The hands down winner is the camera that exists.

The XDCAM-HD cameras are well proven already, in extreme conditions even, and they have proven workflows. Highly portable, self-contained, no cables to a hard disk box unless that's what you want. Shoots on robust and fast media that are perfect for archiving too.

The Silicon Imaging camera should be next in availability. At least a prototype has been used in field production, and because it isn't quite so far out there in the engineering, it should mature fairly quickly. Still, I don't know if they have committed to a firm delivery date, and there's always a possibility that there will be surprises with cold or heat or humidity or long lenses or whatever. For editing, I believe you're looking at pulling out your PP to do the work (not Vegas at this time).

RED has the cool factor down pat, everything looks great, lots of exciting engineering, it is just not known when it will be rock solid, but it looks like next summer at the earliest for the whole system. Then heavy wiring, etc.

Now what do you want to shoot with your new high end camera?

That makes a big difference.

If they deliver then clearly RED is going to offer the best image, next will be the SI camera followed by XDCAM F350.
What the camera is capable of matters little. What image YOU can get from it is what matters.
Both the RED and SI cameras are digital film cameras in the true sense. That means nothing auto, period. Under controlled shooting situations I don't see that as an issue. With the XDCAM and the rest of the pack at the very least you get autoexposure and the whole unit is in one package, you can pull the camera out of a box, insert media and be good to go in under a minute.
The other issue to factor is how and where you can use the camera and the attendant costs. For example we have an ABC Lightweight crane, you can take that crane mountain climbing. You could fly the SI camera on it, RED, just maybe. The XDCAM no way. So with any camera you need to factor in the cost of ancilliary grips like gear.
You also need to factor in the impact of the camera on the scene in front of it. That may mean nothing or everything, depends what you plan to shoot.
And there's the useability aspect. The XDCAM cameras and the other less expensive units are designed with ergonomics in mind. That may have a huge bearing on the shots that you bring back.

I haven't mentioned post costs, I don't think they're an issue these days. You can shoot with the SI or RED cameras and downscale to DV25 if that's all you need / can afford to work with.

As you've probably figure out too, with both the RED and SI cameras you need you to supply lenses and they'll have a significant impact on image quality and final cost. Same goes for XDCAM although you can probably get a pretty decent bundled deal out of Sony. Don't forget to allow for matte boxes, filters, rods, follow focus gear. None of that stuff is cheap.

We're thinking very seriously about the SI camera but that's a business decision. If I had unlimited funds and was buying a camera for my own personal use I'd be thinking very seriously about the F350.

Bob.

For example we have an ABC Lightweight crane, you can take that crane mountain climbing. You could fly the SI camera on it, RED, just maybe. The XDCAM no way. So with any camera you need to factor in the cost of ancilliary grips like gear.

Good point about the grip gear, but don't the RED and SI cameras also need a bulky computer box to store the video bits on?

I'd be delighted to carry a PDW-F350 in my backpack for mountain climbing, together with my Microdolly jib (crane) which can handle up to 50+ lb. cameras, and can use locally available materials including rocks and/or water in bags for counterbalance.

Speaking of the great outdoors, I could recharge the batteries in my PDW-F350 from a simple off-the-shelf solar cell setup. With a RED or SI, I expect it would take a bit more, perhaps I'd have to hang a Honda generator over one shoulder also :O).

Don't get me wrong, I'd love a working SI or RED, but they won'[t be the right tool for any shoot.

If you hurry you may be fortunate enough to give the people at red 1000.00 to reserve your 18k red!! Oct 31 the reservation line ends. This thing has the best ad scam dudes workin since they worked on 24p, that wonderful jumpy ass dv format. IMHO

24p, that wonderful jumpy ass dv format

Ummm, have you ever been to a movie theater?


(24p does take more careful camera work, but it does have proven dramatic advantages too.)

yeah seen a few movies done in 24 fps film looked great,, 24p dv looks like shi%,, of course thats my opinion

Good point about the grip gear, but don't the RED and SI cameras also need a bulky computer box to store the video bits on?
=====================================================
Yes.
If you're planning on acquiring the full 4K then RED's going to need some serious storage. With the SI you only need a laptop and a USB drive, don't know for certain yet however I suspect with RED you might be able to do the same at less than 4K.

However my point is the amount of weight you put on the end of the jib. With the SI camera the head is extremely small and light. Both cameras will of course need glass and that can be very heavy, probably with the SI camera any glass will be heavier than the camera. With the SI camera you're also going to have to factor in a battery to power the head but Li-Ion isn't terribly heavy, particularly if you only need to run the head for under an hour.

With both cameras and remote recording you still need a cable(s) back to the recording device. With the SI camera that's only off the shelf Cat 6 cable, good for 100M and so cheap you wouldn't care if you broke it.

The other place where you'd save money (and muscle) is Steadycam shots. Every kilo you shed off the camera is at least 2 Kg you shed on the weight of the rig, if you get to use a lighter rig even more weight is saved. If you've ever tried using a steadycam kind of rig that can be a BIG issue unless you're built like Arnie. Petite blonds in a steadycam rig look pretty hot, what you don't see in those product shots are the medics on standby.

The great news is we're going to have more options, the RED and SI and other similar units in the works are going change the landscape a lot. My understanding is that this isn't due to any of the conspiracy theory bunk about Sony or Panny, it's the advances in silicon that have enabled this. The sensor technology I think has been around for a while, it's the rest of the bits needed to deal with the image in a practical way that's been the issue.

Bob.

Red is likely going to take a similar approach to SI, recording compressed RAW. Right now, it seems like you will be able to record compressed RAW onto an on-board SATA drive. On-board 4K recording will be a feature I believe- this is one of the big things they were showing at IBC.

With the *4K* workflow, you run the footage through Redcine software. The first pass will generate offline cutting copies. When you are finished the offline, you conform the project back through Redcine.
You can at this point apply a higher-quality de-bayer, and spit out uncompressed 4K files for online.

The Red workflows are still being worked out. For the lower formats, it would be nice to see something like Cineform RAW- shoot compressed RAW, real-time de-bayer as you edit. Ideally, you could edit directly off the camera media- no log & capture or anything like that.

Heck, they might even implement cineformRAW onto the camera (this is just my speculation). It could make sense. Or they might use other aspect's Cineform's technology, like its ability to work in the different NLEs with fast performance.



I think economics and pricing strategy play a big role in this. Suppose cameras are similar to software in its cost. Software has a very low per-unit cost, but high initial R&D costs. You either charge a very high margin and have low volume, or you lower your margin and have much greater volume.
Avid VS Final Cut demonstrates this... Final Cut has a much, much lower margin than Avid (a fraction) but makes up for this in volume (500,000 registered users according to Apply). Another example would be Apple reducing Shake's pricing to $500 (from a few thousand)... they can do this because they can make up for it in volume.

Bob, no argument. When I bought my Arri in 1990 various people warned me that film would be dead in 5 years, cinemas would be getting everything by satellite download. This was good, because I got the camera at a nice price. Now I think we're within that formerly mythical 5 year window, although satellite download of 4K is still pie-in-the-sky.
Sensors of adequate resolution have been around for a while, but getting the data out at the required rate has been the difficulty. RED et al appear to have that licked.

Tell Jim Janard, the developer of Red (and owner of Oakley Sunglass) that he is full of it. The sensor was demoed at IBC---the images were exquisite. Risce sounds like an amateur.

The misunderstanding is not about DV per se (which at least in NTSC 4:1:1 looks mostly unacceptable when transferred to 4:2:0 DVD in my eyes), but about camera movement.

24P requires very smooth camera movement (far more than with 60i).

The ultimate here is achieved through the use of a "gear head" and lots of practice, where you don't pan and tilt with a handle but with frantic cranking on wheels to move the camera, usually around a nodal pint even.

Then you get smoooooooooooth, even with a little DV camera.

Not really sure why people find panning such an issue. Surely most pans are done for one of two reasons:
1) expand the field of view, or
2) follow action

If the first, then people do need to have time to see what you're showing them. If following action, you're not watching the background. If you're looking for artifacts, then they're there by the buckets in standard DV. But looking for artifacts takes your attention from content. Yes, I know that artifacts can be so intrusive that they grab your attention; that was a problem, because I was looking for them, when I first started watching DVDs on a large screen.
So I still pan at the 5 secs per screen width that I learned for 24fps and you can do that smoothly handheld (shoulder brace) or with a fluid head on a good tripod. 50i allows faster, but mostly why not do a straight cut if I want it to all blur passed (smoothly or otherwise)?
Probably the matter arises because many people have grown up watching TV and notice those differences inherent in a slower frame rate, while being used to poor colour and resolution. Others have spent their time with film and see undesirable artifacts in video. Does it matter? Obviously depends what you're shooting; ball sports: frame rate is an issue. For narrative it isn't and whatever equipment or system you use, you must have skill to get the best outcome from it.

..........Risce sounds like an amateur.........
Sorry, thought Amateurs also could state an opininion,

I think the issue arises for a number of reasons.
Still the only common progressive scan format available for video is 24p but that is changing.
A few folks jump onto the 24p bandwagon without realising just what they're buying into, don't know how to display / shoot it or understand that the primary reason movies on the big screen look the way they do is the centuries of combined experience of those out of shot. Even just having enough people on the shoot counts for a lot, everyone stays (or should) focussed on their role and their role alone. The techos stay focussed on their part, wardrobe, makeup do their bit and the people making the creative decisions don't have to worry about grot on the gate, logging shots, numbering reels etc. This just doesn't apply to the big budget shoots either, being organised counts for a lot and it seems to me part of human nature that creativity and an organised mind are kind of mutually exclusive

The other trap with 24p is shutter speed, anything faster than 1/60th of a second and nasty motion seems a sure thing. I've not dabbled much with 25p but during my brief messing around with it I rapdily learnt that much. Much easier with a film camera where the shutter speed is fixed.

Quite apart from all that, both RED and the SI camera are certainly capable of more than 24fps, I await 60p with anticipation although I did read an interesting article that suggests that even 60p is not the limit of human perception.

Bob.