Can my old handicam be better than my XL2??
 

Tonight I was watching a DVD on the television that had footage from my 6 month old XL2 which I love... and then it also had some footage from my panasonic PV-GS250... which is great too... but I was noticing that my shots with the Canon were very pixelated... but on the computer they appear very clear.. I think... where as the panasonic shots look great on the TV... I have been shooting in Tv mode 1/100 or 1/250... and using +-0 Gain and setting the white balance per sunlight... also not using any CP's.... this may be a post production question not sure... but any thoughts? I may not have my camera dialed in yet... shooting on the open ocean always.

any help would be great! thanks!
Matt

Hi Matt,
Were the xl2 and panasonic footage edited at the same time?
Were they on the same timeline and output to dvd at the same time? with the same compression settings? the reason I ask is if they were done at different times you may have saved them at different compression ratios. Could this have happened?
Just seems strange that one lot of video will look pixelated and the other OK.
and also effects! were any added? just some thoughts!
James

they were in the same timeline, and put on the same dvd together... but after watching again last night... I think the TV isn't that great, because I watched the same DVD on a huge tv about a month ago, and everything looked great... the second thing is the panasonic is now only used for underwater stuff... and the xl2 is for surface... and last night when I paused a surface shot... the water was pixelated... and when you watch underwater it doesn't appear to be so but when you pause it, it actually is as well... I also made a new DVD using different settings...

maybe it's the dvd player itself because when I look at my canon stuff on the computer its as clear as can be... so maybe it's about getting that same image to translate on DVd with less than good players and tvs????

All sorts of possibilities why the panny might look better. Here are some:

1. You shot the XL2 in 4:3 aspect ratio. Causes a significant decrease in quality becase you're only using part of the CCDs.

2. You shot the XL2 in 16:9 but in order to get the panny and the Cannon on the same timeline you had to blow up the 16:9 images to get rid of the letterboxing. Magnification causes decrease in quality.

3. You shot the XL2 in 24p and then put the footage into the panny's 60i timeline and you lost quality in the conversion.

4. You shot the XL2 in very low light, or with the gain turned up.

5. You used a codec in compressing for DVD that favored the panny for reasons that are unclear.

6. You ran filters on the XL2 footage and the rendering software didn't work right.

Any of these possible?

Douglas

They were both shot in 30p... both 16:9...

I'm using Adobe Premiere Pro...

The only thing I can think is that it's the DVD player or the TV I've been watching it on... or maybe it's the way I'm transcoding?

Everything looks great on my computer... but when it goes to the tv it's really grainy...

If it looks good on the computer and not the TV, then yes, clearly this is an editorial level problem not a camera issue. I don't know about Premiere but in FCP you need to set up the correct presets for the sequence before you edit clips into it. If the presets are wrong then it will screw up your footage. That's one possibility.

The second is that there is come compression issue.

Either way, a Premiere Pro BBS might be more useful in troubleshooting this problem than an XL2 board.

Douglas

thanks for the advice... yea, I wanted to start at the camera...which I was sure it wasn't... but the guy I'm working with keeps saying " I can tell your old stuff (old camera) because it looks better"... but I KNOW that my XL2 is much more clear and better quality because you can see it on the computer... but yea, when it gets to TV there's something going on... so I've posted on the Premiere board... so maybe there will be some answers there...

thanks everyone for the help!