extent of motion problems
 

Can someone explain to me in plain English what the motion blur problem is with the FX1/Z1 cameras?

My understanding thus far is that if you pan quickly the image reproduction is poor. I just cannot believe this is the case as a fast pan is such a common movement to make with a camera, rendering these HDV models inherently flawed.

I have one on the way (the wait is killing me!) but should I be worried?!

no you get used it it and learn how to deal with in. you want to see fast motion slowed way down in 720p check out this little surf clip. this was shot in

F6.8
0dB
S 180
AWB - outdoors

i was worried about the ghosting but after i de-interlaced and down converted to 720p all is butter!!!

check it.

Http://www.digitizedmemories.net/28th/28th05.wmv

let me know what you rothoughts on this are.

thanks

joel

Here is the deal.

A smooth, reasonably fast pan would be ok, especially on a tripod. To be honest 99% of the "camera moves" you typically use are going to be ok.

The stuff you have to avoid is the kind of jerky run-n-gun type of camera movement. This isn't the camera for that.

I guess the speed of the pan isn't as important as the "acceleration" of the pan. A really fast "whip-pan" is going to look pretty bad, but then again you would avoid that with any camera if possible.

An excellent test (if you want to see the worst case of this problem) is to run with this camera (not walk fast, really run) like you are shooting an episode of Cops :) Or, better yet, mount the camera on a tripod and have one person bump up againt the tripod (make sure the tripod doesn't fall of course). The super-fast back and forth movement when the tripod is bumped will result in what almost looks like a drop-out (but it isn't). But again, neither of these examples are typical scenarios for most people :)

It has never been an issue for us, honestly I can't ever remember thinking "man, if we just had a DV camera we could do a faster pan for this shot", but then again we don't shoot "COPS" style.

<<<-- Originally posted by Joel Corral

check it.

Http://www.digitizedmemories.net/28th/28th05.wmv

let me know what you rothoughts on this are.

thanks

joel -->>>

that surf footage is nice . . .

what did you use to do the slo-mo?

Ben

pretty basic, i am using Canopus Edius Pro 3.x just just adjusted the duration and Edius did the rest. so orginally the footage was shot in 1080i. i Downconverted to 720p using WM9HD codec and exported from Canopus Procoder. I love Canopus Stuff For HDV. I think they have the all around BEST Solution For the HDV Format HANDS DOWN!


joel

see chris,

the whole point of me posting that clip is so you can see that there is NO motion blur from panning.

Cheers, looks good to me!

What exactly is Canopus Edius Pro 3.x?

Regards,

Chris

<<<-- Originally posted by Chris Jothi : Cheers, looks good to me!

What exactly is Canopus Edius Pro 3.x?

Regards,

Chris -->>>

it's a NLE. you should really look into it if you are going to be editing HDV.

www.canopus.com

good luck

joel

When I initially evaluated the FX1 for a short film (I ended up using the FX-1 over the DVX100A), I was very concerned about the "motion blur" that occurs with long GOPs (the way the video is encoded via MPEG-2). I was used to JVC's short GOPs (6) on the HD10U vs. Sony's 15 GOPs. However, I only noticed the blur when dumping the HDV to the computer. Upon playback on an LCD-based HD projector or a CRT HDTV television, the motion blur was not an issue, or at least it wasn't real obvious.

If you go those extra steps to deinterlace and downconvert (1080i -> 720p or 480p/576p) the antialiasing helps minimize the motion blur even more as Joel pointed out.

In my professional opinion, the motion blur issue really isn't an issue. I did many "hand-held" COPS-style shots and failed to notice anything unusual with the footage. All the footage was shot with 1/60 sec shutter speed during daylight hours. I agree with Ben that 99% of your camera techniques are going to be okay.

I only have two complaints with the FX-1: 1.) hard to focus and 2.) poor depth-of-field capabilities. Those are my only complaints; other than that, I was rather impressed with the camera.