OT: Panasonic HDC-SD100

A friend asked me about this cam and I know little about it. I believe it is an AVC Inter framed cam
and assume that the footage shot with it would be able to be edited with FC in a 1920x1080i sequence. Any opinions?
Thanks,
Steve

steve-sharksdelight

Do a search on "AVCHD" in the forums.. Lots been covered.



www.strypesinpost.com

I did that first, however, the search came up with nothing which is why I asked here regarding this specific cam.
Steve

steve-sharksdelight

There's lots of discussion on the format. I'm not sure why that term doesn't bring a result, as that works for me.

In a nutshell, you'll prefer working on an Intel mac (L&T will transcode AVCHD to ProRes or AIC), and you'll need LOTS of storage. Or a PPC with Voltaic or the Toast plugin to transcode to ProRes and have LOTS of storage.



www.strypesinpost.com

Possibly because it's "AVC Intra," not "AVC Inter." That's "Intra" as in "intra-frame compression only."

Hi Jeff,

I jut checked. It is AVCHD which is an Inter frame codec, Temporal and Spatial compression. Long GOP H.264, don't you know.

--ken

Ah, I stand corrected. I'd never heard the term "AVC Inter" before, and took it for a typo. Silly me for not googling.

Thanks, Ken.

Nope, it's AVCHD. AVC-Intra is only available on the professional models, I don't think they released it for the consumer models yet.

[www.panasonic.ca]



www.strypesinpost.com

Hi Jeff,

Did you ever see the movie 'Sneakers' with Robert Redford?

"Too many secrets".

Well, in our new brave world of 'HD'.

"Too many codecs".

--ken

Wow. You guys are fast.

Panny uses High Profile, 4.1, H.264, Interframe compression, up to 24 Mb/s, with 4:2:0 chroma subsampling, 8 bit depth.

Avc-Intra is High 422, intra only.

But to use that in FCP, it's quite processor intensive and requires transcoding so you'll need lots of drive space.



www.strypesinpost.com

That was really my whole question. Other than knowing that the Panny HDC-SD100 was an Inter based AVC cam, I was not sure how easy it would be to edit in FC with it. I was simply trying to get its workflow for use with FC. Thanks for those who responded.
Steve

steve-sharksdelight

One wouldn't be too surprised to discover that a future update to Final Cut adds native AVC Intra editing. It's not incomprehensible; ProRes is also a very processor-intensive high-bit-rate codec, and we use the hell out of that. AVC Intra at least has the benefit of being I-frame only, which means the computer only has to decode one frame at a time, instead of having to decode whole GOPs like it does with HDV, to name an example.

But yeah, I think AVCHD is going to occupy the same market segment as HDV: Inexpensive, widely available in consumer equipment, but still heavily compressed and difficult to work with.

(Just to totally nerd it up, AVC Intra nominally comes in two flavors: a 50 megabit variety that's 4:2:0, and a 100 megabit variety that's 4:2:2. Though I haven't seen it myself, word on the street is that AVC Intra 100 significantly outperforms DVCPRO HD at the same data rate, largely due to AVC Intra's full-raster nature.)

And finally, to elaborate on the major caveat of AVCHD, Final Cut transcodes AVCHD shots to ProRes when you import them through log-and-transfer. This takes time, and how much time depends on your system, but suffice to say it's not instantaneous. Also, ProRes wants roughly 60 GB per hour of 1080i.

So I guess the real answer here is "Yes, with a but."

I would like Avc support for the Intra and the inter frame versions. It makes very little sense to transcode rushes from a 24 Mb/s into a 220Mb/s format for the rushes. We're talking about expanding storage up to 4 times just to work with it.

Although that may mean a different workflow/approach, eg. cuts only preview and long render times/render out to ProRes...

As for processor intensive codecs, Graeme may mention more about wavelets and RED workflows. Working with it pre-Grand Central, on a 32 bit NLE, may be a bit of a dream.

>word on the street is that AVC Intra 100 significantly outperforms DVCPRO HD at the same data
>rate, largely due to AVC Intra's full-raster nature.

I won't be surprised. They are based on different technology. AvcIntra uses a more advanced compression scheme. Panasonic compares AvcIntra to Jpeg2000, which is based on wavelets.

> Final Cut transcodes AVCHD shots to ProRes when you import them through log-and-transfer

To re-emphasize, that is only supported on Intel macs.



www.strypesinpost.com

Just to add Jeff:

AVC Intra is also a 10 bit codec, DVC Pro HD is an 8 bit codec. The difference between the two is pretty obvious when you see them on screen, with AVC Intra looking quite a bit cleaner and has no banding on gradients and is a bit sharper and smoother. The new Panasonic HPX300 is the first AVC Intra capable camcorder under $25k and it looks pretty impressive, I got to play with it last week. An amazing tool that streets for $8,495.00 with the lens.

Editors who do green screen, compositing and visual effects will really like the AVC Intra codec, is it is the latest and most sophisticated codec for professional video and is essentially D5 quality on a P2 card. The results can look pretty stunning.

Dan