Mini DV tapes Sony Excellence
 

Does anyone use the more expensive Sony Excellence tapes for doing weddings? If so is the picture any better than the typical mini dv tape?

Thanks,

Jeff

Nobody in the game of football should be called a genius. A genius is somebody like Norman Einstein.
Joe Theismann, Former quarterback

There's an area on DVinfo.net for discussion concerning tape. To give you the short answer about video quality, no, the quality of the video is exactly the same. It's a digital recording, that is transferred, bit for bit, to your computer for editing, exactly as it was recorded. The only way that the quality of the video is affected, is if you get dropouts (where the recorded information is corrupted on the tape). Higher quality tapes will result in fewer dropouts.

They are all I use. I hate dropouts and the cost is a no brainer for me.

Mike

Sony Excellence are all I use as well. They won't award you any better image quality. It's supposed to be a higher grade tape stock, though many people don't believe the extra price is justified. I, personally, don't know...it's all I ever used and have been happy with their durablility.

I use them in my XL2 for the simple reason that I want to illiminate as many problems as possible.If the price is double that of a regular tapes but the chances of drop outs are 25% less,then the extra cost is well justified.Who wants to risk wasting time and setup costs if the risk can be minamised by spending a few extra dollars.

I'm going with Panny MQs. From what I've been able to gather, they should provide just as good performance as any other premium tape (avoiding dropouts), and perhaps result in less head wear, at an attractive price. It is difficult to find any hard data on miniDV tapes, and I won't assume that something is better because the price is higher (way to often, that is not the case, and the opposite can often be true just as well).