EXCAM is Sony's version and has some advantages. It's the darling of shooters everywhere which is strange because it has problems working with Final Cut and Avid.

I haven't had an opportunity to try it with Vegas but I have to think if any editor can handle the codec Sony Vegas can read Sony EXCAM ...?

P2 cameras are kinda bulky, the media fills up faster than with EXCAM, and the frame size is wonky - like 960x720 interpolated up to 1080 wide ... something strange like that.

I've never used the new SxS cards, but I believe that they require a re-wrap in Vegas as well. I'm sure that this is something that Vegas will be able to handle natively eventually, but P2 will always require third party.

I do find the HVX a little bulky, but from what I've read the EX1 is in the same league, in fact I think its a little heavier. The EX3, with semi-shoulder mount, looks really cool though.

On the HVX (but not the high end P2 cams) the frame size is normal, but the sensor size is the wonky bit. It uses pixel-shifting to achieve the same frame size, which makes it less sharp than the EX 1 or 2.

I know their are some people on these boards that use both cams (I think Spot is one of them), and I have a question about the cams' color. Is it possible, using the in-camera settings, to get the colors kinda close? I know the sharpness and noise will always be apparent, but what about color?

kairosmatt

SXS cards require a rewrap in the current version of Vegas, but it's 1-100% realtime, which is ridiculously faster than P2 in terms of Xfer.
Frame sizes on the EX series is "real" with zero interpolation.
I have both...and P2 is more or less a "rental/loaner" system. Can't imagine ever going back to it.
960 x 540 twice interpolated vs 1920 x 1080 native isn't a hard choice to make.
Out of the box, HVX kicks butt. II believe it's because Panasonic is smarter than Sony in terms of creating some good, if not accurate, settings at the factory. Sony is more "flat" out of the box, and this hurts them, IMO. It's the better way to go, but doesn't sell more cams.

HVX is a bit heavier, but also noisier, and more brick-like. I hate the controls on the EX, they're placed very strangely. I have big hands tho.
EX image vs HVX image....not even in the same league. Like DV vs HD in any good flavor.
Some folks like the noisy "cinematic" look of the HVX. I'm not one of them. then again, after Panny denied, denied, denied their imager size for so long, and even went so far as to accuse various writers of being liars....coupled with their refusal (and denial it was their own doing) to allow Vegas to directly read P2, and as a result I have a bias that should likely be taken into account when discussing Panny cams.

" SXS cards require a rewrap in the current version of Vegas, but it's 1-100% realtime, "

Have you tried the latest incarnation of the Clip Browser (V2)?

I timed it fairly closely a few nights ago. 1 hour of SP took 1 hour to transfer and rewrap. That's on a 2.5GHz Q9300 using RAID 0 drives. If I'd recorded HDV to tape it would have taken as long to be ready to edit.

I'm not the only one to complain about this with many switching back to the previous version of the Clip Browser!

That said I believe but haven't verified that Shotput Express can also do the rewarp and much faster than the Clip Browser.

Bob.

Shotput is much faster than V2 clipbrowser, which I also don't use for the reason you mentioned.
V2 is terrible, IMO, and I hear it's worse with 50i

Thanks, time to buy another copy for my own PCs.

Bob.

Spot said: "960 x 540 twice interpolated vs 1920 x 1080 native isn't a hard choice to make."

First of all, P2 itself has nothing to do with resolution of recorded images. It's just a recording medium, not a format.

If we're talking about *DVCProHD* (which is the format most commonly recorded on P2 cards), then there are two flavors: 1280 x 1080, and 960 x 720.

Spot's comment seems to be alluding to the common misperception that the image from the HVX200 is "960 x 540 twice interpolated". The camera has three CCD chips; the green chip is spatially offset horizontally and vertically, so that its photosites fall into the area of the registers on the blue and red chips. There is no "interpolation". The image processor creates a 1920 x 1080 digital image off the analog chipset, and for recording in DVCProHD format that image is downsampled to 1280 x 1080 (if recording in 1080) or 960 x 720 (if recording in 720).

The offset imagers work to bring the theoretical resolution up to 1440x540 when all three primary colors are equally represented in an image. Less when an image is less varied color-wise.

A Z7 or S270 uses three 960x1080 sensors which makes little difference at 60i but doubles the vertical resolution in the progressive modes. The Z7 and 270 also use offset sensors to bring the resolution up to 1440x1080 in progressive modes when all three primary colors are present but adds interpolation to smooth out the edges when colors are missing. In this case the interpolation is an improvement on the Panasonic approach which loses resolution when primary colors are under-represented.

If I was to judge cameras by sharpness, I would put the EX1/EX3 first, the Z7/S270 second and the HVX third.

I just finished a chroma key job from a 200 and just about died in a bad way. I would have preferred BetacamSP.

Spot's comment seems to be alluding to the common misperception that the image from the HVX200 is "960 x 540 twice interpolated".

No, it's not, but I can appreciate how one might think so.
The camera has a 960 x 540 sensor block.
Panasonic goes out of their way to attack how Canon and Sony record their image, regardless of whether the sensor blocks are native or not. It's equally important to balance that market-speak by pointing out that Panasonic's popular HVX has an image block smaller in horizontal resolution than a PAL SD camcorder, whether it records a 960 x 720 image that displays at 1280 x 720, or whether it's recording a 1280 x 1080 image displayed at 1920 x 1080. Additionally, the camera is blanket marketed as a 100Mbps camcorder in the same class as the Varicam, when in actuality, it is predominantly a 40Mbps camcorder that puts low-resolution data into a 4:2:2 stream, not terribly unlike recording PAL SD to HDCAM and calling it an HDCAM stream.
P2 is indeed a storage mechanism, but also is a "format" in that it requires a specific toolset to decode and read the data, no different than Xpress card is arguably a "format" even though it too, is a storage device.
So long as we have non-standardized "formats" on a variety of storage devices, the storage mechanisms themselves are part of the "format," IMO, not much different than Beta being used as storage for a variety of codecs. Now we're the other way around.

One thing I think both of us had mentioned as being a cause for concern with the HVX was the number of times the P2 cards get cycled through the camera. My predication was that the contacts would fail without considerable care being taken.

I felt somewhat vindicate when a local Panny tech told me that their oldest P2 cards are now failing. They seem to be able to still read the data by going directly into the guts of the card so it's good odds that it's the contacts that are the cause of the problem. Not to say that SxS might not eventually suffer the same problem however it's going to take a lot longer and the contacts appear larger which should reduce the amount of wear. Regardless of if you use P2 or SxS a shirt pocket is not the place for them.

In my mostly worthless opinion the P2 tech made good sense in the larger cameras with more card slots and with crews that have bigger budgets that can afford several sets of cards. If Panny really wanted to stun us all they could switch to SxS technology, wouldn't hurt them and would be very much for the common good.

Bob.

These are all very helpful comments. Thank you.

Local Panny dealer was telling me this about a year and a half ago, Bob, but I still have had the fun of being attacked for bringing it up in both online and live presentations regarding tapeless workflow.
I've had two Echo cards fail in the past as well, same technology as far as 62 pins being expected to line up every time, no different than those of us that have had failed CF readers due to bent pins. Figure that you're expecting 1240 points of contact per day to be perfect if you're cycling the card 10 times a day (not that many, that's only 5 into the camera, 5 into the slot, at 20 mins of record time avg....
SxS contact points are larger, and not pin extension-based.
True, our P2 cards have not failed, but they're also not heavily used.

Just a story about the HVX and chroma keying:

We do a lot of science and biology education, and most of our interviews are outside. One dark, windy and rainy day a representative from the National Trust was up here and had one hour of time to spare to get our interview in.
We had a bland conference room to work with and no studio (working on that, give me a few decades).
So not knowing what I'm doing, I go down to the linen store and buy me a twin size green sheet (the biggest they had!). Perfect color, but they fold it so nice and it had been sitting on the shelf for so long (I guess nobody really wants that color in their room) that it had perfect creases all over. And me without my iron.
We tack the thing up behind the interviewee, but we have NO lights except the overheads in the room and during the interview all I can think is this is going to cost us our jobs.
The thing is, it all worked out. It doesn't look like Hollywood, but I can put different backgrounds in there. I must say that it is for web/DVD so it won't be projected big screen, and there are definitely some rough spots, but it worked and it wasn't so hard to do in Vegas, with HVX footage.
I think with some skilled lighting, the right color and...an iron, the HVX (or any camera-except maybe one from a cell phone) will pull a great key.
Just gotta stick up form my little camera 'round here, it keeps pulling me through...!

kairosmatt

Kind of funny though that everytime someone needs to pull a key they ONLY think of using a chroma key!

I read a rant from a Hollywood FX guy and he had much the same thing to say. He spends more time trying to fix shots because of spill problems with blue / green screens than he spends on the actual keying. Luminance keys can work much better and with no spill problems.

In your case the good old difference mask might well have worked better than a chroma key and saved you the problem of what to do with a horrid colored sheet after the shoot. Vegas does difference keys very nicely, just make certain you've got a clean background plate, the background doesn't move and the camera doesn't move either.

Bob.

And make sure the sun and clouds don't move either if you are thinking about trying it outdoors or anywhere near a window...

There are some situations where chroma keying kind of doesn't work... spill is one of them.

But if your shot is simply head to shoulders, then you can easily minimize spill. Especially when you get to overpower the spill with white light that hits the subject from behind. Depends on the shot I guess.

The background and camera didn't move, and the light was the same (no windows or moving clouds)-sounds like everything you guys are saying should work.

Thanks guys!-I've never used the difference mask (which pulls a luminance key??) but I will investigate that today.

kairosmatt

A difference mask works by creating a mask from the difference between two images. Usually that'd be a still image of the background and the video of the subject in front of the exact same background. Unlike the chroma key FX you have to build it in Vegas using the correct compositing mode etc.

Even if it doesn't work out for what you were trying to do it's a good exercise that'll really show you the power of Vegas. Plus sometimes you don't have a screen or lights. Using a difference mask you might still pull it off with nothing more than a blank wall as the background.

An excellent example is the famous Two Cats from one of the SCS guys. You can find it here.

That example is fairly complex, a single subject key is much simpler.

Bob.

Had to revive this for a thought...
I'm in Pepperell, MA for the weekend on a sport activity, and there is one guy shooting an HVX and me shooting a Z7 at the same subject.
Put em' both up on a 16' projected screen tonight. Everyone wanted to know why mine was so sharp and the other guy's was so fuzzy. It's the first time I've seen the two go head to head in a large-screen format.
OK, isn't related to P2, but rather HDV vs DVCProHD, or more specifically, the Z7 vs the HVX, but damn...the difference was staggering. I'm hoping to get my hands on the P2 footage and post a split screen. We're at different angles, but not that far apart, flying the same speeds, same light, same helmet, and even the same wingsuits. I *really* want to put on my EX1, now....

Yeah but - you're an ace when it comes to this stuff - how are his camera op chops?

He's significantly better than I am....nearly double the aerial experience. It's sharpness, gamma, chroma, everything. Yes, my cam could be slightly better set up than his, I don't know how he has it set up, except that it's customized/personalized settings, just as my Z7 is. I've got some profiles I really like. No one is commenting on the flying skill; comments are about picture quality, specifically sharpness and color pop. Both cams are feeding component inputs on the projector....Mine is playing off the CF card, the HVX is playing off P2.