Alister, is all this info on bronze, silver etc. available or is it just through personal contacts. I can't seem to see anything mentioning specific cameras apart from the refeence to the HVX200.
Steve

This information is in the current Discovery HD producers guidelines. It is only available from Discovery when you get a commission and you must sign an agreement not to publicly distribute the information it contains. I have a couple of producer contacts that have the latest documents.

Given that this document is only given out on a per production basis it is possible that there are different versions, but whenever I have seen it it has been the same version.

Discovery are now listing specific cameras and setups. For example bizarrely the F350 at 35Mb with an HD lens is approved in Silver while the F330 is not which really makes no sense at all. They are also specifying workflows and editing codecs. I think what they are trying to do is eliminate as many up front issues as possible and the document is mainly aimed at those new to HD that don't understand the consequences of different formats and codec.
My guess is that if you went back to them and put a strong case for just about anything you may get it through.
If you read through the BBC's guidelines you will see that one of the main reasons the BBC want 1920x1080 acquisition is because the majority of co-production partners (which includes Discovery HD) will no longer accept 720P.

Odd. If the F330 didn't make it, then how so does the EX line? Is it the CMOS chips? Is the codec better in the EX models?
I honestly don't see the difference between the F350 and F330. This is giving me a headache.
Alistair, thanks for your information. You've definitely given us all food for thought.

Back to the original post - I still say go with the EX3. A shoulder-mount camera, even a semi-shoulder design, is far preferable to full hand-held. Believe me, I base this on personal - and painful - experience. Plus, an interchangable lens system is always a positive.
I now have a JVC HD-200, but I'm seriously considering selling it to buy an EX3.

IMHO, the JVC camera is the line the EX-3 is aimed at competing with.

I just wish Sony had designed it with the JVC "mini" shoulder mount design, as I really agree with this body shape.

But, given that so many people have stated that there is a sort of parity in the XDCAM line (EX can be interchanged with the PDW-700 ect...) that I think Sony had to protect its higher end products and not make the EX-3 design too much of a home run. Or why would you spend thousands+ more for incremental gains...

The EX line seems to be the sweet spot right now with the only drawback is the handling of still flashes, which until you use the camera, it is tough to know the impact.

So I would say you are ahead with either one you choose.

Glen, 1 thing in favour of the EX1 over the F330/350 is that it's got 1920x1080 chips vs 1440x1080. In terms of image quality though the F330 and F350 presumably are identical so that is baffling!

So, the EX3 has this "ajustable shoulder pad"... How long until someone replaces that for some "over the shoulder" brace?

George/

I think the F330 did not get approved because at the time the tests were done it used to be supplied as a kit that included a servo controlled auto-focus lens. I believe it was the quality of the servo lens that led to the F330 being rejected. The Discovery tests are pretty exhaustive and as well as picture quality take many things into account such as use-ability, ergonomics, workflow, subjective image quality as well as technical image quailty, build quality and the legendary codec tests.

As it would be impossible to tell whether something was shot with an F350 0r f330 (assuming a decent lens) then I doubt there would be a problem using an F330.

To do so ...
 

Would not be difficult at all. It's very clear that a on/off brace can be made to fit the EX3 ~ easily. Hell, I'll make one myself.

Right, my thoughts exactly. All this "talk" about how it should have been a "real shouldermount" is a bit moot in my book. The EX3 design looks really flexible to me! In fact, I'd say it could not BE any better.

George/