New Sony AVCHD HDR-CX100, CX105

[sdctlc 0]

Matt, that is awesome! I am about to order one... Any guesses on color Spot? What does that say about me??

My the HC5 with a D-Box and Hypoxic Mini will be up online in the classifieds in the very near future! Love the HC5 but the speed and size, along with trying to compile some footage at a few boogies, will be way easier and nicer on my head in the future.

That along with my new T1i will be a nice set up! Not quite as fancy a helmet though so I will still be way behind with lowly Batrak

Scott C.

"He who Hesitates Shall Inherit the Earth!"

[mnskydiver688 0]

That happens on mine too. Another thing I have noticed is that for some reason even with the power on by LCD off the camera will still turn on when I open the LCD both if the Hypeye is plugged in and when it is not. However when the Hypeye is plugged in when I close the LCD it doesn't turn off, so I still have to use the Hypeye button. Some little quirks I have discovered. Also, I have realized the importance of buying a good memory card. A regular Memory Stick Pro Duo takes a lot longer than the internal memory.

Sky Canyon Wingsuiters

[DSE 3]

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I got it in black. What does that say?

That you're a mean, onery badass that wants everyone to know how chuffed he is.

I got red and silver. Means I'm bright and sunshiney, with a tad of intelligence thrown in.

Damn, that's weird about the mirroring vs a flip.

But I'll love not capturing tape any more.

[The111 0]

Sounds like we are on the same path Scott. I am leaving my HC5 for the CX100 also... I loved it, I just got sick of tapes. Also 1920x1080 is great... now if only we could get 1080p I would be happy. I'm super sick of interlaced video and the hassles it entails. Hell I'd take 720p over 1080i.

Also am considering going from my XTi to the T1i. My only concern is whether or not my 10-22mm lens can actually resolve enough for the 15MP to be fully utilized?

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[The111 0]

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Another thing I have noticed is that for some reason even with the power on by LCD off the camera will still turn on when I open the LCD both if the Hypeye is plugged in and when it is not.

Sounds like a problem with the camera. If I set my "power on with LCD open" setting to OFF... it never turns on when I flip the LCD open, with or without the Hypeye... just tested it both ways.

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[sdctlc 0]

This last weekend in MOAB was my first real chance to play with my 10-22 on the T1i and I was pretty happy with the results.. I have not really dug into the pics fully but a somewhat quick look through gave some pretty happy impressions. I shot both RAW shots as well as Large .jpg shots.

Scott

"He who Hesitates Shall Inherit the Earth!"

[DSE 3]

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Sounds like we are on the same path Scott. I am leaving my HC5 for the CX100 also... I loved it, I just got sick of tapes. Also 1920x1080 is great... now if only we could get 1080p I would be happy. I'm super sick of interlaced video and the hassles it entails. Hell I'd take 720p over 1080i.

Also am considering going from my XTi to the T1i. My only concern is whether or not my 10-22mm lens can actually resolve enough for the 15MP to be fully utilized?

Down convert 1080i to 720p. Via Kell, you're gaining chroma stability and sharpness anyway.

No, your lenses won't take full advantage of the 15mp, but you'll still have a significantly better image. It's not like the camera just ignores that information...Take your lense to the store, shoot some pretty plants and high detail, you'll like it. Promise.

[bomb420 1]

This was a slight bug in the first run of the HYPEYE D PROs. I was sending a bit to the cameras that flips the image around so it can be used for underwater housings. (Nice undocumented features) One of those things you never expect to happen, but we finally saw it in the field. Pulling it out a few mm so the switch deactivates flips it back to normal.

If you send it back I will reprogram it for you. Or, if you're going to be at chick's rock or Eloy anytime in the near future I can do it there.

HYPOXIC

[The111 0]

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Down convert 1080i to 720p. Via Kell, you're gaining chroma stability and sharpness anyway.

By "downconvert" you mean de-interlace... which is where all the hassle comes from and the reason I want a device that records progressive to begin with.

Also, my desktop i7 powerhouse rig has no problem with these AVCHD files... can even preview a Vegas project at full quality rendering on the fly. But my new laptop with Intel T4200 mobile processor cannot even come CLOSE to rendering these files smoothly, even though it does great with the HC5 MPEG-2 files. Oh well.

Thanks for the quick email reply Trunk!

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[DSE 3]

Deinterlacing is part of the process of downconvert from 60i to 30p.
Trust me on this one, you DON'T want to be shooting 30p. 60p, yes. 30p, no. Your skydiving footage will be jerky as hell. There is a reason that BY FAR the majority of acquisition in this world is still interlaced. Just as there is a reason that virtually all broadcast is interlaced.
Small pipe still can carry big picture with interlacing.
Your rneders aren't smooth from your laptop? Something wrong there. Never heard of Vegas (or any other NLE) not being able to render a file that is smooth on output. If you mean "not as fast," well, that can be expected when downconverting.
Go fly the Panasonic HMC150. It's AVCHD, shoots 30p. You'll hate it, guaranteed. Shoot same cam in 720p60, you'll love it, but now you're lower in resolution and can't go up. 1080i converts very nicely to 720p, and the render time on most machines is very reasonable. And the image is great. Unless you're delivering on Blu-ray, there is no reason to NOT downconvert to 720p, as its the best format to submit to YouTube, Vimeo, etc. If you are delivering to BD, there are techniques to turn 60i to 60p and then 30p from there.

[raceface 0]

i don't agree, my camera is doing 720p30 (avchd in *.mov) and i am very happy with quality, it is at least comparable with cx-105 (if not better).

my pictures

[DSE 3]

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i don't agree, my camera is doing 720p30 (avchd in *.mov) and i am very happy with quality, it is at least comparable with cx-105 (if not better).

You disagree with which?
That due to Kell you get a more saturated image when downconverting from 1080i to 720p?

or

That 60i is a better acquisition rate for fast motion than 30p?

or

That 720p is a great delivery format for the web?

If you're suggesting that 25p is superior to 60i for fast acquisition, it's patently clear you've never made a comparison.
There is a reason that both the ATSC and EU don't accept 25 or 30p for sports acquisition. Fear of lawsuits related to triggering epilepsy is only one reason. It looks TERRIBLE. Everything we shoot for broadcast is shot in 24 or 30p. Except sports.

With 60i or 50i, you have 30 or 25 more opportunities to capture motion, which is double what you get with progressive acquisition. If you're shooting 50p or 60p, then the motion is terrific, assuming the bitrate is high enough to manage the content and data rate.

It's not an opinion as much as it is a well documented and supported position that for fast motion, 50i/60i are superior to 24, 25, or 30p, even with very fast shutter speeds. Additionally, you can't slo-mo 24, 25, or 30p well because there isn't enough frame information to do a clean slo-mo.

BTW, .mov is merely a container and bears zero relevance to the quality or lack thereof related to picture quality. It's like suggesting that a brown paper bag is superior to a white one. They're both just bags, the contents of which could be garbage or gold.

[mnskydiver688 0]

Your mastery of the english language constantly leaves me in awe, and the way you make such eloquent similes. Absolutely magnificent!

Sky Canyon Wingsuiters

[raceface 0]

i disagree with:
"Trust me on this one, you DON'T want to be shooting 30p..... Your skydiving footage will be jerky as hell..... You'll hate it, guaranteed."
i don't have experience with HMC150, so maybe something is wrong with this camera.
hope skydivingmovies.com will be online again,
i will upload something to compare.
the note about mov is just a note...
and i agree 60p would be better :-D

my pictures

[The111 0]

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Deinterlacing is part of the process of downconvert from 60i to 30p.
Trust me on this one, you DON'T want to be shooting 30p. 60p, yes. 30p, no. Your skydiving footage will be jerky as hell. There is a reason that BY FAR the majority of acquisition in this world is still interlaced. Just as there is a reason that virtually all broadcast is interlaced.

I understand what you're saying, but my 30p web renders don't look jerky, even when viewed on a big screen.

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Your rneders aren't smooth from your laptop? Something wrong there. Never heard of Vegas (or any other NLE) not being able to render a file that is smooth on output.

Well, maybe render was the wrong word... I meant just "previewing" the project on the fly in Vegas. But heck, my laptop can't play one of my MTS files smoothly even using WMP/VLC... which makes no sense since here I tested a MTS file from Saskia (from the same camera) and it viewed very smoothly on my laptop. WTF. Trying to view the test footage I took last night (which was in a low lit room), my laptop CPU (both cores) go to 100% and the footage plays at about 5 fps and the sound loops. So I can view her test file, but not my own? Maybe hers were a lower bitrate... but if anything that should take more CPU, right?

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[DSE 3]

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i disagree with:
"Trust me on this one, you DON'T want to be shooting 30p..... Your skydiving footage will be jerky as hell..... You'll hate it, guaranteed."
i don't have experience with HMC150, so maybe something is wrong with this camera.
hope skydivingmovies.com will be online again,
i will upload something to compare.
the note about mov is just a note...
and i agree 60p would be better :-D

Nothing wrong with the HMC150, nor the XDCAM EX, XDCAM HD, or any other HD camera that shoots 30p. Temporaly, 30p (25p in your case, which is even worse) simply can't carry the day. To an untrained or unfamiliar eye, perhaps it cuts it. To the majority of the world (again, it's a BROADCAST SPEC to not shoot fast action in 24 or 30p, partially because the content and the strobing may combine to trigger epilepsy. It has in fact, done exactly that. 25p coupled with a rippling logo presenting the 2012 Olympics has spawned a lawsuit against a Brit broadcaster. 25p/30p cannot shoot smooth fast action, as there isnt enough temporal information even at a high shutter speed (although that *can* help). But, maybe my experience over the last 30 years, the ATSC and EU, the NAB, SMPTE, and NAPTE are all wrong and we don't understand....anything is possible, I suppose.

Matt, the content is equally responsible for the ability of the CPU to decode AVCHD footage. Not having seen Saskia's footage, I'll assume it's heavy clouds with just subject movement compared to your footage being a changing landscape and subject movement. These cams are mostly VBR, so yours could be peaking the bitrate while hers is not. Just a guess. But yes, the higher bitrate/higher compression *usually* means more CPU cycles and is more difficult to decode. If it's a lower bitrate but lesser compression, it will generally play more smoothly.
Also, be SURE that you're using project settings to match the media. Old AVCHD camcorders shoot 1440 x 1080 while most of the new ones shoot 1920 x 1080. Be sure your project settings match the media, or it will be a low decode.

[The111 0]

Yeh, Saskia's was typical outdoor skydiving footage, mine was running around my house in poor lighting chasing my cat... pretty shaky footage with a lot of bandwidth peaking I'm sure. Hopefully it fares better with stable freefall footage.

And yeh, I did figure out (after a while) to put it on HD 1920x1080 project settings instead of HDV 1440.

And... doesn't high bandwidth generally correspond with low compression, and vice versa? (EDIT: for the same piece of source material, I mean. I guess what you were saying is not that high bandwidth and high compression go together, but that both of those things increase CPU load, which makes sense.)

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[DSE 3]

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And... doesn't high bandwidth generally correspond with low compression, and vice versa? (EDIT: for the same piece of source material, I mean. I guess what you were saying is not that high bandwidth and high compression go together, but that both of those things increase CPU load, which makes sense.)

So much for my mastery of engrish.
You said it well.
You can have compression as high as 55:1 in a stream that is say....12Mbps, or you can have compressions as low as say...35:1 in a 24Mbps stream. Which one do you think is harder for the CPU to read?





















Keeping in mind it's VBR, and content-dependent...the answer isn't so easy. Bitrate is constrained to the max, but as you found, low light and noisy content can be hard to decode. If there is a lot of redundancy to frames, it's easy to decode ie; clouds and a small skydiver.

Perfect point to pitch my "Full HD" book. It has pitchers and tables, and even drawings for the cavemen.
Even Jarno could read it.

[The111 0]

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You can have compression as high as 55:1 in a stream that is say....12Mbps, or you can have compressions as low as say...35:1 in a 24Mbps stream. Which one do you think is harder for the CPU to read?

Not sure. I'm gonna go with the first one though, my guess it that heavy compression is a harder hit than high bandwidth, but not sure by what margin.

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[alge 0]

Regarding your problems with AVCHD playback:

The decoder probably is not up to the task - VLC and other free dshow decoders are not quite there yet. VLC frequently goes to something like .5 FPS when decoding my AVCHD files. To get the .MTSs to consistently play smoothly you'll have to buy CoreAVC or something.

I've had some luck with using mplayer from svn trunk and ffmpeg from the multicore git tag, but I wouldn't really recommend it to non-geeks. (;

[The111 0]

Yeh, I installed CoreAVC and now it seems to run a lot better, thanks. But now I can't tell whether or not my K-Lite Codec pack or the CoreAVC is taking precedence in certain situations.

www.WingsuitPhotos.com

[BenediktDE 2]

Info for the Dutch:

There is a 50 EUR refund promotion for the CX105 in NL at the moment:
http://www.sony.nl/article/2009/10/haarscherp-beeld-ook-bij-weinig-licht

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.

[2pac 6]

hi there,

I have a cx105 and it dioesnt want to take pictures from the video on a memory stick so someone told me there is a firmware update which fixes that and tried to find it on the sony site but there is nothing about that there

any help is appreciated


cheers

www.slobodanpad.hr
www.skydiveadria.com