Mar 6, 2012, 2:16 PM
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Back to older camcorders???
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Every year a a bunch of new cameras, file formats, compressions and etc. come to the market. It's hard to keep up with as we know... Tape is pretty much dead. But there were cameras made with still up to date capabilities or beyond, except their recording medium. For example the Sony V1U, a kick-ass camcorder which couldn't utilize its true capabilty because of the lack of high data rate recording devices. I just realized that now days we can buy SSD HDMI recording systems for an affordable price. For example a Balck Magic2 enclosure and a 128-160Gb SSD drive can be purchased for about $500. This means a "good old" Sony V1U (and many other camcorders) can record true progressive 1080x1920 uncompressed 4:2:2 video vs. HDV onto tape which is MPEG2 1080x1440 in interlaced stream. Most of those external systems also allow compressed recording, but the file format is still lot better than HDV or today's AVCHD. Further more these recorders allow editing directly from their drive on most NLE systems. So it all seems to me recording externally through HDMI makes those cameras "better" than they were in their own time. DSE and the other few experts please corret me ifmail] I'm wrong here!
(This post was edited by Laszloimage on Mar 6, 2012, 6:56 PM)
DSE (D 29060)
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Mar 6, 2012, 3:19 PM
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Re: [Laszloimage] Back to older cmacorders???
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Every year a a bunch of new cameras, file formats, compressions and etc. come to the market. It's hard to keep up with as we know... Tape is pretty much dead. But there were cameras made with still up to date capabilities or beyond, except their recording medium. For example the Sony V1U, a kick-ass camcorder which couldn't utilize its true capabilty because of the lack of high data rate recording devices. I just realized that now days we can buy SSD HDMI recording systems for an affordable price. For example a Balck Magic2 enclosure and a 128-160Gb SSD drive can be purchased for about $500. This means a "good old" Sony V1U (and many other camcorders) can record true progressive 1080x1920 uncompressed 4:2:2 video vs. HDV onto tape which is MPEG2 1080x1440 in interlaced stream. Most of those external systems also allow compressed recording, but the file format is still lot better than HDV or today's AVCHD. Further more these recorders allow editing directly from their drive on most NLE systems. So it all seems to me recording externally through HDMI makes those cameras "better" than they were in their own time. DSE and the other few experts please corret me ifmail] I'm wrong here!
There is a lot of truth to what you're saying. If you take the uncompressed 4:2:2 8 bit from the HDMI or SDI port on those cameras and run it into a Ninja or other portable recorder that can manage the stream, there is a massive difference between the HDV, AVC, AVCHD images, no doubt.
However, it's still interlaced (since you brought it up, assuming you have an issue with it), and depending on the camera, you'd perhaps still have some imager issues. All that said, many broadcasters have been using Z7 out the uncompressed port and converting with Convergent Design Micro or similar. Now with the AJA Ki, CD Nano, or Atmos Ninja...there are options for around 2500.00 that provide monitoring as well.
The glass makes a major difference, as does the offset, imager size, and DP, so it is a way to get a fixed lens camera cheap, and have it provide 4:2:2, 8bit uncompressed. Don't buy into the "10 bit off HDMI marketing hype; the last two bits are set to null, so it's still 8 bit (which is plenty fine for almost everything but the most intense grades)
Mar 6, 2012, 5:47 PM
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Spot, Thank you very much for the info! I wish if the new Canon Mark-III could output uncomprresed video too through its HDMI, but it doesn't The new Nikon D800 does though...
(This post was edited by Laszloimage on Mar 6, 2012, 7:21 PM)
DSE (D 29060)
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Mar 7, 2012, 12:47 PM
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The BMD certainly can. I'm not familiar with the other model. It claims the data rate, but I'm not sure that it'll sustain it. I have a BMD box, used on an NX5
Mar 8, 2012, 4:58 PM
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Thank you for the valuable info!
LouDiamond (D 25931)
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Mar 14, 2012, 10:41 AM
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Saw THIS camera and thought of this thread. Talk about a throw back in form factor but the file format it saves in might be appealing to you and it seems you are not the only one that has noted the "older" cameras features are more desirable in some ways.
The new Nikon D800 does though... 
