AG-HMC-150, XH-A1 or HDR FX-1000?
 

It's good to be back. This is my 1st post since the mid 2005s.
I'm returning to the game & looking to purchase AG-HMC-150, XH-A1 or HDR FX-1000 for wedding videos. Looking at B&H pricing, all three camcorders are similar in price (they're closing out the XH-A1 for the XH-A1s so the best deal is on the XH-A1 for now).
My last HDV was a Sony HVR Z1 which wasn't so good in low light, which is a concern as I mostly do weddings & need good low light performance. I've been reading but haven't seen much on the HMC 150s low light capture other than it's OK. There are some screen shots comparing the HMC150 to XH-A1, which the 150 looks slightly better. And, I also found a comparison of the XH A1 to the FX 1000, which the FX1000 was a clear winner.
But, the HMC150 is 1920x1080 not HDV 1440x1080.
I'm aware of AVCHD editing needs (CPU & such) but I'm not concerned.
Although the FX1000 doesn't have XLRs, I do have an XLR adapter from my TRV 900 days that should work.
So, given all that, is there a clear choice between the 3?
All advice is appreciated.

Fx 1000
 

Hi George

I'm also an ex TRV900 boy and also did weddings and used an XLR box.

I have just bought a FX1000 and have only filmed a dual camera dance shoot (yet to edit) and a game of cricket (Aussie baseball game) For tripod work it is absolutely fantastic but for handheld its pretty heavy. An appropiate L bracket would be a must get.

My real concern at the minute is the results in Standard definition as most of my work goes to DVD. SD just seems a bit fuzzy and not as sharp as other cam even the TRV900.

I am doing a test tomorrow using the same tape in SD with the FX1000 up against the VX2000.

HD footage is sensational but lets face it unless one is going to BLuray or broadcaser TV there is little point in HD.

Watch this space.

George,
The HMC150 is a great Event cam, it's lighter and better balanced than the others. Low light capture on the HMC is from my experience, much better than "OK". it's very, very good. I have shot a coupe events at night with it, and it really shines in adverse lighting--at least so far, at an indoor concert and soccer game shot at night.

The real difference will be in its not being tape-based, it can do 720/60p for some very clean slow motion work, and it handles motion better (MPEG2 vs. MPEG4).

Rent the candidates, test them yourself, then pick what works best for you. That's the best way to get a handle on it.

Those are recording format specs, and don't necessarily reflect the resolution of the camera as a whole. In the case of the HMC150, the chips are 960x540, but pixel shifting makes it effectively around 1200x650 for luminance. That's not bad, but it isn't 1920x1080 overall.

The EX cameras are top of the quality tree for under $5,000, but they are more expensive than such as the 150. I'd look long and hard at the new JVC that's just been announced, which is expected to compete head on with the 150 for price. The main advantage it seems to offer over the 150 is using the same codec as the EX, rather than AVC-HD. That should be much easier to edit and not need transcoding as AVC-HD generally does.

But it has 1/4 inch chips.

Martin,
I've shot video with a HVR-Z1 in HD, then down rez'd in post to SD. The best part was I could re-frame whenever needed for tighter framed or zoom effect without degrading the PQ. Might be worth a try!
The test vs the VX1000s sharpness should be interesting. The VX is on of the best for low light.
I see HD as the future. I know not all clients are in it yet, but it's still a must. Many blu-ray players will play AVCHD DVDs disc burned with a PC (not sure about Macs).
Thanks for the help!

I hadn't thought of renting. Could work out best.
Good to hear that it's very good in low light. I have owned a DVX100 which looks very similar to the HMC150 but without tape. The DVX was great in low light!
Thanks.

There seems t0 be a few ex-TRV900 guys here and I'm another one of them. The reason I stayed with Sony was because I just loved the 900 and my carry-over battery mountain took me through the VX2000 and now the Z1. Along with the Beachtek box.

I used a big hefty L bracket for a few years Martin. Great for the hand-held fluidity I wanted as I moved around and between the wedding guests, but a bit of a pain when it came to quickly snapping it on an off the Manfrotto 503.

I've had my Z1 three years now. It's not let me down and never once failed to bring home the goods, whatever the lighting situations we've been in. Changing to another camera that's (say) a stop better in the gloom is neither here or there in the great big scheme of things, as the nut behind the shutter is far more important than what's clasped between your palms.

tom.

H...M...C

Hands down!

George:

I have only had the HMC-150 and XH-A1 and can comment on those.

Rating for low light:
#1 HMC-150
#2 XH-A1
The 150 has less and better looking noise. Color grading low light footage also works better for the 150 footage for some reason.

Rating for overall PQ when downrezzed to SD on DVD:
#1 HMC-150
#2 XH-A1
This is where the camera and codec really shine over the XH-A1. Shimmering, strobing, flashing and motion artifacts are much better with the 150. We have to realize, neither camera is bad, but the 150 is better. Note that the 150 does not record SD, but the XH-A1 does, although I never tried it.

I think you should consider the FX1000 or the HMC-150. You want solid state or tape recording?

As for sound, can you get away without XLR on camera? The camera could record from the wireless on the mini plug to one channel and use the on camera mic for the ambient. I don't see a need for XLR on camera except to power a big phantom mic on camera thats going to give you ambient. Do you really need ambient off a $600 on camera mic?

As for the new JVC camera, I wouldn't even consider a 1/4" sensor block camera, and I have & still like JVC cameras. The 1/3" sensor block cameras are pushing the resolution to sensitivity barrier as it is. A 1/2" camera like the EX-1 would be great, except for the cost, CMOS and weight.

Jeff,
This is very helpful as you can make a true A-B comparison.
The FX1000 & HMC150 are in play.
To get setup, the FX has a big price advantage as I do have a BeachTek XLR adapter (I do have wireless mics & would need an XLR input for them) & LANC for my tripod; I'd need a Varizoom for the 150 as well as some large SDHC memory & those aren't cheap.
As far as mpeg2 vs H.264, & this is IMHO, I think H.264 is much better. I say this because I own a blu-ray player & there's no comparison in PQ between the 2; I've seen far more artifacts with mpeg2 movies than those encoded with H.264 or even VC-1.
I've read some of the release info on the new JVC but saw the 1/4" chips & lost interest.
Thanks

Me too - but only from a dof pov. At least they're CCD aren't they? Jeff's line, 'the EX-1 would be great, except for the cost, CMOS and weight.' is something I go along with except that cost is only money and weight is neither here or there - we're all strong men. But CMOS is rolling shutter and there's no way round its flash issue as yet.

tom.

With respect to the cost of SDHC cards, yeah the Panasonic 32GB cards at $273 or so and $89 for their 16GB card at B&H.....however, I did pick up a couple 16GB cards class 6, ("Patriot" brand) from Frys for $30 each, and they are great. There are ways to get good values in SDHC cards.
But the real thing to me is how fast I am actually saving a ton of $$$ in not having to buy tapes. I was using Sony Digital Masters for client work, at $14 each, or Premiums at $2.10 each. It adds up! Now I don't have that problem.

But how do you store your masters or your raw footage? Tape still is a super-reliable, dirt-cheap and very compact method of storing your work.

Tom:

Hard drives are about $0.09 per GB and tapes are $0.80 GB and up ($10 bucks + for a good tape). Since AVCHD has a smaller footprint, there is also a little savings there too.

In my case, I have lots of tapes from both my old DV camera and the XH-A1s that are useless since I sold the cameras. I did capture all my family XH-A1 tape to hard drive before I got rid of them. That was painful.

It just took me getting used to having a BU hard drive system for storing my raw and finished products. As a bonus, I am regularly backing up all my other files and photos on a much more regular basis.

I also never delete the files from the SDHC cards until the project is delivered as yet another safety. Cards are currently $13 for 8GB and $35 for 16GB, so they are not yet as cheap as tapes, but they will be soon.

George:

I use the Sennheiser for wireless. It has a XLR and a mini plug cable for the reciever. Does your wireless reciever have an option for a mini plug cable?

Getting a zoom controller and the excellent focus/iris controller for the HMC-150 is pretty expensive. Cost wise, those controllers (maybe it's all in one for the Sony?) are probably a lot less for the Sony.

I don't think you can draw conclusions about the codecs for camera use on the basis of Blu-Ray discs. The former need to be done in near real time, the latter don't, and would normally be done with a least two coding passes in much longer than real time. For coders that can get the most out of the system, there's no doubt that H.264 will give better results *at the same bitrate* than MPEG2, but for near real time coders in relatively cheap cameras I don't think H.264 will get anything like as much out of the system as it's theoretically capable of.

The drawback to H.264 is that it requires a lot of power for native editing, and realistically needs transcoding for editing. Absolute quality will depend not just on codec but bitrate as well - high datarate MPEG2 will be much better than a lower rate H.264.

For professional use it may be more appropiate to use MPEG2 at a higher bitrate than H.264, it will give the same quality but be far easier to edit. The downside is higher file sizes.

My BeachTek is a model DXA-4S which was recommended when we were doing all TRV900 shoots that only had a stereo mini mic input; no XLRs. The BeachTek worked fine so long as it was grounded properly. It has an AUX input, which I've never tried, switchable Stereo/Mono & separate Line/Mic switches. My wireless mics are made by Samson.
A Varizoom for the HMC would cost $240 min as it controls Zoom/Focus & Iris Control. I do have a LANC controller that would be compatible with the FX1000. It's from an old Sony tripod that was used with the TRV900. The LANC was built into the tripod's handle so I removed the handle & inserted it in a heftier Bogen tripod & used it with the HVR-Z1.

Tom,
I still have DV masters (raw) from wedding shot 8 years ago. I also have their final edit DVDs in case something happens to their DVD.
But, what's wrong with archiving the AVCHD masters (raw, unedited) to BD for storage or just the final edit of the BD or DVD? I guess I'm not seeing a difference so long as everything is backed up.
George

David, there are still real differences in how the two codecs process the signal, and handle motion, for example. AVCHD continues to enjoy the advantage there, even with higher bit rate MPEG2, because frame prediction methods are different, etc.

The real advantages of MPEG2 over AVCHD are only in the number of available cameras that support HDV/MPEG2 and the current ease of editing.

But that scene is changing every day. A year from now--maybe even 6 months--I doubt ease of editing AVCHD will be much of an issue. There will doubtless be a boatload of solutions out by then that will likely make editing MPEG4 about as simple a matter as editing MPEG2. Remember all the gyrations we all went through when first sorting out how to edit HDV?

Tom, you are quite right about the ease with which tapes can be archieved.

I transcode the AVCHD file to DVCProHD using the Main Concept transcoder from Panasonic's site. I can then copy the transcoded file to a backup drive with little trouble and be secure in the knowledge that my my original files are backed up.

Once edited, I will have to treat it much as I do HDV, where I back up to external drives plus burn a master copy to DVD, or BD.

That means for each project I shoot I will have my original Premiere Pro project file, a copy of it on a backup drive, and a copy on BD.

Not nearly as clean and simple as SD on tape, but what is? It should be workable.

Hard drives are getting cheaper than tape, but not by much (depending on your tapes) and the latter is arguably more reliable. I still have all my master tapes from the past ten years and am confident I could recapture video from most of them; the number of hard drives I've had fail during that period is sobering. With today's tape cameras you can record an hour of video for a few bucks and have your permanent archive as soon as you're done recording, plus record simultaneously to solid state or an HDD recorder if you have the right camera and accessories. With a solid-state only camera you have to take time to archive the data and sustain that archive indefinitely - for which the most reliable option may be a DLT tape! Plus you may need to transcode the footage to a less compressed format for effective editing, which reportedly takes longer than capturing footage from tape.

The biggest benefit I can see for today's solid state cameras is longer continuous record times compared to miniDV tape; other than that they're just trading one set of workflow issues for different ones.

What I'm saying is that AVC-HD will unarguably yield better quality than MPEG2 *at the same bitrate* - and the amount depends on the individual coders used - but with a high enough bitrate MPEG2 can be better than AVC-HD. The ease of editing argument is the attraction at the moment to using MPEG2, and just accepting the somewhat higher bitrate. You can still get 50 minutes of XDCAM-HD on a 16GB SDHC card.
I accept that point in principle, but I think your timescale is very optimistic. It also means that to buy an AVC-HD camera in one or two years time means you will have to upgrade your edit system, buying an MPEG2 camera doesn't.

I don't deny AVC-HD may be the way of the future, but still feel MPEG2 may be a better overall choice for the next few years.

I don't think conversion times are much of an issue now. As an example I have SR11 AVCHD cam I can transfer to the PC using the Sony Motion browser software an hour( about 8G at 1920x1080i) in about 15 mins and then use either Cineform Neo Scene or Canopus HQ to transfer to a very editable intermediary file in about the time it would take to capture an hour of tape. In the case of Neo Scene it will convert 1 hour of AVCHD in about 20 mins. Canopus HQ takes about 40 mins so both are less than the tape capture with the present versions. I can only assume it will get better in the future. I back up to 50G Bluray every so often from the hard drive that at the moment is about the same cost as tape for this time.

Ron Evans

So you have no time advantage over capturing from tape and have the added time requirement of creating and maintaining your master archive - plus you didn't say how much computer horsepower you need to do the conversion in the time specified. If AVCCAM offers visibly better quality than HDV then it may be worth the new workflow requirements, but it doesn't appear to be a simpler or more efficient solution.

Big advantage for me of the SR11 is long record times and no tape changing to worry about. Transfer to PC is probably the slowest from a hard drive camcorder like the SR11 rather than a flash memory based camcorder. Once the program time gets over an hour there is a big advantage over tape. Capturing an hour and 40 mins from tape will require tape changes as well as capture time. If the event is longer there will always be tape changes. For programs shorter than 1 hour one can just back up to 8.5G DVD disc as fast as any other burning, say 20 mins. For a 1 hour program that means I can transfer to the PC and backup to disc in a lot less time than it takes to capture tape to the PC. Also there is a time advantage if I just want to edit short pieces in Vegas which does not require any conversion to edit realtime on the timeline.
I do mainly multicamera shoots of long programs so have to mix with two FX1 outputs as well as SR11 so this is worth the conversion time to be able to edit in realtime in Edius. It is difficult to compare quality at the moment for me as it is not fair to compare a $1300 1 chip camera with a $5000 3 chip camera whatever the recording process. However the SR11 produces a stunning picture easily equal to the FX1 in good light.Personally I would love an AVCHD version of the new Sony FX1000 with hard drive and flash card recording.
I agree backup is an issue but i have adopted the approach of keeping a copy on hard drive as well as optical disc and do not find this to be a problem now I have it all figured out.Having copies on the hard drive, in my case indexed by the Sony Browser software makes it easy to find things by folder or date. Beats sorting through boxes and I can use again immediately no recapture!!!!
As far as PC I have a Quad core Q9450, 8G RAM running Vista 64.

Ron Evans

Kevin, I am seeing an improvement in picture quality in going from HDV (Canon XHA1) to the HMC150, especially in sports and low light situations. However it is more difficult to discern if these differences are all due to MPEG2 vs. MPEG4, or other camera design parameters. I am willing to invest some time to develop the new workflow, because from what I have seen, it has a lot of promise.

As far as I can see, hard drives are clearly far cheaper than tapes based on a $10 miniDV tape. They are less than half, and that allows a redundant backup drive for each archive. That is better than tape, a non-backed up tape has no redundancy. I have quite a few threads where I have done comparisons.


If that were 1000 tapes, 100 per year, or 13,000 GB, I could store that on nine 1.5TB hard drives and 9 back up 1.5 TB hard drives. 18 X $130 = $2,340. Or 1,000 tapes @ only $5.00 = $5,000. The tapes I used were $10.00 each.

What? A hard drive backup is extremely quick, it's not a factor. You are going to record to tape & HD? Why? Because you can work off the hard drive so you don't have to capture? You don't have to sustain a tape archive indefinately? What about the space for tape storage? What about a backup to the tape?

Simply not a factor for 90% of users. For those who have problems, a computer upgrade and NLE updates will cure it just like when HDV first was released.

That and;
1. tape dosen't support full raster HD
2. SS media dosent need to be captured
3. SS media files have metadata attached like date, location, shoot name, etc.
4. you can stop and review footage anytime, take the card out for a upload, etc. and you don't lose your place/timecode, you just start recording again when you put the card in.
5. etc.

With the newer SDXC cards coming out with super high speeds and up to 2 TB capacity, the market will probably see a few changes in the future. With a 2 TB card, optical media will be done for. Tape is already almost done.

http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/15389-N...tore-2-TB.html

Another benefit (depending on what you are using it for) is instant review. You can take any clips you like and delete the rest instantly. You aren't required to capture them all and fish through them later. I've found this to be a huge benefit.

HMC-150 and Edius
 

Anyone out there using the 150 and Edius 5?

I have an FX-1000 but are wondering if the world of cards would be better for me as I am sick of the whole tape rewinding and just using tapes. Hard drives are cheap these days so I don't see having to purchase more drives as a problem.

I am interested to know how long it takes to down load a 16gig or 32 gig card to my computer and would I then need to convert the file?

What device do I need on my computer in order to read the file?

Also what about recording either live or after the shoot to a DVD recorder. Assuming this is straight forward - RCA out and the camera downconverts there and then tot eh recorder I hope).

One more - Is the zoom speed painfully slow like with the DVX100 or fast as with the Pana DVC30/DVC62? Hoping the later!

I am running a 3 gig dual core PC with 2 gig ram. It flies.

thanks

Martin.

Martin, Edius V5 will not run AVCHD from my SR11 realtime. I need to convert to HQ then of course it runs just fine. However Vegas is my prefered for a single track AVCHD as the file can be played native on the timeline mainly because the preview runs at a reduced resolution. On auto on my Quad core it is about 1/4 resolution. I am sure the same would be true for Panasonic files. As to quality that I mentioned in my last post its a little difficult to compare like with like. The newer consumer cams from Sony and Canon of course record full 1920x1080i and I think this difference is noticable at times compared to HDV with non square pixels. Unfortunately of course the playback display will also play its part. Feeding 1440 anamorphic to a native 1920x1080 display means some scaling somewhere in the chain compared to native 1920x1080 over HDMI. Scaling of course goes in the other direction with 720 displays!!!! And then there is the issue of interlacing. My ideal would be a 1920x1080P60 and I just wonder how long I will have to wait for that.
To add to the advantages:-
Stopping and then starting means no over recording pieces one wants to keep!!! Its always a new file.
In camera editing( at least on my Sony I assume this is also possible on the 150, split/trim/delete etc)
Playlists of clips. Quick edit can be done in camera.
On my Sony and I think the Canon's these playlists can be copied to the flash card.
etc, etc
The issue of backup does not seem much of a problem once addressed with a process and the advantages are many. Just wish there were more pro style cameras than just the 150.

Ron Evans

1. I use Vegas 8.0c with my HMC-150s footage. I edit native AVCHD files. I can also mix native HDV files and it works perfectly. Don't have Edius.

2. Card to computer download times seems pretty variable, based on the card, the reader and the computer. Im getting 16 GB in less than 10 minutes, but I honestly don't remember exactly. It's fast enough I don't have to plan for it or think about it. Getting a good reader is very important, I have had at least 15 readers, and one of my older ones turns out to be fastest for me. I have some new Extreme III cards I might test over the weekend. I normally use Transcend or Ritek.

3. To view native files without the NLE, you need VLC or something similar.

4. A dual core will be a little slow with AVCHD. Whatever you get with HDV will be 1/2 to 1/3 with AVCHD. Usable but slow. The only real problem is that native file playback stutters and is frustrating on a slow (any dual core) machine.

Jeff,
Could you describe your PC. I have a dual core Intel but was going to upgrade to a quad. It's kind of confusing trying to get up to speed & this would help.
George

I don't know anyone who pays $10 for a miniDV tape: more like $4-5 for most folks and as little as $2.50 each if you shop around. That works out to about 20 cents/GB for a full tape, which is roughly twice the cost of hard drives at today's prices. But since hard drives are unreliable for long-term storage you have to make a backup of any critical data on drives, which negates some of the cost advantage over tape. Plus hard drives require regular testing and possible replacement to ensure data integrity, which is part of why major data centers often back up their hard drives on...tape.

No question that solid state recording and hard drive storage are becoming cheaper, but the cost comparison to tape is still debatable unless you would expect to use a whole lot of tapes. In a typical year I might use 100 tapes which cost me $250 and hold (say) 50 hours worth of footage I want to keep, which would require two hard drive archives costing a total of at least $150. If I was buying new cameras today I might consider that minor cost difference as a factor, but it's not a make-or-break issue.

What does get my attention is the long record times for AVCCAM on large SDHC cards, and that's a big point in favor of these cameras compared to HDV. I'd consider it a nuisance to have to deal with the current AVCHD workflow and don't expect that to change much any time soon, just as HDV is still best edited by converting to an I-frame intermediate. What really matters here is the quality of recorded images and things like low-light sensitivity, which appear to be fine with the AVCCAM cameras.

By the way, my point about using multiple recording solutions with a tape-based camera is that you can't necessarily do the opposite with a solid-state camera. With HDV I can record to tape and a hard drive simultaneously and walk away with both the tape master and live data at the end of the shoot, which has some advantages depending on your needs. Different strokes for different folks, but there are still some benefits to tape-based cameras. Solid state cameras are starting to look pretty good, but not necessarily for cost reasons.

as crazy as this sounds, the HMC-150 really appeals to me, as an EX1 user. I love my camera, but I HATE HATE HATE CMOS. I am almost thinking of selling it and my Z1
and pick up a pair of 150s and be totally tapeless. now that is VERY appealing.

Hi Scott,
What kind of PC or Mac do you have? It seem that most are saying that you really need a hi speed CPU (duo core or quad) to work effectively with AVCHD. When I had a Z1, file conversion was necessary (CinaForm in Vegas) to edit. Do you find this to be true as well?
Thanks, George

I am running FCP 6.0.5 on a mac pro 2.66 quad. transcoding to pro res not a big deal for me, since i start my footage import when I get home from each shoot, even if it's 1am :-)

Hello Martin,

I have an HMC-150 & use Edius 5

My workflow is:

Copy the AVCHD files to my hard drive
Rename them in sequential order (001,002 etc...)
Back up the AVCHD files
Convert the orginal files to Canopus HQ format
Delete the redundant AVCHD files
Import the Canopus HQ files into Edius

If I ever need to recover a project, I will re-spawn the Canopus HQ files from the backed up AVCHD files.

This way I am backing up the smaller files original files and using the HQ files for editing which play like DV inside of Edius.

So Tom, if you are doing multiple shoots on a weekend, that you can't get to edit right away, are you them simply dumping the AVCHD files on a hard drive (and back these up) and then reuse the card again for the next shoot?

Then when it's time to edit you transcode the AVCHD files into Canopus HQ files for editing?

If you're used to editing HDV in FCS2 then AVCHD won't seem as plug'n'play.
Transcode to a file seven times the original size.
You better make sure your computer can handle ProRes before you go AVCHD.
Oh, and your computer needs to be an INTEL mac or FCS2 won't let you play....
This is a great camera to get your system ready for the new RED Scarlet camera.