Canon XL H1for my Cinema...
 

Hi Guys, I am pondering with my producer on the option of shooting a Feature on CanonXLH1 on HDV mode 16:9 24p Edit in HDV mode then final output is blownup to 35mm for theatrical release. We have cameraman who has been a Arri Camera Guy for years & has quite a few films to his credit, so we will keep a look for Good Lighting & other technical aspects of film making (also good script & casting etc) but we are quite unsure on how the out put will come out on 35mm SDcreen....

Any suggestions etc from ur past experiences etc will surely help us. Also we have Canon 16-35 2.8, 24-70 2.8, 70-200 2.8 lens would these lens add any value to our video quality if we use the EF adopter on the Camera lens mount ???

Thanks
Bankim jain

Hi Bankim,

Those Canon 35mm still photo lenses might not be all that useful to you. That's because the field of view on any of these lenses is magnified over seven times when you use them on the XL H1 with the EF adapter. So your 16-35mm photo lens on the XL H1 is going to give you a field of view equal to a 112-245mm focal length or higher. In other words, all 35mm still photo lenses with the EF adapter become extreme telephoto.

See my page at http://www.dvinfo.net/canonxl2/articles/article10.php -- I wrote it for the XL2 but the principles are exactly the same for the XL H1.

Whatever you do with the XL H1 it should look great on screen with a 35mm film transfer. Hope this helps,

Protect thine whites! In the same way that a film neg will wash away all the darks (making protecting your darks very important in film), you will want to protect your whites in digital as they will clip above 100%. contrast range is narrower (although seems better in HD than DV) than film, so watch your framing and set design/costuming to minimize the white to black spread. Direct it like film...I let the cameras roll on my last piece and I'm digging through mountains of footage now...about a 10:1 shooting ratio - ouch. But hey, tape is cheap!

Thanx...
 

thx a Lot for the info. I also wish to know what is the rough pricing per minite transfer from HDV to 35mm. I am doing the project i9n India so wish to compare the pricing elsewhere offhand roughly.

Cris I read more on the P+s mini35 adopteron your site & was wondering how mush the diff in temrs of quality will it outcome whren i use stock 20x lens against the cine prime with a P+S mini35. Will the DoF be less when i use mini35 against the stock 20x lens ? or is there any way around to get shallow DoF thru the 20x stock lens ???


I will do a test shoot & later test blowup for my eye to eye test ...

Thx
Bankim

shallow DoF on a small format camera is acheived by getting painfully close to your subject or by getting far away and zooming in. With enough space between your subject and the background, the background will be pulled closer that the area whose out of focusness would be hidden by the pixel density of the ccd will be glaringly obvious as it is enlarged by the zoom. This will flatten the image a bit, but gets a nice effect. I used this in the movie I'm currently posting, works like a champ, but the leaves a block away from the actors in the end up the size of the actors' heads. You will never get real shallow DoF with a small format camera (the XL1s is about an 8mm camera). but you can cheat it :)

my riverside park shots are the ones I used this technique for...you can see the camera setups in the BTS photos and the teaser has that footage in it.

You can get a very shallow DoF with the stock Canon 20x lens if you shoot at the telephoto half of the zoom range. But this isn't always a practical thing to do, see http://www.dvinfo.net/articles/optics/dofskinny.php for an explanation.

The P+S Technik Mini35 will let you use 35mm motion picture lenses and it preserves their focal length and shallow depth of field properties, but you're looking at the expense of the Mini35 plus the various lenses. For some folks this is a rental proposition.

Hi Chris
 

Hi, I read the Article where the JVC HD100 was evaluated during NAB. Now i have a very big Confusion. what to go for Canon H1 or JVC HD100 its like 1080 vs 720... also i havent got a good hands opn exp when i bought my JVCGYd5000(i had to sell it in a year) so far so good I havent heard any thing good on JVC equipment where as Canon is quite know for its semni pro Xl series etc. Now I wish to know what should be the best chpice for me esp when i will shoot a full feature 3hour mopvie to be blowup to 35mm after shoot/editing etc on HDV formatte. Also I would go widescreen & when i went thru the broucher of h1 I was bogglled by various screen size ratios... i am not able to make up my mind. since i dont have either unit available in market so i will do my net recce & then make my buying decision or even a rental including the mini35 (& lens ofcource).

Thanks for the insight so far,
bankim.jain@gmail.com

Hi Bankim,

There are a variety of significant differences between the XL H1 and the HD100, but the single most important difference is that of image size. The XL H1 produces a 1080 interlaced image, the HD100 produces a 720 progressive image. You have to make that decision yourself, as to whether you need 1080i or 720p. And yes both cameras are native widescreen 16:9.

I've made a comparison chart here:

http://www.hdvinfo.net/articles/jvcp...omparexlh1.php

...which gives you a side-by-side comparison of features between the XL H1 and the HD100. Hope this helps,

Chris, your articles are invaluable and your efforts are greatly appreciated. Thanks for continuing to serve the XL community.

Thanks Steven. Much appreciated. DV Info Net started life as a Canon XL message board back in 2001. I can never forget where my roots are. Other parts of DV Info Net are more popular now but my heart still belongs to the XL and probably always will.

I hear you brother...I am now a convert :)

Hi
 

Chris, Pl pardon my ignorance on the subject as I am quite new to the HDV arena & am not very clear on the diff between Progressive & interlaced scans.
I presume that Progressive is like each frame is individual image with no two fields in it like what we in ordinary videos.
Interlaced is much like have Two fields in One Frame.

Going by what i feel that if i use HD100's Progressive scan than it shall be much close to the 24p film motion when I go for 35mm Reverse telecine for my intended feature.

I look for critisim or correction.

My sole aim is to buy one piece & head for my shoot & then hit for a reverse telecine for a 35mm blowup.

Thanks for the wonderfull links & tons of info you have wtitten ... !

You'll also want to keep in mind that shooting in interlaced mode means the image will have to be deinterlaced for the film-out, losing resolution.

The HD100 or the HVX200 may be better options

Hi Bankim,

Don't forget the Frame mode on the XL H1. It gives you 24fps and 30fps and it works just like progressive scan. Most people, myself included, can't tell the difference between native progressive and Frame mode. So it is possible to have the best of both worlds with the XL H1.

Progessive and Frame are two different things but they deliver very similar results. Although they are different, they are not all *that* different. Other feature set differences between the XL H1 and the HD100 will have much more of an impact upon you than the very subtle differences between progessive scan and Frame mode. You can get a very nice 35mm film transfer from Frame mode.