Can I use the HV20 like a normal DV cam...?

[AngryMonster]

Hi (first post!)

ok...I am ready to buy my HV20
But I have a few questions ... if anyone could help that would be great!

- Can I use the HV20 in 'normal' resolutions... eg Pal 720X576 and more importantly Pal widescreen (720/1024X576)?

- I have a 3Ghz duo, 4G Ram (ends up about 3G), an average 6800GS nvidia, and use After Effects and Premiere. Is that ok? do I need anything extra to get the HD into my computer?

- I use After Effects. Do you know if I can mix footage... eg A normal pal widescreen project using normal size footage... and then occasionally use HD, so I can add camera moves on the HD without a loss of quality?

(whoo!?... that was a big question... maybe an AE forum question but if anyone knows that would be great!)

Basically, I just want to be able to mix up the formats (HD and DV) when I edit.

Thanks!!

[Mal]

Yes, the HV20 (PAL version) can shoot 4:3 SD; and 16:9 SD (which is still only 720x576 though, but with different pixel aspect ratio that work out to be 1024x576); and HD in two flavors.

You can mix all sorts of footage on the timeline of your NLE, but the trick will be whether you can seemlessly go from one to the other without noticing a difference; and that would be difficult.

I don't see why not to shoot HD all the time, as it doesn't take up more room on the MiniDV tape, nor the hard drive.

[AngryMonster]

Great !

Thats exactly what I wanted to hear.

Yeah... maybe I should use HD all the time. It's just , I have noticed that some people find it a little cumbersome when editing. For the project I am working on I only need Pal wide... and so I thought I could use the HV20 as a standard wide camera with the ability of HD( if I want to manually do camera moves in AE.

What do you reckon...

- Is there much difference editing with HD?
- Does the whole 'not really real frames' every a problem?
- Is the quality better if I film HD and final render in standard pal wide?

Thanks!

[Mal]

I am not sure where you are, but since you are mentioning the PAL version, editing the HD content will be [almost] without problems. You can get 25p which is exactly 25 fps. No pulldown, nothing.

Starting with HD content and reducing to SD in your NLE should give you better results/quality than if you recorded SD to start with, although it would be nice if someone did this as a test to verify it. But from what I've seen, this would definitely be the case...

[Pom16/10e]

I can certify that shooting HDV then downsizing in the NLE will yield much better results.

The image quality doing so is on par par with that from an XL2.
But it can get even better if you drop HDV footage in an uncompressed timeline instead of a DV timeline.
The result is a perfect 4:4:4 uncompressed footage, as opposed to the 4:1:1 compression you get from DV : no more artifacts and color bleed.

[Mal]

I've seen you post this before, Pom16/10e.
Unfortunately I think you aren't quite right there, or maybe more accurately: it may be a bit misleading.
The color space is determined during recording to your media (in this case HDV to MiniDV tape), not what you save it as afterwards.

You can't regain color information that wasn't there in the first place.
Although you will have made 4:4:4 footage, which you can more effectively use for further editing/post processing,
you will have done so from 4:2:0 footage which already had its color information "eroded" or lost.

The only way to get higher color information out of the HV20 would be via HDMI and record that in a format that
supports higher color space. Best you can do though, is 4:2:2.
It is NOT possible to get 4:4:4 color info from the HV20.

Or, put simply:
I can take a VERY compressed JPG image that was saved at 50% compression, and open it up in Photoshop, then
re-save it as a BMP file, but by doing so, I would not have regained any information or quality; all I would have done
is preserve an uncompressed copy of the crappy original picture.

[Pom16/10e]

I can hear your point, Mal.
And you're mostly right !
However, you are forgetting something essential here : downsizing. (HD->SD)
Colorspace information from each final pixel is going to be calculated averaged on 4 pixels from the original size, gathering more chroma info than one would need.
You do get real 4:4:4

Now, the NLE used does also matter !
I know many a windoze app that won't be able to do that correctly.
I'm talking about doing it in Finalcut :

-Capture the footage as 1080i HDV
-Change sequence settings to uncompressed 10bits SD (4/3 if you need letterbox or crop, or 16/9 anamorphic is best) THEN create a new sequence (order is important !)
-Drop the captured clip on this new uncompressed timeline

-Export this sequence as quicktime movie (Not through quicktime conversion).
Et voila, you have SD footage that no cam under $10k could give you.

If you still don't get it, let's take your photoshop example a step further with some downsizing :
Say you have a 1600 X 1200 .jpg @50% quality (so it's quite a bit blocky)
now downsize it to 640 X 480 : blockyness is long gone since blocks from the jpg compression have now been downsized to one pixel, so there's no more blocks.
Now save two versions :
-1st version : .jpg@50% quality -> blocky result as you'd expect since you are re-compressing.
-2nd version : .png lossless -> perfect result.
in this example, downsizing to DV would be the 1st version, where downsizing to uncompressed would be the second one.
Are you getting it ?

There's no way, that's a fact, to get 4:4:4 @ 1920 X 1080 from the HV20 !
The trick comes from sizing down, gathering the chroma info from multiple pixels to recreate a correct uncompressed info, at the expense of picture resolution.

That's the precise reason that made me enter HD with the HV20 as a test run despite the fact I have no professional need for HD now and in near future (I deliver SD and will keep doing so for quite a few years to come... that's what my audience wants... French people are so retarded when it comes to adopting new technologies quickly !)

And it turns out the test run's a home run !
Shooting HD for SD delivery opens up wide new fields :
-dialog multicam shooting...with only one cam
-Pan / Zoom on edit rather than while shooting
and of course the one we're discussing :
-bring cost down by using HV20s instead of XL2s and yet come out with a much better result.

Well, of course, i'd love a hacked up firmware for full gain/aperture/shutter control... but I'm sure that's gonna come someday, simply the cam technically can do it.
Until there I'll still be hanging around with GL2s and XL2s... but the HV20 has found its unique place and role in my workflow and I'm pretty sure lots of pro are gonna follow. (in fact I can feel from the forums here and there it's already started)
This cam's gonna be a huge hit for canon, to a point I think the XHA1 is at danger in the product line (think of a prosumer HV20...)

[zyad]

Guys, what about transferring the converted videos back to the HV20 itself (it the DV tapes)?

Which exported formats can be played back on it? Will it play back anything at any resolution (I don't mean DivX or any of those other codecs, just MPEG's and AVI's, both SD and HD).

[Mal]

I didn't realize you were talking about downsizing only, Pom16/10e.
For downsizing it's very valuable info in your post.

[Pom16/10e]

Zyad, no it's not possible, you're confusing things.

HDV footage downconverted to DV could be recorded back to tape, but I don't really see any practical use for that.

And "enhanced" uncompressed downconverted footage cannot be transferred nor read to tape (well, technically it could, but only a computer could read it).
For those who'll try my technique to downconvert to uncompressed :
Beware that this is a whooping 60Gb/hour of footage !-)

[zyad]

Zyad, no it's not possible, you're confusing things.

HDV footage downconverted to DV could be recorded back to tape, but I don't really see any practical use for that.

And "enhanced" uncompressed downconverted footage cannot be transferred nor read to tape (well, technically it could, but only a computer could read it).
For those who'll try my technique to downconvert to uncompressed :
Beware that this is a whooping 60Gb/hour of footage !-)

Well, there are some practical uses. What if I want to give a copy of the tape with downconverted DV video to someone who has an non-hd DV camcorder so they can play it back using their own cam?
Or for archiving purposes, using DV tapes which are cheaper? Isn't DV of higher quality than 480i DVD's?
Can a different brand (i.e. my brother-in-law's DV Panasonic) play back DV that was exported back through the Canon on his camera?

How much video time / Gigabytes can a standard DV tape (not HDV tape) store of HDV video? Aren't HDV tapes higher capacity (60 minutes of HDV) than regular DV tapes?
The reason I'm asking is because I want to decide what method I will use to store recorded HDV footage until I'm able to buy a Blu-Ray burner within the next year or two. I'm thinking storing my HD footage onto DV tapes until that time comes might be the cheapest option considering that regular DV tapes can be bought for pretty affordable prices in bulk online. Isn't this option more feasible than buying a high-capacity external hard-drive for example?

[Rikki]

I am in the same boat. Im using a HV20 recording in HDV and setting the camera to lock output to DV res for editing.

Beauty is the stuff I do now is fine, but if I need to remaster later I've got the tapes all in HDV so will gain quality.

[Pom16/10e]

Point taken, Ziad : I can see why you'd want to do that.

DV tapes are the second most effective storage solution (talking about the best soon). store them in a good old shoebox. (avoid heat, light and humidity)
Your brother in law should read them fine and so should any DV deck or cam
They hold 12Gb of data (60min DV tape)
HDV tapes : marketing scam : although the media actually is better (taken only at the middle of the roll so there are zero defaults), the real benefit (of using them Vs standard DV tapes) is close to zero.

Hard drives (raw, stored in fire proof safe) are the way to go if your living depends on the stored data. With an universal Ata/Sata to usb2 adapter to quickly connect them to computer without needing a whole external drive enclosure. Bullet-proof, dependable, practical and cheap to the Gb.
Hard drives do fail sometimes, but not when they spend most of their time being stored, and even if they do, they show signs before it's too late.

Tapes on the other end, suddenly they show an error and there's no fixing it, it's too late. Which is why most software that allow you to use them as digital linear tapes (to store computer files) usually only store 6Gb/tape because they write the info twice at different places of the tape to add redundancy and therefore increase safety.

Rikki, if your computer can handle it, I'd advise you edit in HD, then burn to SD DVD. Later when HD burners really come out, you'll only have to burn to HD without any remastering.

Hope I make sense ? (excuse my english if I don't)

[zyad]

Yes you're making sense man...


I still want to know how much HD footage I can fit into a 60 minute regular DV tape?!?!?!

[Mal]

60 minutes.

It's irrelevant if it's DV or HDV, the tape runs the same speed (and it's both about 25 Mbps data rate. There is also DVCAM which runs at 1.5 speed, but that's the only difference, it's also SD DV.

[zyad]

60 minutes.

It's irrelevant if it's DV or HDV, the tape runs the same speed (and it's both about 25 Mbps data rate. There is also DVCAM which runs at 1.5 speed, but that's the only difference, it's also SD DV.

Wow that's great. I was under the impression that the data rate was different and that the speeds were different. 60 minutes of HD on a regular DV tape which you can buy for $3 is great. I'll archive all my HD stuff on DV tapes in that case, and burn it at a later date to Blu-Ray.

[zyad]

By my calculations, 25 Mbps works out to just over 11 GigaBYTES per hour, is that correct? If that's the case, then a single-layer Blu-Ray, which is 25 Gigs, should easily be able to hold over 2 hours of MPEG2 footage (plus menus etc...), without having to sacrifice any of the original streaming rate from the camera, right?

I can't wait until Blu-Ray burners and discs come down in price! My home videos are going to look awesome.

And using a different Blu-Ray supported codec (other than MPEG2) like AVC and exporting to a Blu-Ray disc using future video editing applications will give a video just as good in quality at an even smaller file size, which will allow for even longer viewing times per disc.

[AngryMonster]

Great!....so much info

Thanks every one

[slolerner]

So, using Pom16/10e's method for creating SD from HDV, I could shoot the HDV in 24p, and end up with 24p SD, something the HV20 can't shoot directly, if I'm correct?

[24Peter]

So, using Pom16/10e's method for creating SD from HDV, I could shoot the HDV in 24p, and end up with 24p SD, something the HV20 can't shoot directly, if I'm correct?

Well, kinda. The problem is for true 24p editing in either HDV or DV you need software that can do flagless pulldown removal since Canon hasn't thus far included flags in the HV20's 24p footage. So what you'll actually get if you shoot 24p HDV without removing pulldown and then downconvert while editing to SD DVD (which is what I do in Vegas 7) are 60i SD DVDs, but for the most part they'll look the same as 24p SD DVD's.

But you can change all that: contact Canon and tell them you want flags in your 24p HV20 files so you can do pulldown removal!

[Lunchbox]

Shooting HD for SD delivery opens up wide new fields :
-dialog multicam shooting...with only one cam
-Pan / Zoom on edit rather than while shooting
and of course the one we're discussing :
-bring cost down by using HV20s instead of XL2s and yet come out with a much better result.

That's just a brilliant idea!

[srloren]

I want to shoot in 1080i. HDVI am using a PC with Windows XP Pro SP2 updated. Is it possible to do the following using Pinnacle Studio 10+?

-Capture the footage as 1080i HDV
-Change sequence settings to uncompressed 10bits SD (4/3 if you need letterbox or crop, or 16/9 anamorphic is best) THEN create a new sequence (order is important !)
-Drop the captured clip on this new uncompressed timeline

Also could you explain in a little more detail, the following: 4/3 if you need letterbox or crop, or 16/9 anamorphic

Thanks much for your help.

[Pom16/10e]

I'm very sorry I can't help on the peecee side of things...

The "order important" is strictly a finalcut thing : sequence created before the new settings won't be affected, so you gotta change settings first then create a new sequence (which will bear those new settings)

About the 4/3 Vs 16/9 :
If you are downsizing, odds are high (well, in France they are) that you aim mainly at 4/3 screen audience.

Using a 4/3 sequence, you can't fit the whole 16/9 picture from your HV20 in your sequence frame. Either you use full Height of the 4/3 secreen but gotta crop the sides from the 16/9 footage, Or you can display the footage in full but then you have black bars at the top and bottom.

Using a native 16/9 aspect ratio (anamorphosed) will allow you to let the audience choose (provided you deliver on DVD and your DVD software knows how to deal with widescreen content).

Er...I suggest you head over at digitaljuice.com 's DJTV and watch for a tech know episode dealing specifically with this.

This topic (crop/letterbox/ana) is quite simple all in all but overwhelming at first.