POLL v2: Does HDV actually suck or not?

Have you shot or edited with HDV, and, if so, were you happy, or unhappy with it? Give examples if you want, but please try not to flame anyone - this is just to try and gauge some real figures, to help people decide about its usefulness.

At the end of your post, please include a vote for or against HDV as a useful medium. This makes it easier to figure out the results. You can also vote 'no idea', or 'still not sure', or 'just don't care' or whatever else you like.

ie I vote YES for HDV
I vote NO
I vote STILL NOT SURE
I vote KILL IT WITH A STICK.

etc.

cheers.

KILL IT WITH A STICK

This argument is old. HDV shot with a nice camera is SWEET. I have played with it in After Effects / Magic Bullet Looks Suite and the results are STUNNING. It's not HDV that sucks...it's Long GOP...gotta get outa that format ASAP into frames then it's happy time

I vote YES for HDV

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

When the first HDV camera came out from Sony, I thought; now this out to be good. I took the camera out to a baseball playing field on a clear-bright sunny day, so no lighting problems.

At first the images looked great - that is untill I tried a normal speed pan. 29.97 should pan quite as well as DV,RIGHT? Wrong! The image smeared as I was doing a fairly typical pan for DV. IE: Try to follow the ball once hit from the bat to the ground where it lands! Impossible to get a clear image in the pan!

Then. I tried editing it -- wow! What a paid to deal with, even with the Apple HDV codec.

It is my opinion that Sony is going the wrong way on Long GOP and that helped me make the next camera purchase an HVX-200.

Wayne - Why kill it, specifically?

Joey - what's the preferred format and workflow you use to get out of long GOP?

John - what specifically was a pain for you during editing?

My personal experience with HDV is quite small - I saw a lot of capture issues that were almost always user error at a Uni, I had one shoot with it in which I seemed to have lost a GOP - so one section where I lost 12 (I think it was 12) frames at once, and there was no way to recover from this. That scared me off a bit.

Also, the whole thing about conforming and having to dumb down to SD in most instances seems kind of long winded and annoying. Not sure if the benefits outweigh the problems.

On my system, importing via firewire and working natively, the quality difference on HDV shot on a Sony HVR something, and identical footage shot on a 16:9 switchable Betacam with dockable DVCAM back, was negligible. The DVCAM was easier to work with, but in defense of the HDV, it contained a digital dropout of a few frames, so not infallible either.

So I'm in Still Not Sure land.

and that's

YES - 1
NOT SURE - 1
NO - 2

Although this new camera looks kind of interesting...

[www.videoguys.com.au]

Prices are Australian dollars.

Hi Jude:

As an early adopter of the Sony Z-1u, I will have to overall give HDV a thumbs-down. The codec does break up a bit on fast action and the lack of color space makes green screen a distinct PITA. I traded in my HDV camcorder for the HVX-200, it's a better codec. Last year I was shooting aton of green screen and the HVX did the trick, beautiful keys and composites.

That said, if I were extremely poor and could only afford HDV, you can still make great looking images with it, it's just not as convenient as DVCProHD for me.

Dan

So the question in my mind would be: If we're spending AU$15,000 (works out to about USD$13,000, I think) for an HDV camera, are we getting something that much better than, say, a lower-end DVCPro HD camera? I'm not much of a camera guy, so I'm hoping someone who's more jack-of-all-trades (eg. Wayne, Johan) can give some opinions about this.

On HDV, based on my limited experience, I'm in the STILL NOT SURE column. It seems to fall into an awkward middle ground between consumer and professional, and I've seen both nice-looking HDV and some awful HDV, depending on the cinematographer and the lighting situation. Which is how it is with all formats, I suppose, but if I were to spend the money to get a great cinematographer, I'd probably also go with DVCPro HD, not HDV. If I'm directing, limitations on shooting techniques would be an absolute deal breaker for my style of editing and shooting. I feel like equipment should never limit the expressive palette available to us.


www.derekmok.com

I vote YES for HDV ..... With the following specifics :
Yes for HDV when no fast action or fast camera movement is your typical working condition.
Yes for HDV when you shoot video alone and need long recording time as your workflow.

HDV or XDCAM HD or XDCAM EX by using Long Gop give you de plus and minus of MPEG 2.

I dont talk about these vs others formats or codecs , you must select the tools for your needs.

PRODUCTION D. GOYETTE
TOURNAGE / MONTAGE VIDÉO CORPORATIF
DISTRIBUTION DVD / BLU-RAY / WEB
[www.productiondgoyette.com]

Got me an Canon HV20 that I'm cutting footage into a doc with DVX and HVX. The shots that don't have much movement look every bit as good as HVX200 in 720 mode. Just don't bother with moving the camera much, although subjects moving within the frame are only slightly better. editing in FCS2 with the open format timeline on a Dual 2.0ghz is nice to get realtime preview. The small form factor will allow me to get some nice shots in places that I wouldn't dare take an HVX. I vote yes but... easy does it.

I hate to say it, but I vote YES for HDV...if shot with certain cameras.

XL-H1 and XL-A1. Sony V1U...and the JVC 720P model. (And Canon HV20...but ONLY if you have that Redrock rig...)

AND...only if you capture as ProRes and avoid the HDV codec in post. The cool thing with FCP 6.0.2 is that now you can do that...VIA FIREWIRE...on not only an intel, but also G5.

[library.creativecow.net]

I hate to admit that the format cam make good images. But again, gotta use the right recipe. Good camera, and get outta HDV asap...as mentioned.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

"but ONLY if you have that Redrock rig..."

There is also the Brevis35 which does the same thing. I have seen stunning results from a Brevis used on an HVX.

Which leads to the point that the lens counts... a lot. Other things being equal, the bigger (wider) the lens, the better.

Not too many years ago, this question could be phrased something like "Does 16mm actually suck or not?". That question was seldom asked, because film people understood the limitations of 16mm film - the cost vs. performance compromises.

HDV has limitations, and it has an important advantage - It's cheap! If you're on a budget, you can acquire beautiful HDV footage for considerably less than other HD formats. If you're going to choose ANY medium or format for a project, you would be wise to learn its characteristics, including its limitations (Remember cost can be a limitation) before you start your project.

HDV has been great for what I've needed it for - but I was pretty clear on its limitations before I started using it.

Travis
VoiceOver Guy and Entertainment Technology Enthusiast
[www.VOTalent.com]

I vote FOR HDV.

So, to this point, the vote is

YES : 6 (I'm assuming Baz was a yes for this)
NOT SURE : 2
NO : 3

The YES vote seems to be tempered with
1. Understand the limitations you could face during shooting.
2. Use the best lens you can and
3. Get out of Long GOP as soon as practicable.

NOs are mostly about
1. Problems with fast action
2. Colour space / Green screen problems
3. Long GOP trauma

The vote is still open.

I vote YES. But you can always spend more money.

Is it just me, but does every option on the market at the moment have fairly severe limitations in some form?

Only used Sony HDV cams, never had issues with import/export - looking forward to my next one where I'm going to import via ProRes and see the difference - will I see the difference? FX1..

Ta. May as well make the most of a rare friendly HDV topic on here - nice work Jude

I vote Yes primarily because many broadcasters now accept it as an HD capturing medium. So the equation is pretty simple, if you can buy a $6k camera and get paid the same amount of money you'd get paid had you bought a $20-40k (+lens) camera, that's an easy choice.

One reason they accept it is because they've all gotten hooked on integrating footage from Joe Sixpack and THEY all have HDV cams now. Also, if you shoot carefully, it looks great. No two ways about it. It becomes increasingly hard to tell the difference between HDV and I-frame codecs after all the transfering and compressing a broadcaster does to it by the time it airs.

For shooters, the money is in reality TV and news, neither of which are particularly quality dependent even though both are going HD out of necessity. As an editor, why fight it? If you can make HDV look better than the next guy, embrace it and take the money.

If you're working (shooting) for day rates, there's no way to justify spending $70k on a set of gear when you get paid the same for having spent $20k. For that money, HDV puts many good shooters into the ranks of owner/operators whereas having to spend $70K for a DVC-ProHD set-up- such as an HVX-900 with all the accoutrements- keeps them renting which only benefits rental houses.

HDV is here and probably not going away any time sooon. Might as well make the most of it.

A bit of a stuck record but from an Offline & Online experience of HDV...

Grading HDV is a nasty nasty experience - if you shoot HDV make sure you get it right on the shoot as there is little you can do afterwards, it responds like bad Canon consumer DV...

Why limit yourself to only shooting talking heads and slow pans of low detail? It is a definite no for sports (or horse riding )

Many UK broadcasters won't touch HDV as a master and not even for acquisition without prior confirmation which can slow up any possible commission.

Its nice that you can get a long record time but you'd be better looking at XDCAM HD if you can't get an HVX200 with FireStore (or similar).

You don't get little glitches with HDV, damage to certain areas of LongGOP can cause a whole second and often more to be totally unusable.

SD DVD conversion of HDV looks great but HD DVD (or HD broadcast) breaks up like a Rubik's cube under the feet of a Mardi Gras parade.

It was a stupid format to start with, it should have had a higher bit-rate and better colour sampling.

Go with XDCAM HD if you need longer recording or DVCproHD and a FireStore if you want quality with longer recording times.

Ask anyone on tapeless workflow, the time saved is worth the extra cost (as if there was much in it!) of the better quality tapeless formats.

Avoid HDV like the plague unless you are given one for free and have no other choice but to work with it.

I vote: No



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

i will echo all the other reasons for the NO column. as you all know from my MANY old rants - im the BIGGEST opponent of HDV. i shot with all three (canon, sony, and jvc) original HDV camera offerings and they all suffered from the same problems. camera/rapid motion artifacts/judder, workflow convolution, dicey when working with graphics.

some folks have found ways around some or all of this. i just personally dont have the time nor interest to dick around trying to make a fundamentally flawed codec fit into my workflow. VIVA LA DVCPROHD!

the argument that HDV doesnt handle camera motion well alone gets it a thumbs-down in my book. i shoot a variety of work. and often the camera moves. IMO, a video camera that doesnt handle movement well is called a still camera.

May I ask

XDCAM HD vs HDV -- aren't they both long GOP -- does XDCAM do something different than HDV that avoids some of these problems?

We're considering the XDCAM EX -- it's received good reviews for it's 1/2 inch chip - pro lens and shallower depth of field

but will we have the same editing problems and panning artifacts as HDV? Thanks Andy

In my opinion, it's not easy to vote globally for or against.
It depends on the circumstances and what you need it for.

For interviews, narrative, etc under controlled environments HDV can look stunning. We all know that. XDCAM EX should be even better. Supposedly, underexposure noise and shaky camera motion can break the long GOP approach, but it has to be rather extreme.

For heavy post-production work, even if converted to a production codec, the color grid is too destructive and the compression is too much. I certainly prefer DVCPRO HD for keying and secondary color correction, for example. This is not to say that it's better overall. For my line of work, where these tasks are everyday things, HDV is not good enough.

Adolfo Rozenfeld
Buenos Aires - Argentina
www.adolforozenfeld.com

i think were getting off on what should be another thread - but xdcam still shoots to a delivery format - which makes it also a thumbs-down IMO.

Hi Jude,

good idea for a poll. I've been using HDV since it hit the market with results in line with what everyone is saying. The format has its plus points, but the downside involves a lot of workarounds and inherent disappointments.

Maybe this sheds some light on the discussion (quoted from Sony's initial press release in 2004):

>>Sony Corporation today introduced the world's first consumer HDV 1080i compatible Digital High Definition (HD) video camcorder, <HDR-FX1>. This new camcorder contains various newly developed semiconductors, utilizing Sony's most advanced circuitry technology.<<

Notice one key word: consumer. Initially, Sony never touted HDV as being a professional tool, although they did use the words "Digital High Definition (HD)", which I think was pretty misleading and certainly created a lot of confusion. After adding better audio connections and a few other features they then claimed the newer cameras to be "for professional use", but mainly reserved the HD label for their higher end (and far more expensive) cameras. I think that the marketingspeak got overlooked by a whole lot of people who were expecting, and were maybe led to believe, that HDV was the upgrade from DV to HD.

Arguably, DV was never full SD (i.e. not Uncompressed 10 Bit), so the name HDV could also only point to a downsized version of HD. Same with DVCProHD, which doesn't outrightly claim to be full HD, although it maybe lets you think so.

Meantime, 3 years later, we're still waiting for a BluRay or HD DVD standard delivery format, not to mention a standard HD tape format. Web compression and delivery is a specialty in itself.

Voting time: is HDV a useful medium? Sometimes. So I guess bottom line, the answer has to be yes. I wouldn't kill it with a stick, but expectations as to what it is and what it can and can't do have to be realistic. Its just another sign o' the times, staying on top of a jungle of codecs, formats, and delivery specs.

Clay

This all so reminds me of the whole DV argument. It was a consumer format. No pro would touch it. Most of network news is now in DV25. The same will happen with HDV or AVCHD or some other format that Sony decides is for consumers, but professional adopt.

The first year DV came out Sony didn't bring any of its DV cameras to NAB. They said it wasn't for broadcasters. Panasonic was the only ones showing a DV camera, not a very good one, but it was mobbed. The following year Sony had it's prosumer line there, and the year after, its consumer models. They've been showing HDV at NAB since it came out. Had a full-size HDV camera in a plexiglass box as well as their XDCAMex mockups. Next year they'll be showing AVCHD cameras as well.

The point is these are all acquisition formats, and market forces will ensure that they will be used, especially when cameras for well under $1000 can produce excellent pictures. If you want to do post with them, especially compositing, upres it to ProRes or something. That'll be the most likely workflow for AVCHD and XDCAMex and HDV. If you have to shoot green screen, shoot in a different format for that material, and bring it as ProRes the same as your other material shot on a cheaper camera.

Terrific point, Tom. A big part of it is getting used to the limitations. That said, however, the film-school world I was in had the exact opposite reaction to DV from the broadcast-world reaction you described. My old film school was not exactly the best in terms of equipment, and the few first-year students who had DV cameras in 1998 were red-hot properties. (One of them, who had a Japanese VX1000, was recruited as the cinematographer on 30 or so of our first-year projects, out of 70 students.) It took some time for us to realize that the looks we wanted lay more in the cinematographer than in the DV format.


www.derekmok.com

The new format that the Sony PMW-EX1 primarily shoots in is XDCAM EX. It is a 35Mbps format versus HDVs 25Mbps so it should look a bit better. But it's still long GOP. Why would I shoot with a 35Mbps long GOP format when I already shoot in a 100 Mbps format?

Best,

Dan

"Why would I shoot with a 35Mbps long GOP format when I already shoot in a 100 Mbps format?"

Because going from 25 to 35 Mbps is not a small jump but a big one. A third more. And its a full 1920x1080 resolution, unlike DVCPRO-HD and HDV.

And the new PMW-EX1 blows the doors off of every single under $10,000 camera. I have recently looked at both HVX-200 footage and EX1 footage on HD monitors and there is no comparison. The HVX-200 is more like "super-PAL" in hindsight.

Honestly, this poll is made less relevant by the introduction of the PMW-EX1 and the full-HD XDCAM-HD codec.

If you can afford six or eight grand, why touch HDV at all? HDV is now for the three to four grand and below HD world. And DVCPRO-HD can take its place back with the high end Varicams and HVX-900s.

The new middle ground is XDCAM-HD EX until Panasonic or JVC catches up to the resolution and performance in this class.

-Christopher

Ah, OK, to this point I think the vote is

YES : 9
NOT SURE : 4
NO : 5

Which is kind of surprising to me. In a good way.

If you do reply to this thread, please include what kind of vote you want to make. If I'm not sure which way you fall, I'm going to put you in the NOT SURE category. Which is fine, if that's where you want to be, of course.

In what way surprising?

Surprising because my general impression was that HDV was a pain and was going to end up mostly as a no vote.

And you haven't answered my question on the other thread. So now you owe me.

I actually just got back from the premiere of a feature film made by a bunch of mates of mine that they shot on HDV, edited on FCP. A whole 80 minute gore fest for $6,500 AU (and lots of freebies) - coming soon to an online DVD seller near you. It was a brilliant job, for the money, and really only possible because they were able to utilise a borrowed HDV camera. Soooo.. I might have to change my vote, at some point.