2 Camera Problem
 

I have to shoot a college opera tonight. I have an XL2 and XL1s. One camera will be positioned at the back of the theatre (75 feet) to get a full-stage "master shot" of the show. The other camera will be used backstage to finish up a documentary on the production that has been shot 16:9/24p with the XL2. The question is which camera should be used for what purpose.

The long shot is required becuase an organization that has provided funds for the show needs a video of the production to complete the grant.

My inclination is to use the XL1s for the long wide shot becuase it won't be very good or usable for the documentary and go backstage with the XL2. My assumption is that any resolution differences between the two cameras will effectively washed out, if I do intercut XL2 and XL1s footage, because the long shot is so long and wide. I assume differences between the cameras would be more obvious intercutting XL1s closeups with XL2 closeups.

Am I making the right choice? Opinions? Anyone with experience intercutting XL2 and XL1s footage?

When you say "finish up a documentary that has been shot 16:9 24p with the xl2" This sounds like there has already been a documentary shot and you job is to get some other shots to finish the documentary is that correct?.

If so then you should definitely use the xl2 for the documentary shots so it ties in with the other footage and leave the xl1s locked off for the wide shots of the show.

Bare in mind the xl1s can only shoot interlaced, if its locked off its fine but if it moves you would have to run the footage through a program like DVfilm maker to deinterlace it which would give it the progressive look so it ties in with the xl2 progressive footage.

Andy

You've got the idea exactly Andy. I've shot about 18 hours with the cast in rehersal with the XL2.

Thanks for the reaction and advice.

"Bare in mind the xl1s can only shoot interlaced...."

Maybe I have misunderstood the above statement.

The Canon XL1s can shoot in "Frame Mode" which, in my opinion, would be better if you are attempting to match 24p mode XL2 footage.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

Your right the xl1s does have frame mode but i found it so motion blurry that for me it was a non option. Iv'e owned one for years and i guess I just consider it to be an interlaced camera which has a dodgy movie look mode (IMHO) that I turned on for some tests when i got it but didn't like it.

I've never used an xl2 so i don't know what the progressive footage looks like but with my new HD100e there is a huge diffirence in the motion blurr between the dv 25p and the HDV 25p, the dv 25p has alot more motion blurr.

So my point is if you cut the xl2 footage with the xl1s in frame mode the xl1s might have alot more motion blurr than the xl2, and that would be recorded to tape where as if you used DVfilm maker or similar program on the interlaced footage from the xl1s it is non distructive and you still have your origional material

The fact that i consider the xl1s as being only able to shoot interlaced is an old habit because i don't consider the movie mode to be useable (just my opinion)

Anyway if you decide to use movie mode to cut with the xl2 i suggest testing it out first to make sure there is no drastic diffirence in motion blurr (which i imagine there will be)

Andy

I woudn't exactly call it motion blur. You are capturing 30 full frames as opposed to 60 interlaced fields per second. You should see a more strobe-like appearance in 30P. If the motion is too blurry, then increasing shutter speed will clean it up. I have shot projects on the XL1 in frame mode and with a higher shutter speed(1/250), you can get cleaner frame grabs for DVD cover art, etc. by going that route. In faced, interlaced scanning is meant to create smoother apparent motion by increasing the 'sampling' of motion within a 1 second time period at the expense of only half the frame in each sample.

-gb-