In addition to what John said I believe HDV is a bit limitted in its abitly to deal with high contrast differences. but still probably a step above what you are use to now.

Spot or other users of the Z1 as opposed to us FX users could probably comment more on those cameras abitly to control more of those aspects , such as black stretch, gamma curves and the like.
I have only seen these settings in action actually in VASST seminars by Spot and the like.

Additionaly , I have recently purchased one of the small CMOS A1 hdv cams. I will say though it is a great cam for me its a second cam/back up. even with the pro type features you still dont have a precise of control over exposure as you do with the larger models. something I know you as a photographer would definatly want.
Plus I dont think its low light compares to the larger cams either.
There is no doubt that the pic quality with the FX is amazing (I love mine) and would be more than happy to lend it to you if we werent on oposite sides of the continent.
But there are some features of the Z1 that I wish I had.
Although you know I dont do the same type of shooting you do, maybe I could send you some tapesor discs with some examples you could play with .

I would consider the A1 vs fx1 for price reasons. The fx1 with 3ccds will probably be a good camera, but the A1 has more control options. Since you usually push the video, the A1 will work well for you.

I have 2 A1's but they are not much for low light. Don't get me wrong, I like'em a lot, but when the lighting is low you're going to get some grain.

j razz

For what it's worth, I did a VERY amature 1CCD vs 3CCD demo after a friend bought a 3CCD camera:

1ccd vs 3ccd

Granted, it's only one model vs the other, in one kind of light (daylight in the parking lot where we work), and I know there many other factors to consider (low light, contrasts, white balancing, etc..) but this is what it is.

Edit: and my Sony is about 3-4 years old, with a 1/4" CCD, the Panasonic is a few months old with three 1/6" CCD's.

Coming from a decent but admittedly amateur shooter, if what you are talking about is contrast range, I doubt that HDV , one or three chips, is going to differ greatly from SDV cameras ( one or three chips).

My understanding is that all presently available sensors for video have about a 40:1 contrast range versus about 80:1 for film, versus about 800:1 for the human eye. My VX2000's are pretty impressive in low light, but transferring movie film always causes choices between burning out the brights or sinking the darks into the black. They are great low light cameras, but in a well lit environment, they will not perform any better than a one chip camera with comparable glass.

I assume you have looked at this site, where all sorts of cameras are compared against each other. If you haven't seen it, I think you will find the information very useful:

HDV Info

from another amateur shooter, I have to say I'm thorougly impressed with my panasonic 3ccd camcorder I bought; much better clarity and color saturation compared to my sony camcorders..

I need to spring for an FX1 (or whatever's best) one of these days, but for my needs, the 3-CCD camcorder does a great job.

on a seminar shoot however, the videographers' sony broadcast cam shot decidedly brighter and better-looking footage, compared to the panasonic 3-ccd one... I'm doing a multicam edit right now, so I see the difference..

in Vegas, I like to use the sony brightness/contrast plugin, it makes a huge difference in cleaning up video signal quality..

ken

I just watched "Go on Her." They say that you could give Hitchcock a consumer VHS and he would deliver a great movie. I know that is true. You just demonstrated it if you shot that with the little single chip camera that I saw in the video.

You have obvioulsy spend more money and work on the lighting, girls and environment than on the camera. BTW, that is the correct way to do it! CONTENT, CONTENT, CONTENT. You obviously have paid attention to the light etc. The problem for you appears to be you are lighting for film not video. You have to balance even closer for video. Don't get me wrong, I will take the piece just like it is. I am just saying that if I understand what you are looking to do next, you have no choice but to reduce the actual contrast to get the contrast level on video that you want. I would guess that 90% of what you want could be accomplished with foamcore.

Now on to cameras, because the lighting is really Victor Milt's area. Not referring to tech specs, just my extremely subjective eye, here is what I have seen. In the lower end price, single chip versus three chip cameras do not seem to have that much if any difference in dynamic range (light to dark). You will see better detail in the low mids and richer colors. You already have already found the #1 way to improve color performance, which is more light. With three chips, you improve it again and have more playing room in post before the picture goes south.

Dynamic range between my single chip Sony TRV 20 and my three chip PD-150 is not visable to me. Color, detail etc is very visible. (chip size, better glass etc is invovled not just chip numbers)

Dynamic range between my PD-150 and my Z1U is noticable. In fact, the picture tends to look flat because I shoot and light like I am still using my PD-150. It needs more contrast to POP. I found that Sony's CineAlta had more dynamic range, but I am not sure that it was from 0-TOP. It felt more like it was just a lot better response in the low mids and the mids.

How is that for a completely subjective and non-tech response? No I can not back it up. It is just the way the pictures "feel" to me. This is art right?

What you are doing still looks better shot on 35mm. Not for the 'film look', but because of the film response. I can't believe that I said that because after producing a movie with a CineAlta I swore I would never go back to film. Galmour girls like that just 'feel' better on 35mm.

Keith Kolbo
amediaprof.com

You might find this technical "white paper" from Sony a useful document to skim through:

The Basics of Camera Technology

It might be more practical to look at the implementation of cameras itself, as many factors affect exposure latitude and how useful it is to you. The raw signal from the CCD itself has many stops of dynamic range possible, much more than what's recorded. The Andromeda modification to the DVX100 demonstrates this:
see image here
Not all cameras will record all the dynamic range possible. Also note that not all of the dynamic range is necessarily useful- the Andromeda mod shows color shifts throughout the exposure range. It would be possible to apply some sort of look-up table to compensate for these shifts, but I'm not aware of any applications that do this (or where to get DVX100 data).

On many higher-end broadcast cameras, they have knee functions that compress the highlights. The downside is shifts in hue and saturation. In my opinion, the use of knee is not very film-like at all and definitely video-like.

(From what I know) Some cameras (i.e. DVX100, Varicam) have adjustable gamma settings that maps extra stops of exposure latitude in a "linear" way. This gives you more dynamic range but results in a flat-ish looking picture. If you apply a s-shaped color curve to this, it'll add contrast but too much will bring out noise.

But basically:
Video standards like ITU-R Rec. 709 define a specific transfer function, which results in an exact number of stops of dynamic range. So most video cameras are going to have similar amounts of dynamic range.
To get more dynamic range, there's different ways of mapping additional dynamic range into what's recorded.
Video knee is one of them.
The cinegamma settings on the DVX100 and the varicam is another approach.
Some cameras can record RAW... i.e. andromeda, Viper, etc.
Yet another approach is the Sony Cinealta cameras, which let you input a user-defined transfer function.

2- Some more information on setting up particular cameras at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp034.shtml

3- I haven't tried comparing a camera like the DVX100 to that of a mid-high-end broadcast camera to that of something like a Z1 (not sure what the Z1's gamma settings do exactly, but I always assumed it would be like cinegamma).
A real world test would likely be the most useful.

I gotta say, the stuff I've seen of the DVX100 is just beautiful. And what I saw was from people who had no photographic backgrounds either. It had that soft, lush look that I crave in my shots. Also the high contrast "glamour" look is great too, but I'm not sure how much longer I'll be doing that. I try to find a look, and see if I can achieve it then log it in my head and move on to the next technique.

I did that for years with stills and am now applying it to my video work. I just would hate to think I'm being limited by my camera. Oh well, guess I can always borrow from guys that want to hang out on set with me.....lot's of offers....lol.

Probably one challenge you're going to face in the future is having to shoot 16:9 and for your work that could pose a number of issues apart from the camera.
My gut feeling is that the Z1 might not be the ideal camera for your kind of work although others may disagree with me. I'd just have some reservations about girls doing 'hait flicks' full frame and HDV coping with that.
Certainly 3 chip cameras given the amount of inage manipulation you're doing in post might not offer much other than a lower noise floor.
However from my experience for coping with extreme / dramatic lighting the 1/2" cameras are way better than the 1/3" ones and the 2/3" another big step up. Of course price goes up very dramatically!
Still it's perhaps worth looking around for a camera like the 570, one of my clients shoots with one regularly and it does cope very well with extreme lighting conditions, plus it's native 16:9. It's been discontinued for some time so you might pickup one 2nd hand at a good price.

You other option is to rent a camera for a day or two. I think nothing beats trying before you buy. You can look at all the test footage under the sun and read a zillion posts but only you know how you work, you might find one very simple design flaw in any camera a deal breaker for you.

Bob.

Very good points farss.

My little Elura actually can shoot in 16x9 mode. I'm seriously thinking about implementing that into my future work. The apprehension on that is obviously an asthetic choice in that the girls standing are a vertical subject and what to do with that additional horizontal space.

But AGAIN, there's my limited thinking. Am I just gonna film girls standing in front of the camera all the time dancing on the spot??? Think I've done that enough. Time to think widescreen and time to think of new compositional techniques and try more than what I've done in the past.

Some really good posts on this topic. Thanks guys...

Stan

Stan,
It's not nearly as much about what the CCD's vs CMOS can do, or 3 vs 1 CCD, etc. It's more about the DSP. Almost all cams use some form of DSP. (Digital Signal Processing)
We know that 1/3 chips can do more in terms of latitude than what we get to tape, simply by using the component out vs tape. Other cams/products/experiments show this too.
If you were gonna go HDV, I'd recommend the Z1 only because of the "extra" range you get with Black Stretch and settings. The Panny is nice in 720mode, useless in 1080 mode, IMO.
For what I've seen of yours, the A1 would be useless.
For what I've seen of yours, the HC3 might be quite nice, but it's audio features are worse than suck. We use our HC3's for extreme sports only. Useless for any audio other than reference, but *significantly* better than the A1/HC1 in low light. Can't imagine what Sony was thinking with the audio on this thing, because otherwise, it's a VERY impressive cam. Try one if you can.
HDV will manage the contrast just fine, if you're happy more or less with DV. you'll want to shoot slightly higher shutters if you can, which will cost you half a stop or more. However, the gain in the FX1 and Z1 are to die for. NOTHING in the price class comes close to these for clean image with so much gain.
Shot some exceptionally dynamic footage today with the HC3, and was knocked out by the quality of that footage as well. (Into the sun, with black clothing, you can still see face of person wearing the all-black outfit, and can see detail. Sun is off the charts for exposure, but no blockiness)
Anyway, more/bigger chips are better, but less compression is better still. On your little cam, is it a single 1/3? Some of the smaller cams are 1/4 and 1/6!