Getting back to the Conversation....
 

I too think the F-350 is a great camera. Excellent post workflow with those next proxies for making offline edits. Overall, the camera is better then I would have expected and I am excited for another shoot with the XDCAM HD. But- you have sorta derailed this particular thread a bit. If the XDCAM has a 2/3" sensor and was the same price as the 350, then there may be some merit to your argument. Maybe. 2/3" CCD's matched with Digiprimes or Fujinons, Canons, wide open at T1.6 will generate a DOF equivalent to T2.8/4 split in 35mm Cinema Cameras, assuming the FOV of both the 2/3" lens and 35mm lens had identical FOV. But even if this was a reality, I do not see the cost of the 2/3" camera being in the same realm as the 1/3" camera. We're talking about apples and oranges here. 1/3" HD with 35mm Lens adapters are something in a class of their own. Sure, the 350 has shallow DOF as you "verified." But lets not go overboard here Paolo: Every time I use 1/3 or 1/2 inch sensors with ANY lens attached (even a 2/3 inch lens using an adapter), and I am trying to generate nice falloff in the background to pull out the subject that I am shooting (shallow DOF) I am ALWAYS forced to not only shoot wide open, but drag the camera away from the subject really far and zoom way in to the end of the barrel, and only do such a thing if I am using an excellent tripod head. Sometimes even the best tripod head is still not something that should be moved with extreme caution as ANY movement is magnified 100 fold.

So no, I'm sorry but the F350 XDCAM is not really an alternative to shooting drama with 1/3inch HD and 35mm Lens adapters (assuming you know what you are doing). This is from a fiscal and practical standpoint.

And I'm a bit unclear about grouping the shallow DOF shots together and renting for a weekend??? Productions are all over the place, and the some last one day, some last a week, months, whatever. Directors want all sorts of things at any given time, and a production in mid-stream is a moving train that has little patience for these groupings of shot changes that you mentioned. It's all about moving fast and getting into a rhythm. So I am totally baffled about your statement there.

In any event, the point of this thread was how best to use 1/3inch HD with lens adapters and 35mm lenses, and then how best to deal with the content in production and post, and finally, how best to output the final project to a UNIVERSAL standard such as HDCAM, DIGIBETA, BETASP, etc for clients, broadcast, and film festival delivery. There are alot of people on this list who are interested in this (I think) so lets try to keep the post on THIS THREAD relevant to the thread itself.

I will post a couple emails that have been written in the past few days as they are pretty interesting and will hopefully get this thread back up on it's feet.

All the Best, Taylor

Sorry, at DV Info Net we have a policy against posting private emails for public display. Thanks in advance for understanding,

10-4, no problem Chris.

Final Version of Music Video
 

http://www.collectiveent.com/UUDOWN_webQt.mov

Level 3 post has the beta version of the firmware that will allow for the Miranda HD Bridge Dec+ to uprezz to 1080PsF 24 HDCAM from the conformed 720p mpeg stream. Without this firmware upgrade, the GOP structure will create hiccups in for the Miranda and you will drive yourself crazy trying to figure out what the hell is going on. I will post the firmware version number asap, because it's imperative if you are going to use the HD Bridge.

HD100 content looks great at 1920x1080..... yikes!

Native file for download (40mb total)
 

Exported from FCP using QT movie, make move self-contained. RT 10 seconds.

http://www.447productions.com/720p24HDV.mov

http://447productions.com/AIC.mov

This is the first NATIVE file that I have put online of the HD100/M2, and it's the first 10 seconds of the music video. 40mb total. I can also upload the ungraded file as well but in general, I want people to come to their own conclusions regarding the quality of the setup as seen in it's native size, framerate, Codec, etc. Otherwise, everything looks pretty good or pretty bad when you apply compression for the web or show things small.

No sharpening tools have been used. The only tools in FCP were the 3 way Color Corrector and the waveform to bring the whites that were btw 100-110% back down just a few notches to just below 100% in some cases in this clip. I was surprised at what I could recover in the whites, and happy with the look of the grade overall. The image did not seem to "fall apart" as we had anticipated b/c we did not export to another codec.

As far as I can see, there are no lens abberations or other odd things that I am aware of. I used this clip because the focus does not rack and it allows you too look all around the edges of the frame for edge to edge sharpness. The suitcases and skirt have nice edges to help see if the sharpness is acceptable.

NEW native file. DOF a plenty!
 

http://www.447productions.com/master_50mm.mov

10 seconds, 1280x720, 23.98
codec: AIC

50mm Nikon. No CC in post. Cir Pol, .6 ND Grad on camera.

Thanks Taylor, the problem is that Windows users aren't able to read the AIC codec within Quicktime (it's a Mac Os specific one)... Wouldn't be possible to post the footage as m2t, or something more standard please ?

Thanks,

Kristin

800x450, h264, deep DOF
 

hey kristen- a full res h264 looked not so good. i think i need to fiddle and find the right bit rate perhaps. for now, here you go. reasonable sized h264 qt, 19mb, rt 1min

http://447productions.com/50mm_f4.mov

same setup, general idea of showing this clip is that it's not all about SHALLOW DOF and you can shoot for the story rather then for the neat device you have. it's great to use selective focus when needed and not to draw attention to itself.... i think..... '-0

Thanks Taylor ! This clip is really great, you're totally right about dof ! I think it's a common mistake to shoot everything wide open...

Kristin

No adapters, just what comes in the box works too.
 

no cc, no adapters, no on camera filters, no cinegamma. you can definately shoot some nice stuff with or without adapters so what comes in the box is fine. this demo could USE some grading, but thats another day i guess. and h264 is absolutely amazing! download MpegStreamclip from the Squared5 website too. works great, IMOP.

http://447productions.com/720p24HDV_h264.mov

Nice. Was it shoot with the 16x? Are any of those shots done with the lens fully wide? What was the F-stop ball park? Looks great!

Another Split Screen/Showreel Article Published
 

http://447productions.com/ColorCorrection720p24HDV.mov (h264, 630x360)

I have no idea how this can be possible. Thought I would try to take something completely clipped and see if I could pull any information out of it, just for fun. 3 way color corrector in FCP is all that was used.

HD100, 24p HDV, stock lens, white clip 108%, Knee 85%. Original 20min clip was shot normal and intended to be a timelapse to be done in post. In this case, just took a little peice and also sped up clip 250% so you could see clouds moving faster....... same exact clip on both sides of screen. Not at all implying shoot overexposed, but just wanted to show this split screen because it's kinda odd, if that is the right word.

Michael: The last group of shots you asked about were shot with the stock fujinon (i suppose it's 16x). Lens was all over the place. Iris wide open, closed down to 11, long end of barrel, short end of barrel..... etc.... wanted to push the lens and camera mostly in that set of shots.
-------------
FWIW: The Showreel Peice has been published and is 8 pages. I am trying to get Steve Parker to have it downloadable and so I will work on that and get you a link asap.

Hey Taylor, thanks very much for that post. I am planning an HDV project and have been worried about latitude. In the past I have worked with DV that was extensively graded, so have a big appreciation of what a good grade can do, but was worried that the increased amount of pixels and higher encoding on HDV would seriously affect latitude in post. It's good to see an example of roughly at what point information gets completely lost (looking at the bottom of the screen where the sun is brightest you can see the clearly defined edge where the information loss begins.)

A quick question, the power lines on the very right of screen have pretty extreme purple and green edging. Was this on the original footage or is this some sort of compression artifact from the compression to the web?

Great video Taylor, very impressive. How do you shoot handheld stuff with the hd100 with the image flipped? I have the new hd201 and am in love with the built in image flip! I can finally shoot 35mm stuff using the viewfinder.

Showreel Article (JVC/M2/Nikon in Production)
 

Hello- The latest edition of Showreel Magazine includes the 8 page article (Part 1). The magazine should be mailboxes this week for US subscribers. Part 2 will focus on the post production circus we went through to deliver onto HDCAM at 1080PsF24 from our original captured 720p24HDV content.

The first link is a freeview and if you go there, you will find more freeview articles that you may find interesting. The magazines are dense and not sure the subscription price. Very worth it. www.Showreel.org

The 2nd link is a PDF of the printed article. If you DO download the PDF, please email the link to a friend rather then emailing the downloaded PDF so downloaded 'stats' can be accurately generated. (if you were wondering: the pdf is on my ftp server because my server provides very elaborate stats. I want to show the publisher why he should switch server providers....fwiw)

http://www.showreel.org/memberarea/article.php?242 (text only)

http://447productions.com/M2.pdf (PDF of actual article)