Mixing 720p & 1080i
 

I shoot almost exclusively interviews with an HD100 but may be needing to augment my next job w/ interior shots that I know the HD100 won't handle well because the lighting won't be great. Ordinarily I would just use my PD150 and keep the project SD, but this project I want all HDV. I've heard the Z1 is better in low light. How bad would it be to have my b-roll footage in 1080i and cut it into a 720p sequence (FCP)? Are there other 720p HDV cameras out there that are as good as the Z1 in low light (if that is truly the case)? Would it be worse to rent a SD wide screen camera and cut it into my 720p sequence?

Thanks.

You would have to covert all the 1080i footage into 720P. This can be done with the free program MPEG STREAMCLIP.

There isn't really much difference, and frankly if you adjust the gamma you can get amazing low-light results out of the HD100. It isn't really worth the hassle or sacrifice of interlace just to get an extra 1/3rd stop.

That's good to know. Are there any specific settings you would recomend? Thanks.

Tim, I used your low light setting and it works very well. Just shooting around my house on an overcast morning, I'm very pleased with the results. I boosted the gain which helped in some darker areas, but it wasn't really necessary for the most part. I'm set. Great advice, as always. Thanks.