Alexey

<< 1. Do you know how much time laptop can power from battery? >>

In a professional and properly managed production environment, battery power on location is never an issue for experienced shooters.

<< 2. 100 Gb is maximum. Big 3.5'' external HDDs will not working from batteries. If it will, laptop will take much more power. >>

Okay, once again! In a professional and properly managed production environment, battery power on location is never an issue for experienced shooters.

<< 3. Do you think it's comfortable? I don't think so. I went to friends to shoot birthday and I must take camcorder, laptop and few HDDs... >>

This is not a consumer camcorder and I don't think anyone is going to use it to shoot a consumer application friend's birthday. Even so, how much recording time would you really need for that -- not much. I think the tolerance threshold for watching birthday parties on video is an international standard of about 15 minutes maximum.

<< PS: Wireless (and shooting directly to computer with cable) is only good if you shoot in video-studio. >>

Sorry, incorrect. Both instances (wireless and direct cable) can be employed in the field, easily.

<< If you make so serious films - you should buy Pro camcorders. $50000-$100000. :) >>

This is a professional camcorder, and the target price is below $10,000. Please get into the spirit of the discussion here, or move on to some other category. We cover a wide variety of formats here at DV Info Net. Thanks,

I know many people who bought $5000 camcorders to shoot birthdays, kids, vacations etc. Because camcorders under $2000 shoots really bad.

Guys, are you working for Panasonic or something? I can't understand this love to extra problems (laptops, 4 mins flash cards...).

<<<-- Originally posted by Andreas Fernbrant : <<<-- Originally posted by Chris Hurd : << P2 is perfect for a filmmaking environment, -->>>

Take this for an example,
You are alone and collecting footage for your documentary, You see something spectacular, like with most animal encounters or things of that nature. You have to be fast.. No time for that additional tripod, You start shooting, after 4 minutes your P2 cards is out, it starts recording on the other card, you need to pop the card out, pull out the hardrive from the backpack, put the card into the hardrive and dump the material, all of this without taking your focus of what's in your viewfinder or adding additional camera shake. I would say that's impossible..

They need to offer atleast 60-100gig P2 cards for this to be a good alternative to tape! -->>>

Documentary wildlife shooting, is nothing like a typical "film" shoot. Documentary shooting of any type is different from almost any kind shoot due to the massive amount of footage typically shot. Obviously, neither P2 or even large HDD would be good for this style of shooting. We could all make up scenarios, though, where any format would be less than ideal if our only goal of the discussion was to disprove its viability.

On a typical film shoot or in studio, where power is not an issue, equipment is plentiful, good preproduction work has been done, and the DP has one or more assisstants, P2 would work fine.

Just last week "Sesame Street" had a shoot in my local mall. They were shooting onto some non-tape format. In between setups, the director walked over to a man on a laptop sitting next to the sound table. It was the project's editor, and he and the director were cutting together the program as they shot it. The workflow looked very natural and simple.

Wouldn't it be fantastic fun if this format helped to move the editors on set?

Simple solution if you are shooting a doc:

You can always use a different camera.

BUT, someone will shoot a doc with this cam, because they'll have multiple cards and a laptop handy. Which will become more and more commonplace on a shoot as time goes on.

I'm going to play Devil's Advocate here. First off, let me also thank Jan for her constant support and input. I've been in a similar situation on a much smaller scale, and didn't do half the job she's doing. Also, she's not only doing it here, but a couple of other professional sites I regular. Again, my hat's off to you. This is one of the things that's starting seperate Panny from Sony for me. Everything I own, is Sony right now. But, that is going to change in the very near future. On the other hand, it seems that certain points are being presented when it suits that point of view. Sometimes people are refering to this system as the next thing for Indie and Documentary filmmaking at a low budget, which I hope it is. Then when people make points regarding power needs and other field needs, some make points regarding generators and such, so that won't be a problem. I've worked my share of low budget field jobs, and even with portable generators, power was always in demand. It just seems that people are bouncing around and adding info to support their position. I hope I'm making sense. I don't think the situation is as B&W as it sometimes is being presented. On the other side: The reality of the situation is that I'm excited about the camera. If I wasn't, I wouldn't even talk about it. I worked with the Sony HDV a couple of times and was not impressed. So, I don't talk about it. The one thing that's won me over with Panasonic, aside from the DVX100, is that they seem to be listening to costumers. Sony seems to be like we're Sony, so you'll take what we give you. That's not an option anymore. Thanks Panasonic.

Ugh, you guys are making me sick! Here are some facts:

- Memory prices are falling drastically, just give it some time.

- The camera most likely won't be released until a few months or so after NAB2005. This supports the above fact.

- Laptop shooting isn't necessary, Panasonic has the external HDD option for P2 card layoff. Also, we know little about this device as well. Perhaps we can swap out the HDD with another one instead of buying more of the same device?

- If using a laptop, most instances will call for an extra battery and/or extra HDD at most. If shooting indoors, AC power can be used to alleviate shooting length worries.

- 4 minutes. That's all we've got for DVCPROHD recording for awhile and that's all that we need for single takes in most instances. Quit complaining and just have your talent practice more! >=D Lazies! Shoot Clint Eastwood-style, it's just so professional.

- The camera doesn't shoot just DVCPROHD, it shoots DVCPRO25 and DVCPRO50 (whether it can shoot 24p for all modes or not is still up in the air if I'm not mistaken).

- Documentary people aren't who this camera's primarily for, as of yet, this camera, right now, is meant for indie filmmakers. If need be, documentarists that need longer shooting times can shoot the DVCPRO modes instead of DVCPROHD. Or use another camera altogether! >=D

- The price hasn't been officially announced yet, just the figure that Panasonic is aiming for. Regardless of the camera price, yes, an investment will need to be made towards upgrading for HD. Software and hardware most likely need to be upgraded and ATM, only AVID and FCP support DVCPROHD (yet again, if I'm not mistaken). So for all those people spouting, "Oh this thing's gonna be too expensive, I may as well just jump the gun and buy a $20,000 procamera!" or "Shoot, I'll just buy a (insert prosumer camera here) instead!", just be quiet, you don't know how much it's going to cost. None of us do. Wait until we get an exact price at NAB2005.


So, everyone just quit griping and wait and see. Maybe someone can try to come up with another question about this camera for another thread? So far we've only got one page of thread going, doesn't anyone have any other questions?

Alexey Morvin:

<< Guys, are you working for Panasonic or something? >>

No more so than you're working against them.

There is only one person actively participating in this forum who works for Panasonic, and she is Jan Crittenden. She is clearly identified as "Panasonic Broadcast" in the user title below here name. We welcome her presence here warmly, just as we do for any other manufacturer's representatives who care to post here at DV Info Net.

Speaking only for myself, but I'm sure this goes for most everyone else here, I am keenly interested in new digital video technolgies and formats of all kinds, including P2 as well as HDV. And just like all the other discussion boards I have here at DV Info Net, I set up this one so that I can interact with other interested folks and learn as much as I can about it.

<< I can't understand this love to extra problems (laptops, 4 mins flash cards...) >>

Understanding P2 requires some degree of forward thinking. These are solutions, not problems. And we're not talking about four minutes on a flash card; we're talking about hours worth of HD recording on a flash card array.

Your posts so far are highly suspicious in that they are attempting to cast F.U.D. (fear, uncertainty and doubt). This is contrary to the way we operate around here and is highly detrimental to the learning process. Please think about that very carefully. Thanks,

For Ignacio Rodriguez, Jesse Bekas, Michael Struthers, Claude Isbell and Jack Felis: thanks a bunch for your excellent input at the tail end of this thread, guys. Your thoughtful viewpoints were right on target and have made me feel a lot less alone! For awhile it seemed like I was kind of single-handed there.

Jack,

<< Maybe someone can try to come up with another question about this camera for another thread? >>

Thanks, this is the same thing I was trying to say about fifteen or twenty posts back!

I really think this thread is done for; please folks, take Jack's advice (and mine) and steer any further discussion to a *new* topic. Thanks in advance,

And don't forget, Panasonic has already announced that they're going to be building a tiny portable hard disk P2 card reader device, which will be like a little FireStore, but instead of needing to be cabled to the camera you just put a card in and it sucks the data off it and copies it to the hard disk. So for the cost of a little 60gb hard disk about 3" x 4" or so, you can have hours of storage.

Shoot to the cards. When they're full, pop 'em in the disk reader and it quaffs 'em at a rate of about 4x realtime or something. Then continue shooting.

Is this really a big deal here? Seems like a nearly *ideal* workflow. Instant acquisition, instant editing, ability to delete/manage clips on the card right away, ability to store 'em on the hard disk for longer-form recording... you don't *need* a laptop or anything like that, you can just use this P2 card reader disk drive thing for that, and it's no more inconvenient than using a FireStore (one of the hottest accessories for tape-based cameras), and in some ways it's even more convenient (in that the P2 card reader drive doesn't need to be tethered to the camera by a fragile firewire cable!)

Howdy from Texas,

And there you have it... an excersize in F.U.D. (fear, uncertainty & doubt), and how to defeat it, with an excellent closing statement from Barry Green.

This thread was a malignant, overgrown cancerous tumor which has been surgically excized from Kurth Brouseman's original Panasonic AJ-HDX100 topic. It's closed because there's really nothing that needs to be added to it. In short, we don't do F.U.D. at DV Info Net. Thanks,