As the market matures, prices and saturation will improve. I have 3 VX2000's, and will probably get a VX2100 soon. HD isn't in my plans for at least another year. Let everyone else stumble into it. I'll wait until it's more relevant in the real world.

I'd kind of written SD off until I saw Vic Milt's Florida Cowboys movie and was reminded of just how good SD can look.

I agree. Listen, HD is awesome, with the right TV, taped correctly, etc. But I'm not going to sit down now in front of my favorite standard DVD's (documentaries taped in SD) and wince while watching them. I read a quote from a couple of the leaders of AMD in a "Creative Cow" magazine I received recently; they said how they want to make "technology get out of the way, becoming invisible to users. What if we could get the tech out of the way and get users working at the speed of thought?" Until HD is there, it gets in my way financially and creatively. I've hired videographers to do work with me in the past, and when all they talk about is tech/systems/etc, I never use them again because they always miss the STORY I hired them to capture. Tech should give me the best looking footage/post-production options to give me the best looking story I can get, not be something I need to obsess on. There are many technically accurate films piled up in the 2 for $11 bin in Wal-Mart because the story stunk.

All of the above comments are worthy of the positions taken, I'd like to submit some considerations for/against moving to HD at this point:

HD has a future life, ergo, if you expect to use the media in the future (18 months or longer away) you'll have a hard time having SD unless you expect to have lowered resolutions that won't hold up (to the future/current standard).

HD television displays are selling faster than any other previous home entertainment device in the above-1000.00 price class in history. People are buying HD displays very quickly. This is expected to be a monster banner year for HD displays during the holidays.

HD isn't needed for the wedding crowd unless clients demand it; corporate work seems about 40/60 in who is demanding it and who isn't, family home video isn't demanding it heavily right now, or appears not to be, event video isn't hard-demanding it, and local cable access isn't demanding it yet.

If you're creating/shooting/finishing for any major broadcaster, HD is all but required. If the media will have re-broadcast or archival use, it must be HD in some format to satisfy many broadcasters demands of today, and all broadcaster's demands in the next year.

Bottom line is whether your clients demand it or not. If they don't, then waiting costs you nothing and allows you to make careful decisions. On the other hand, shooting HD isn't something you can "just start doing." It takes quite a bit of time to get used to focusing, framing/composing for wide screen, and learning the ins/outs of HD. So, there are trade-offs to waiting as well.

Calling it a "young" format is a little silly; it's actually very mature. MPEG 2 took 11 years to get to a capture/broadcast state in HD. AVCHD is young, but it's also not a professional format, and not really applicable to this discussion.

Well said, Spot.

Being in event video, I shoot what my client wants, turn it over on DVD when done, and will probably never use that SD footage again. But as you mentioned, if shooting for broadcast, that would be a different story.

That's a nice summary, Spot. Thanks for the breakdown on which markets are looking for what.

One exception on the broadcast front seems to be news coverage. Most of the news guys I see -- at least out here in the Midwest -- are still using Betacam. I recently did some stringer work for Good Morning America, who were happy to get SD footage (shot from a PD-150, no less). HD never entered into the discussion.

No question, HD is definitely the future... it's just a matter of how soon to get into it. (And how long before someone comes up with something else...)

Let me add one twist to the discussion that got me started with HDV for shooting....widescreen DV....

Since everything I deliver today is on DVD, recording in HDV allows me to make a really nice widescreen DV product delivered on a standard DVD.

And as Spot said the move is on in homes to widescreen HD capable TVs and everyone has a DVD player. So why not enjoy using the full width of your screen with today's DVD technology.

And I have to say the widescreen DV looks great downconverted from HDV...even if you do it in the camera.

Widescreen is the reason I jumped in. Another thing I'm starting to really like is 30p widescreen renders from 1080i. The 30p seems to uprez better than 60i and look noticeably sharper on an HD TV with progressive scan coming from the DVD player. True 720 by 480 progressive is not bad at all.

I am considering buying a SONY A1 on the basis that all the people that I make DVDs for have widescreen TVs. My old 4:3 Panasonic is starting to become outdated, but their are still doubts as to whether now is the time to jump as the number of HD video cameras is small and all of them Z1 and above are out of my range.
The A1 has some nasty design issues and really is only a more flexible version of the HC1 but twice the price. I am sure my dilemma is repeated amongst many prospective purchasers.
Mick

I got an A1 as a second cam - the main design problem is changing tapes on a tripod, but there are solutions:

Here

The site says out of stock, but they emailed me a couple of days ago saying they'll be back next week.

Thanks SPOT. Presently the Canon XH-A1 has me pinned-up against the wall. Those further rings, the EXPOSURE and a ZOOM rings are starting to become very enticing indeed.

I too want better w i d e s c r e e n, and getting a camera that has native 16:9 would be part of my next purchase. And with this XH-A1, BTW it does HD too! And oh, BTW it has the XLRs as part of the frame, oh, BTW it has a 1/3 CCD, oh and BTW . .. yeah? For me HD is going to "part" of my camera upgrade path. Fortunately for me, Canon have gushed-in plenty more features than I was expecting, coming from an XM2, that obtaining HD wont be THE reason for me upgrading. It will be part of much greater image-acquiring feature set.

Now that I've had the opportunity to crawl all over this camera and I'm kinda warming to it. Oh, and BTW it is black too - at last!

Joking aside, I don't believe we have had all the offerings from the companies yet. Added to which, and at present my aging ASUS 3.2 can deliver me neato previewing using V7. I'd really want to see, and experience one of MY projects doing the same Previewing and editing speed with HD or whatever format that can allow me to preview fast - yeah? Meaning I would also need to factor in a new Duo, Quado or whatever configuration that will deliver "blistering" previewing.

So, I have much to consider.

For others with the broadcast and a work-schedule="order-book" that can support the purchases, I would think going HD is a no-brainer. For me it is this waiting game SPOT mentions. And there are some of us who can do this. Now whether, while waiting, Do-Do and dinosaur-like we fall from video grace/work is another matter!! What I do know, and this hasn't changed, it is what is done with any of these tools that matters.

I bought my Z1 because I needed a new camera and it made no sense to buy an SD camera when all of the HDV cameras also shoot DV if you need it. Now that I've seen what the Z1 can do I've picked up an A1 for a second camera and have my eye on the new V1 as a third. IMHO holding off is fine if you are still using what you've got, but if you are purchasing new, it seems silly buy an SD camera because it will never hold its resale value and probably be of little use a year from now when consumers start buying HD players..

~jr

Another thing about HDV: when you go to do a high res (for the web) version, a 1080 camera's 540 lines per field means that you can get a nice easy to compress 30p progressive version. One of the main things keeping the standard web broadcast size at 240 lines is that that is all the resolution a regular SD camera has.

JohnnyRoy,
I absolutely agree with you regarding any future camera purchases. I wouldn't purchase another SD. I didn't initiate this posting out of ignorance about the future of HD. I get the catalogs in the mail with the new stuff and my wife throws them away like porn lest I rack up the credit cards with a couple new camera purchases. I know I'll switch over at a future time, it's just an issue of wise timing for me personally. And it seems that a lot of people here have stuck their toes in the HD waters and aren't yet sure if it's their time to jump in.

Let me ask anyone this: when I ever do upgrade to HD, is it even feasible to use one HD camera with side angles from my Sony 2100's? Because by that time, the 2100's resale value would be lower than what they'd be worth to me (as they likely are now!). Without getting into major specifics, can you line them up together on the timeline in Vegas? If so, how would you render it?

Well of course you can line them up on the Vegas T/L.
Just render to whatever you want as per normal.

Except the HDV footage is native 16:9 and the 2100 is native 4:3!

Converting SD 4:3 to 16:9 costs you 30% vertical res. You might be able to live with that except the HDV footage downconverted can be about as good as 16:9 SD looks (even hard to tell DB from HDV at times and that's a $50K camera against a $5K one).

Perhaps if you restricted the HDV camera to the wide shots and the SD to the close ups you might get away with it.

Or your HDV camera can shoot 4:3 SD, that's probably the safest way but you've lost a lot doing that.