I am heavily considering the HDR-SR12. But I'm not sure about the future of AVCHD.
How does the HV30 compare?
Canon HV30 vs Sony HDR-SR12
I am heavily considering the HDR-SR12. But I'm not sure about the future of AVCHD.
How does the HV30 compare?
Hi, SuperSpiker, and welcome to the forum!
The future of AVCHD might indeed be rosy, but at present it's a let-down, taking more computing horsepower to decode and delivering inferior results to HDV.
The SR12 got a very good review from CCI. The AVCHD does require alot of CPU to process quickly. But also consider this the upload time of files from the camera is almost instant. Its not a real time upload like tape. I have the SR12 and a moderate PC and find the work flow fine. Render times are longer but I make up for it a little in the upload so for me its better.
AVCHD has made such a leap in the past few months that many people are still going to think old school and give it a bad rap. Thats understandable but look into it for yourself. Even if you got he HV30 it will be a good performer for a long time. But the AVCHD is a very good contender now "today".
There are alot of new cameras comming out with AVCHD so It should be a very interesting year.
As far as the SR12 VS HV30 well that depends on what your end game is.
If you plan on doing alot "I mean alot" of editing and special effects go with the HV30. If you are after the film look and want to spend alot of time working with 24p pulldown and such the HV30 is the choice once again.
If your just goint to play around and have fun the work flow with AVCHD is faster from camera to PC. The SR12 does not have 24p or 30p it is only 60i.
I could care less about 24p If find it to be more of a hassle then its worth. I just like to have fun and film my family stuff. For this I think the SR12 blows away everything on the market today. I mean everything. Again if your fussy about a certain look then yes HV30.
The onlything setting these 2 apart in picture quality thats sets the SR12 back is Ghosting due to fast moving camera work. I have a steadicam and I chased my kids around in several homemovies. I used sony vegas to edit (vegas has great AVCHD support now).I found the video to be flawless. I dont know to much about this ghosting but I watch many HV20 videos on the video sharing sites and mine looks as good and better. This is my opinion and should be viewed as such.
Last edited by Pauly Forte; 2008 April 3rd at 00:23.
The SR12, like all AVCHD cameras made so far, are designed for the "Soccer Mom' and your average "Joe Sixpack". People who generally don't edit their footage. They generally keep the footage on the card or HDD and play it back to their TV through the camera.
Real photographers that enjoy editing their footage should stay away from AVCHD, unless they have an 8-core CPU or real horsepower that very few PC's have at the moment. No doubt that will change in the future, but for now, HDV rules.
The choice is yours...........
There is no such thing as "Idiot-Proof".........a good Idiot will get around that every time.
If you edit AVCHD (from the SR12 or HF10) footage; could you give me an example of limitations compared to footage shot with the HV30?Originally Posted by racer-x
Are you saying that a quad core pc is actually needed for editing AVCHD? What about what Pauly Forte said - instant transfer of files, vs. real time export?..if you have a slower pc editing AVCHD -- vs. the fact that you have to spend the hour import time per MiniDV tape(?)
It's not impossible to edit AVCHD. I don't think that's what is being said. It's much more difficult than HDV to edit...and HDV is already difficult as it is. I have a Core Duo machine using HDV and it's a pain (when editing M2t files). AVCHD is even worse. So you have to transcode it to a different intermediary in most cases just to edit. That, I understand, takes a long time....my point in another thread is....that the time factor for both HDV and AVCHD kind of evens out. Sure it's random access....as opposed to capturing an hours worth of HDV footage....but when you have to transcode AVCHD to an intermediary, just so you can edit, then where is the gain? it all comes down to the same amount of time.
Edit: This of course is all true if you are using something like Cineform which removes pulldown on the fly.
Last edited by Ian-T; 2008 April 3rd at 09:28.
No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life...Albert Einstein
I'm looking forward to all the folks here on this forum reviewing and discussing all aspects of the HF10 & 100 that they have just purchased. It's only about 3 weeks away from being available now. Since I just purchased an HV30, I suspect it will be summer before I move to an AVCHD camera.
The gain for me would be the fact that it's flash instead of tapes.
I'm 80% set on the HV30/but still looking into the possibility of the HF10. The SR12 looks great - but H10 is cheaper. I guess AVCHD is more future-proof than MiniDV; but maybe AVCHD will be the 8-track cartridge format of the camcorder world.
I think I could deal with the inferior picture quality - my main concern is the price of a new pc that's able to edit AVCHD -hopefully in a reasonable amount of processing time.
I was editing AVCHD over a year ago, well before S/W was created for it. Of course it can be edited, but it's more work than it needs to be.
If you are interested in an AVCHD camera, do yourself a favor and download some source files. Make sure you get the original MTS / m2ts clips and try to edit them. Do this before you buy. It will save you a lot of aggravation later.
The plus side to AVCHD is that they can easily be burned to AVCHD disks using standard DVD and DVD burners for play back on Blu-Ray or PS3.
The down side is that AVCHD / H.264 makes for a very poor editing codec until CPU's get much more powerful.
There is no such thing as "Idiot-Proof".........a good Idiot will get around that every time.
....----....
Last edited by Pauly Forte; 2008 April 3rd at 12:08.
Racer-x is a genius Im gonna put my dress back on and get to the soccer game.
THIS is the HV20 site asking for advice or posting it for anything else other than a HV20/30 is pointless. If you keep finding your self here then you should invest in the HV20/30
STS its 2008 not 1978
Racer - I like that. That's a new wrinkle I hadn't ever heard - connecting "Soccer Moms" to the AVCHD format.
lol...what a mess that was. I remember my father hanging on to his old 8-track recorder...long long after that technology died out... I don't think there is any comparison...lolmaybe AVCHD will be the 8-track cartridge format of the camcorder world.
No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life...Albert Einstein
I wish Canon did what JVC accomplished with their cams and allowed MPEG-2 to record to an internal hard drive.....at an even higher bit rate than the standard 25Mbps. I say that's what we can use for the HV40.
No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life...Albert Einstein
Hmmmm... I'm pretty sure I posted this in the "Other cams" forum.
Besides where else would I post to compare these two cameras? A community of people that USE the camera(s) in question seems pretty logical to me.
Regardless, thanks for all the (reasonable) responses from those that added value to this thread.
Ian-T wrote:
Agreed, that would be very sweet. I wouldn't mind a nice 60p shooting mode to go with it.I wish Canon did what JVC accomplished with their cams and allowed MPEG-2 to record to an internal hard drive.....at an even higher bit rate than the standard 25Mbps. I say that's what we can use for the HV40.
There is no such thing as "Idiot-Proof".........a good Idiot will get around that every time.
Exactly now your geting it.
go to avsforum or dvinfo.net for an unbiased opinion on any camera.
notice how the pile-on happened. Hey it's the HV20 form for GOD's sake.
Keep this in mind. IF you are so happy with the camera you have why look into the other cams thread????
Do they really search insite into new technology or are they looking to hang those that proclaim the Sun really does not revolve around the Earth??
Really I like the Real Photographer comment. Thinking that having any consumer camcorder makes you a "Real Photographer"
And as Racer-X stated real photographers should stay away from AVCHD since that format would be worthless to them. you know taking STILL pictures and all. Now videographer's should condsider it as a format to work with for it's ease of use and excellent video quality.
I think you wanted to say videographer racer-x thats ok I don't expect much!!
I see you STS good
Racer-x, I think you are being silly. AVCHD is more taxing on CPU cycles, but so was HDV couple of years ago. Basically, if a faster computer can solve an issue, it was not an issue at the first place.
With my 1GB laptop editing HDV is as aggravating as editing AVCHD. Not even editing, just loading the freaking file. 2-minute file is ok, but 15-minute clip kills the machine. I am getting a quad-core desktop with 4GB of memory, so it would not matter whether video is AVCHD of HDV. I am getting it with Vista64 hoping for a next 64-bit Vegas release. I wonder, will it be possible to upgrade from older 32-bit Vegas to 64-bit Vegas? I am not going to pay $400+ for it, that is for sure.
Currently, I am undecided. I just got Vegas 6 for $80 hoping to upgrade it to Vegas 8 Pro, but now I see Vegas 8 Pro at B&H for $130. Should I get one? Or should I wait for 64-bit upgrade? Or should I just stay with the Ulead VS11P which I also have? Too much money spent on software already, quite foolishly. In this regard, HDV is an easier choice: even the old Vegas 6 supports HDV.
I have no doubt that more than likely most of us will be using AVCHD in the near future, that includes me. The point I'm trying to make and that Pauly Forte doesn't seem to get is there are pros and cons to every format.......
Last year I was on the fence about getting a Panasonic SD1 (AVCHD) or the Canon HV20. What I did was download all the source footage from both cameras and tested both on my PC. I weighed all the Pros and Cons and decided the camera that best fit my needs. That camera was the HV20. I have a pretty fast dual-core PC now, but when I eventually upgrade to an 8-core, I will look more closely at AVCHD. Hopefully on that shoots 60p.
That is what I feel everyone should do, not just listen to crazy opinions of others.
There is no such thing as "Idiot-Proof".........a good Idiot will get around that every time.
OMG believe me I get it did you eve read my post??? No you read SR12 bla bla AVCHD bla bla and posted your knee jerk reaction
Are you saying I am providing crazy opinions??? And if so how are they crazy? your giving your opinion and use the term photographer to convey your point when it is clearly the wrong word. It may not be crazy but any who takes your advice is crazy!
Last edited by Pauly Forte; 2008 April 3rd at 14:03.
Enjoy your new camera......................
There is no such thing as "Idiot-Proof".........a good Idiot will get around that every time.
I joined this forum to get insite into the HV30 and HG10. In search I have come to my own opinion that the AVCHD format has alot to offer me. I considered waiting for the canon hf10. I considered teh JVC as well so I am no fanboy of any manufacturer.
The only thing I can say with absolute certainy is that the build quality of the SR11/12 is the best in the consumer camcorder market today. (this is my opinion)
as far as HDV and AVCHD LIKE I SAID BEFORE it all depends on your end game.
this is not a CrAzY opinion. I did not start ridiculing. I could though. I could provide comparisons and ridicule of those that purchase an $800 to $1000 consumer camera and add a 35mm adapters (which diminish the video quality) and mechanical focusing gizmo's to improve performance. When in the end they could have purchased a PRO camera for the same money.....
But its a hobby and supposed to be fun so I say live and let live. I really dont care what you think racer-x. Your TURE colors came out a while ago.
Good day Sir!
In your mind why would one choose HDV over AVCHD? What "end game" would make you want to use one over the other?
Great question!
I'll keep it simple.
If youwant to add alot of special effects. If you have multiple video streams layered for effects. the HDV is best due to processing speed. Now the 64bit systems are being touted as the cure for this but Im not to sure yet. Vegas 64 bit will be out in the fall and if it proves to be the answer this point is moot.
there is or was an issue with motion artifact with AVCHD. According to the CCi review this has been reduced in the bith the HF10 and SR12. to the point where it is hardly noticed. BUT if you are picky and look for it you will see it.
Also keep in mind as the codec improves this could be a thing of the past!!
So it depend on how picky you are. Are you making a video or film to enter into a film festival?? If your this serious this will be a starter camera anyway.
Even so you dont want your video to be the weak link so HDV might be best if this is your end game.
other than that in my opinion it doesn't matter. What you creat matters. If you can be creative and make something special it wont matter anyway because the camera is only a tool. And if you get to that point where the camera really matters you won't be looking at consumer cameras!!
SO the AVCHD format to me is a very free format to work with.
I was shooting the other day and had absolutly no concern about tape conservation or tape changes.
Also If you are posting to the internet then no difference the video sharing site has the final say on compression anyway.
"I could provide comparisons and ridicule of those that purchase an $800 to $1000 consumer camera and add a 35mm adapters (which diminish the video quality) and mechanical focusing gizmo's to improve performance. When in the end they could have purchased a PRO camera for the same money....."
Actually Pauly those 'Pro" cams also use 35mm adapters. Film is analouge. Video, because of its digital nature, is very clean looking. In order for one to get that "film-look" and/or Cinema look you "have" to diminish the clean look of video. Of course video will never really look like film but for a cam like the HV20 which performs better than some prosumer cms...(PQ wise) I don't think it's silly at all to invest in these "mechanical focusing gizmos." For the most part when using an adapter on a cheap cam or an expensive cam you are going to mainly be using the adapter. So in that case...you can get the same results out of a "good" cheap cam as you would with an expensive camera.
Edit: And for a lot less money.
No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life...Albert Einstein
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