Has anyone used the Sony HVR-Z7U ( interchangable lenses)?

Has anyone used the Sony HVR-Z7U ( interchangable lenses)?
The price is still alot more attractive than the new XDCam range.

Any opinions?

Thanks
Dom

Yeah. Controversial ones. HDV as a format stinks. Either get the HVX-200a, or the soon coming HPX-170. Both record DVCPRO HD. Or look into AVCHD cameras that record to easy to find and inexpenive SD cards. Avoid the capture process entirely.


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Hang on a sec, Shane. You're saying HDV sucks, but as an alternative you're pimping AVCHD? You're a smart guy, so when I hear you say something that's seemingly insane, I assume I'm just stupid. Please explain how I'm stupid on this one.

I disagree that HDV sux. When it's shot right, it's pretty spectacular. You just have to get out of that codec as soon as possible into an edit-friendly codec (ProRes for example)

That's just my 2 cents.

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

"Super 35 sucks. It's impossible to edit on my iMac."

(No. I'm not saying HDV is the same as 35. I'm just saying that "hard to edit" isn't necessarily a deal-breaker. Sometimes it's a trade-off you're willing to make in the name of overall cost or to avoid a tapeless workflow.)

Does anybody understand color space in video here?

The unprecedented standard before HD?? was color space 4:2:2. Sony went off the edge of civility and started using a compressed 4:2:0 or MPEG-2 for recording to.

Granted that the new ATSC standard for broadcasting digital TV is MPEG-2 and AC3 audio but why start with an inferior format ?

The task of getting all those extra pixels of 1080 is a daunting task, especially going over Firewire but DVCPRO HD is the ONLY codec that uses 4:2:2 color space.

If you don't understand why the extra bits of chrominance are useful, please review what color space is used for in video.

AVCHD uses H.264 or Mpeg part 10 which is a much more modern codec than Mpeg 2.

If you have ever encoded anything into H.264 you can tell immediately how much better that codec is than is MPEG-2

Not to nitpick, John ? okay, fine, I do mean to nitpick, since this is a very important nit ? but 4:2:2 is not a color space. It's a chroma subsampling pattern. And unless you're pulling a key, the difference between 4:2:2 and 4:2:0 or 4:1:1 is pretty negligible.

And of course DVCPRO HD isn't the only 4:2:2 format out there. HDCAM SR is either 4:2:2 or 4:4:4, and XDCAM HD422 is 4:2:2, as the name implies.

And just to complete the nitpicking: HDCAM (not SR) is sometimes referred to as 3:1:1, because it records a non-square-pixel 1440x1080 raster. Didn't stop George Lucas from using it, or lots of other filmmakers. DVCPRO HD gets its 4:2:2 I-frame-compressed footage inside 100 Mbps by recording only 1280 horizontal samples. You can definitely see the softness compared to HDCAM or, yes, HDV. You're gaining vertical chroma resolution by sacrificing horizontal and vertical luma resolution. It's a trade-off, not a clearly superior format.

What kind of work are you doing, Dom? Do you need masses of colour correction, or is it more ENG end?

Well, so sorry to nitpick BUT I have used HDV and DVCPRO and HDV has problems with fast pans and sudden zooming. The format can not pick up the nuance of chrominance that 4:2:2 can, so whether or not you call it color space, there is a difference to be recokened with.

Those of us with the HVX200 are not as colorful as the HPX500 or better 2/3" cameras but that doesn't invalidate the advantage of 4:2:2, no matter how Sony tries to play this.

John, it's not about Sony "trying to play" anything. You're coming at this like it's some sort of objective question, where one format is clearly and obviously superior to the other. It just ain't so.

I'm not sure what you're referring to with "problems with fast pans and sudden zooming," but it sounds like you might be talking about rolling-shutter artifacts. That's got nothing to do with HDV-the-format.

Can HDV be used to shoot home movies? Sure, absolutely. Can it be used in creative filmmaking? Definitely. Can it be used it broadcast? It can be, and has been. It is, by any useful definition of the term, a totally viable format. Does that mean you have to love it? No, of course not. It's just kinda silly to talk about it like it's a complete non-starter. That is not the case.

>I disagree that HDV sux. When it's shot right, it's pretty spectacular. You just have to get out of that codec as soon as possible into an edit-friendly codec (ProRes for example)

I'd agree to disagree that HDV sux. As an acquisition format it certainly has its limitations, but when well shot, taking those limitations into account when shooting, HDV can be gorgeous.

As for posting with HDV and needing to get out of the codec and into an edit friendly one asap ... well this has been stated so much and so often, and by plenty of wiser ones than me, its become a bit of a mantra. But I don't know, it rings a little hollow.

As far as I can see it, HDV is not an unfiendly codec to edit with, at least not these days when considering the number crunching power of todays Pro Apps oriented Macs, and the ability within FCP6 to set your rendering codec to ProRes 422 whilst otherwise working with the native footage, or indeed as Jeff does, to edit with the native HDV directly in a ProRes timeline.

If HDV is you've got as source, then unless there is a specific reason why working with that HDV would be problematic or somehow unreliable in any given workflow, then its hard to understand why you'd have to get out of that codec asap

Dom, with a good lens, and if your shooting style is conducive to the limitations of HDV's limited constant bit rate long GOP codec, then the Z7U should be a great camera for you ... XDCAM's higher and variable bit rate format though is far superior. As always, you will get what you pay for.

The HDV codec "breaks" with certain motion inputs when shooting, it's that simple. I have experienced it and it makes sense, giving what you know about the codec and compression rate. Since it is a long GOP format, what could be a tiny partial frame dropout on MiniDV could become a huge glitch in HDV, could screw up that once in a lifetime interview with Brad Pitt.

Other than these two limitations, HDV is a viable format, I have shot some great looking footage with it. I do own an HVX-200 and I do think it looks better than the HDV codec, but it all depends on what you shoot, your mindset about buying tons of cheap tapes versus tons of cheap hard drives for archiving, etc. I too have heard from the gurus who really know this stuff that the AVCHD codec at good data rates will make HDV look like you know what, I tend to believe some of these commentators like Barry Green who have already seen the difference first hand.

HDV is old tech and is on it's way out.

Best,

Dan

This is what I get for starting something while at the Denver Airport between planes.

Sony and Panasonic are behind AVCHD...and Sony ITSELF has said that AVCHD (MPEG-4 H.264 Long GOP, not MPEG-2) is twice as efficient as HDV. THEY said it. And it is new MPEG-4 vs old legacy MPEG-2.

That and AVCHD cameras record onto hard drives or Flash cards. Flash cards are cheap, and you can buy them anywhere. You can fit an hour on an 8GB card. And you don't need a deck to import the footage, faster than real time import....and no wear and tear on your camera.

But, as Jude asked, what type of stuff will you be using the camera for? Corporate? Documentary? Indy Film? Commercials? Weddings? In a short while Panasonic will come out with the HMC-150 AVCHD camera, in the HPX-170 form factor. Light weight and VERY sharp.


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Quote

Does anybody understand color space in video here?

It sounds like you don't, John because you keep referring to the chroma sub sampling number as "color space". RGB / ITU-R 601 / CCIR 601 / 709 = THAT'S COLOR SPACE. If we're gonna nitpick, let's get the terminology correct so people don't get confused.

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Not to take this thread back on topic, but...

Dom,
A few months ago the company I'm at did some tests between a Z1U, V1U, Z7U, and EX-1. We already owned a Z1U and a V1U and were looking for another camera for the stable. The EX-1 was definitely the best of the bunch but the Z7U was no slouch either. We had some problems w/corrupt clips from the Z7U when we used the CF card, but I haven't seen any complaints about that so we might have just had a bug somewhere in the mix.

As far as the merits of the various flavors of HD... it's horses for courses, IMO. DVCPro HD has the 4:2:2 color sampling but isn't as sharp. HDV can sharper but could fall apart w/lots of fast motion and fine detail. AVCHD is 'more efficient' than HDV but also so CPU intensive that you have to transcode it to ProRes or AIC (hello bigger, faster HDDs). XDCAM EX looks w-o-w but both the EX cameras use a CMOS sensor w/a rolling shutter resulting in odd artifacting under certain circumstances. It's all a compromise especially in the sub-$10k camera market.


-A

This is all interesting stuff. In my mind up till now I saw AVCHD as something that fits in your hand, with a fixed lens, used for shooting trips to India, for less than a thousand bucks.

Are there more broadcast quality AVCHD cameras?

Panasonic is working on two...but I think the market they are aiming for is specifically the Corporate/wedding/specialty market...and conventions. The HMC-150 I think is the model. Same form factor as the HPX-170, only it is AVCHD and records to CF cards. Grade 4 or 6 preferred. There is a shoulder mount camera with professional outputs...dunno that model.


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That's the AG-HMC70. It's only got a 1/4" sensor, so it's kinda on the "sumer" side of "prosumer." The as-yet-mythical AG-HMC150 is supposed to be Panasonic's "real" AVCHD camera.

Sony has no pro AVCHD gear that I'm aware of.

I think it's safe to say that whatever its technical merits or liabilities, it's still way too early to consider investing in an AVCHD production pipeline.

I hate to sound blue-sky, but I really wonder what kind of long-term impact Red will have on the high-end prosumer/low-end professional market. Not that I think we're all gonna be shooting on Scarlets by this time next year or anything, but I really wonder whether Scarlet will tap into a demand for greater-than-HD cinematography for the little guys.

I wish I could skip ahead in time a year and watch the same wedding or indie short film shot on Scarlet, HDV and AVCHD. If Red comes up with some kind of solid workflow, could shooting 3K and downscaling to HD be the next big thing?

The HMC-150 ain't mythical. I held one in my hand and played around with it on Thursday. Even recorded a shot or two.

RED...is a FILM camera. There is no way you can grab the thing for a quick run-and-gun interview or a few shots of b-roll. It wasn't designed to take on the video camera HD market, it was designed to take on the FILM market. Scarlet might be a contender, but if it is anything like the Red One, then it is a mini film camera.


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Okay, fair enough. I meant "mythical" in the sense of "not available for purchase."

And Shane, not to be argumentative, but remember when shooting HD meant using a giant Ikegami studio monitor? If there's a demand for it, technology trickles down. What I was musing about was whether there's gonna turn out to be a demand for shooting 3K in the market that normally buys $3,000 cameras. A year from now it's possible ? far from a sure thing, but possible ? that we're all gonna be talking about Panasonic's/Sony's/whomever's upcoming $5,000 4K camera, or whatever. It's possible that before long, bickering over HDV versus AVCHD versus DVCPRO HD will be about as relevant as D-1 versus D-2.

HD used to mean VERY high end...but that was HD was in it's infancy. Just like SD meant 1" and Beta and digibeta and...Umatic (cringe) and MII. What about VHS? Hi-8? Then came DV, and it was quickly adopted.

There are high end broadcast HD cameras, and low end HD cameras that both fit and don't fit the broadcast stream. What is accepted as HD is up to the network that is doing the show. Standards seem to have flown out the window. ANd that sucks.


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Shane Ross Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There is a shoulder mount camera with professional
> outputs...dunno that model.

Are you thinking of the AJ-HPX2000 which can record either DVCPro/HD or AVC-Intra? AVC-Intra of course shouldn't be confused w/AVCHD. Can we get a few more formats going? Please? I mean DVCPro HD, HDV1, HDV2, Canon's HDV2 variant, XDCAM HD, XDCAM EX, XDCAM HD 422, HDCAM, HDCAM SR, Redcode, Cineform, AVCHD, AVC-Intra, and D5 just aren't enough. Ugh.


-A

No no. There are two models of the AVCHD line of cameras from Panasonic. And Jeff got the number...the AG-HMC70. The HMC-150 is the one that is the HPX-170 form factor.

No...AVCHD and AVCIntra are not the same things. AVCIntra...top of the line. In the realm of HDCAM and high end XDCAM, although MUCH better. DVCPRO HD...good midrange HD. Comparable to XDCAM 35 and 50. AVCHD, prosumer level...a very solid replacement for HDV.

Three HD formats. Yeah...ugly. Sony has this too...FIVE actually. HDCAM SR, HDCAM, XDCAM...variety of flavors, HDV, AVCHD. Even Sony admits that AVCHD is twice as good as HDV.


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Quote

I think it's safe to say that whatever its technical merits or liabilities, it's still way too early to consider investing in an AVCHD production pipeline.

I would slightly disagree with this statement at least as far as post.

Regarding investing time:

Those of us on at least a Dual 2GHz PPC G5 or higher spec Mac are capable of using all the Digital formats (with the exception of some RED stuff) and to understand how to use it doesn't take long or at least its as quick as a post and response from the LAFCPUG!

As far as investing money:

For post as I have said above its already a possibility, albeit with a few downloads and software (cheap or free) updates.

Regarding Digital Storage cameras - especially Prosumer - either spend time checking out the formats til you are happy...

or

buy it, shoot with it, edit with it and sell it on eBay if its not right - after all solid state is not like tape - we don't need the camera to re-ingest the footage once we have it!

One DOP/Cameraman I know has done this on many occasions and we just adapt the new format into the workflow without fuss.


So when investing - invest in a setup that can handle anything - thats what I did so now I can ingest virtually anything, hook up any broadcast deck or telecine so if I require it I can hire it. Plug in any camera or data card.

My system can easily run uncompressed 2K/HD so I know I won't have datarate issues with anything else...

We don't need to worry about what the format is so much anymore, only how best to use it to achieve great results.



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