I always try to keep this question in my mind: If I could buy a camera, any camera right now - which one would it be? In my line of work (government), I never know when money will become available. Sometimes I need to put together a quote in the same day in order to catch year-end money before its gone.

If I had to buy a camera today, it would be the FX1. If I could wait until the Feb.-April timeline, it would be the Z1. Even if I had $30,000US, I would buy 2 and all the accessories I could muster, and almost certainly the edit deck.

Having HD resolutions at a DV price and form factor is simply too much of a reason to look at any other camera in this price range, IMO. Your footage is more future-proofed being HD. You can offer an advanced service to clients. You can blow-up and reframe your footage at SD resolutions without sacrificing quality. You can split the footage into fields and have 60fps shooting in SD, again without taking a quality hit. What's not to like about this camera? I just don't see the XL2 as being anything more than a stopgap measure, perhaps for a year or 3. You could very well be shooting with the FX1 for the next 5 or 6 years.

FWIW, my last 2 "buy it today" cameras were the DVX-100a and the PD-150. I also flirted with the HD-10 until I discovered the complete lack of manual control. I just point this out to show that I'm brand-agnostic. If the XL2 had been HDV, it would be in close competition for #1. One of my current cameras is a big DSR-300 DVCam, with a really, really good Canon glass. I would still pick the FX1.

<<<-- Originally posted by Bob Harotunian :
Some people talk about future proofing by using an FX1 for SD movies now and using the tape resource for HD production later. I don't buy that since I can't see clients paying for 2 edits.

Of course not, you don't do 2 edits.. you edit in HD and archive it. From your HD edit, you create a widescreen DVD for viewing today.

Absolutely right, Mike -- when Sony announced the Z1U, that's exactly the workflow they proposed for those who need to transition from SD to HDV.

I would really be intrested in the Z1U but mostly because of it's ability to shoot both NTSC and PAL and do it in native 16:9. I don't know where the whole HDV thing is going yet but that would not be my primary reason for purchasing this camera which is why the FX1 holds NO interest for me. I think it's still a little early.

"Of course not, you don't do 2 edits.. you edit in HD and archive it. From your HD edit, you create a widescreen DVD for viewing today."

Thanks, that was a piece of info I was missing. Still a bit foggy on how this will all fit together. So I assume then that you can edit in HD but still deliver an SD DVD. Considering Premiere for example, you'd need software upgrades to the presets for HD capture and mpeg exports?
Bob

<< Considering Premiere for example, you'd need software
upgrades to the presets for HD capture and mpeg exports? >>

Well, you'll need the Aspect HD accelerator from CineForm, but you're in the right place for that: see our dedicated CineForm forum, and their CTO, David Newman, is one of our regular members here.

<<<-- Originally posted by Dave Campbell : Chris, where did you see the comment from focus?
Will it be a new product, or can their existing stuff have a firmware
upgrade? -->>>

Dave: the last news on this still is in the following thread:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...threadid=24677

Which is a bit old. You can start a new thread in that forum if you
want or contact them directly, ofcourse.

Thanks, started a new thread.

Dave