soundtrack.

Barry, was this shot with a PAL or NTSC camera? The Quicktime file looks like it must be PAL from my poor NTSC adapted eyes...

EDIT:

Also, If I understand correctly this is noraml 720x480 4:1:1 (5:1 compression) DV that has been stretched in post? It just seems remarkably detailed for such low resolution....

nice image but a bit short =). anyway i liked the sun glistening off of the ocean waters. the bird is very detailed. nice shots... but obviously we're hungry for more!! =).

Just back from a few scorching days in San Diego...Here are a few comments on my extended use of the camera, as well as responses to a few of your questions.

Lenses.. I had time to put the 3x and 16x manual lenses on the camera for a comparison with the new 20x. Not a scientific test, just real world stuff. The 20x looks superb next to the 16x...just as sharp, if not even better. The 3x footage was interesting...in autofocus mode, the 3x tends to lose focus when zooming. I think this was also a problem with my xl1s...but I haven't used it much, so I'm not sure. When set to manual focus, the 3x produces beautiful results...much better than what I remember from using it on the xl1, where everything always seemed a little soft.

Low light...I'm pretty impressed with what I'm seeing so far...in fact I shot some exterior dusk footage of buildings around the convention center and ballpark, at 1/60 sec, f 3.4 0-6db gain and it looked really nice...when I got back to the room only to realize that I had left my polarizer on the camera... meaning I had 1 2/3 stops less light coming in than I thought.

Manual focusing in 16:9 is getting easier all the time...I'm not having as much trouble with the cropped viewfinder as I thought I might.

Now some answers...

Marty--I'm not seeing any problems with color reproduction on this camera. The footage I posted was shot in some situations where there just wasn't any color. The still shots I posted show that the color saturation of the DVX and XL2 are in the same, very small, ballpark. On my trip, I had opportunity to shoot some more vibrant scenes...I will try to post some soon. Curious...your shots of the hawk in the tree (are they posted somewhere?)...Just a possibility...did you have the camera white balance on auto, and have the camera pointed at the tree for a while....this could have caused the AWB to try to neutralize the green...which would have made them look grey. Just guessing. I shot some stuff at the botanical garden...greens look great.

Aaron- my camera is an NTSC model.

Greg- The stretch was added only in preview. You should be able to open the file in QT...go to movie properties>video track>size>normal. This will return the preview to its un-stretched, native, proportions.

Barry

thx4 being a 'guinea pig' for the new XL2. we really appreciate you giving us tons of feedback so that a variety of us can decide whether or not to get the XL2 or upgrade from XL1s. we're very interested in the footages =P

Barry,

how would you compare the dynamic range (XL2 vs DVX100A) ?

I don't have an (A) model of the DVX for comparison, but the grabs I posted show that the first DVX and XL2 are almost identical at default in terms of dynamic range.(there is about a 1/6 stop exposure variation between the two shots which accounts for the differences in highlight detail between the two cameras....)

The only thing notable in this one comparison is that the DVX shadows seem shifted to the red, and the XL2 yellows are shifted red.

Barry

thanks for the info !

<<<-- Originally posted by Barry Goyette :
Greg- The stretch was added only in preview. You should be able to open the file in QT...go to movie properties>video track>size>normal. This will return the preview to its un-stretched, native, proportions.

Barry -->>>

Barry,

That did the trick. Now if I can get FCP to display the footage without insisting on rendering it. I think I'll post this in the Mac board.

Greg

Barry,

how about some stills from that ballpark, my dad said they did a real nice job with it! I lived a couple miles from there for fifteen years, my folks are still in that neighborhood above the airport. Thanks!

i just received mine in the mail today...
 

i have a question for all you XL2 owners... the glass piece in the viewfinder... does it seem a little loose to you all? it still operates like a dream... but the glass piece right inside the viewfinder is a little wobbly...

Mine rattles a little...I haven't gotten in there to see whats up with it yet...

Barry

its ALL GOOD...
 

i called customer service and told her about the Dioptircs and she checked all the other xl2s and said that it was designed that way....

btw... what's your custom settings looking like... what do you insist i do to obtain that "film" look...

thanks barry...

Kevin,

I haven't gotten that far yet...still trying to nail down the default "look"...usually I see some defect in the image that I'm trying to correct, and so far I'm not really seeing any problems, except for a slight red shift in the yellows...which I don't know if I can tune out with a preset....

Let us know if you come across any settings that work for you.

Barry

btw...thanks for checking on the viewfinder...I'm glad mine wiggles like everyone elses.

The diopter being loose is common on much more expensive cameras the the XL2.

Barry Goyette writes:
>>>>>>>>"which I don't know if I can tune out with a preset....
Let us know if you come across any settings that work for you."


Barry, there is always the separate COLOR MATRIX controls (normally found on professional external Camera Control Units) which allow for independent incremental adjustment of Red, Green and Blue. Obviously, an engineer comfortable with shading cameras with a vectorScope will admire this feature benefit. I do know that you have tremendous eyes and making a fine-tune color correction adjustment with the Color Matrix controls is entirely within your skillset.

Let me know when you are ready to swap XL2 Scene Settings with me ;-)

- don

Barry,

Thanks for the previous response. I do have one more question though, sorry for my lack of knowledge:

Did you uprez the XL2 image? I'm just curious because I compared it to some 720p material and it was larger (granted it looked slightly softer)! What exactly went into adapting this footage for viewing?

I'm just trying to decide if HD is that much higher rez....

Aaron

No, the footage is at native resolution (480x720)...shouldn't be larger than 720p(720x1280)...the only change I made was a QT preview "stretch" so that the footage would be seen in its proper aspect ratio. This can be removed by clicking normal in the movie properties>video track>size menu.

Barry

Qusetion for those who have used both the XL1s and XL2:

Is there really a significant difference between the two in weight? I only ask because I have heard several people mention the heaviness of the XL2 but B&H lists the XL2 at a lower weight than the XL1s!

Aaron,

yes the xl2 is significantly heavier...most of this is in the lens, but everything is a little bigger...the viewfinder, the body. Personally I find it a little harder to hold than the xl1s...(I think I'm the only one who ever liked the against-the-chest positioning of the xl1s).On the other hand the xl2's mass seems to stabilize it nicely. Despite its extra weight, the shoulder mount design makes it easy to get good handheld shots (certainly easier than the much lighter Gl2 or DVX100 with their true "handheld" designs).

Take a look at the new clip I posted. Note the stair shots...the daytime ones are on a tripod, the night shots are handheld...all at or about 20x zoom.

http://homepage.mac.com/barrygoyette/FileSharing16.html

Barry
............................................................

I've always liked heavy cameras...until I tried the light ones...

I did indeed see the new clip you posted Barry. Very impressive :).

I suppose B&H must be giving the body only weight... that's the only thing I can think of..

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to answer my many (and often naive) questions. Your support has been very helpful and I very much appreciate it.

the clip slowed down (frame-rate issues) in difference scenes. must've been the way it's been rendered or somn. ah well. good clip nonetheless. i like the fish in water shot. very crystal clear.

Audio Question
 

Barry, the audio on that clip sounded fairly crisp. Was that the on-board mic? I think it would work well for ambient sounds.

Greg

Greg

Yes...everything I've posted thus far is with the on board mic. Mostly with the audio levels set on auto. I shot a test interview last week, with a boomed shotgun and the sound was superb. As good as I can imagine from using an a camera as a sound capture device.

barry