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MillimeterNAB 2006
Jun 1, 2006 12:00 PM, By Barry Braverman, S. D. Katz, D. W. Leitner, Steve Mullen, Dan Ochiva, Jan Ozer, and Jeff Sauer
Perspectives from the show floor
Upmarket, Downmarket
By Barry Braverman
It was only a year ago at NAB 2005 that affordable HD was all the rage. Then, HDV, the long-GOP DV variant, was the force to be reckoned with, and it was loudly touted to shooters as high-definition image acquisition for the rest of us. The diminutive format at this year's show continued, of course, to assert itself, especially in eminently capable models from JVC.
But from a shooter's perspective, HD had a new dynamic: The cinema-oriented wündergears of the past — the Grass Valley Vipers, Panasonic Varicams, and Sony F900s — were recast with increased relevance and accessibility for shooters in ENG, long-form corporate, industrial, and other middle-market applications.
Conversely, from the lower end of the market, a marked upward trend in HD camera features could be observed, with last year's prosumer HDV gear acquiring more professional capabilities like HD-SDI output and 60p image acquisition. Shooters in the image-acquisition mainstream, who slave away in the trenches everyday, have reason to rejoice: We've got some really seductive choices in HD camcorders at very reasonable price points right now.
Here's an example of that market trend: JVC introduced the next iterations of its pioneering GY-HD100U, the GY-HD200U and HD250U. Both models feature a new 60p capability, while the GY-HD250U adds key broadcast features such as HD-SDI with embedded audio, timecode synchronization, and genlock. Look for 60p acquisition and HD-SDI output to become commonplace in competing cameras from other manufacturers. The HD-SDI chips have become much cheaper to produce, while the higher 60p capture rate provides much smoother motion for action news and sports events.
JVC's up-market proclivity is further reflected in the HD250U, which integrates nicely into existing studios employing the company's other cameras and CCUs that use 26-pin connectors. Low- and mid-level facilities will be able to easily swap their existing SD gear for the latest HD models without the hassle and expense one would normally associate with such an endeavor.
Sony's new XDCAM HD models also point up the HD camcorder's push into the mainstream, with the new PDW-F330 and F350 models delivering rugged image-acquisition tools at a reasonable cost. The camcorders have similarities to HDV gear, including their use of MPEG compression and a reduced 4:2:0 color space. For many of us, HD tapeless acquisition will swing necessarily toward Sony's proprietary blue-laser type recorded disc in the near future.
Sony's new XDCAM HD models also reflect the industry's trending to smaller form factors for even its workhorse models, as the company opts for lighter 1/2in. CCD-based camcorders. The downsizing of the camera's imager, associated hardware, and camera housing delivers a considerable price advantage over the company's top-level HDCAM gear, which has been the favorite of EFP and long-form producers for years.
The new 1/2in. 3-CCD imager in XDCAM HD models reduces effective depth of field, however, so in the future, maintaining selective focus — with respect to background sharpness — may become more challenging for many HD shooters. Many of my ENG shooter brethren, of course, do not give such cinematic notions as selective focus, depth of field control, and off-speed recording much thought, so the implications of the reduced size imager, apart from some potential loss of low-light performance, may be small.
For EFP, corporate, and industrial shooters, or those who simply want better control of their craft, the PDW-F350 allows true off-speed recording from 4fps to 60fps, the effect of which can be played back in the camera's viewfinder without the need for an external frame converter. Both XDCAM HD models can record 1080i60, 1080i50, 1080p30, 1080p25, and 1080p24, which means PAL standard-definition compatibility after downconversion is ensured. User-selectable bit rates for HD recording range from 18Mbps to 35Mbps. At 18Mbps, the camcorder can record more than two hours of HD (albeit with greater compression) on a single 23GB professional digital disc. This extended runtime capability is further evidence of the new camcorders' relevance to mainstream ENG and EFP shooters.
Since Grass Valley had no large installed base of its own proprietary recording technologies, it is in an interesting position as it pushes into the HD mainstream with the open-source Grass Valley Infinity camera. The Infinity's absence of a proprietary image-capture protocol and mandated recording medium gives shooters enormous flexibility for optimal integration into any IT-based workflow.
The camera is highly unusual, moving aspects of Grass Valley's high-end Viper camera down the market. Employing JPEG 2000 compression (the same codec recommended in the Digital Cinema Initiative), the Infinity embraces established IT industry I/O protocols including Gigabit Ethernet, MXF, and FireWire, while recording to standard Flash memory or readily available Iomega drives.
As shooters in an increasingly IT world of LANs and server-based storage, we must bear in mind that our image-acquisition tools lie only at the beginning of a long and complex data management process. At around $25,000, the Infinity is well positioned in the thick of the mainstream competition, with an open design that enables a wealth of HD opportunities.
Across the spectrum of camera manufacturers at this year's NAB, a concerted push into the broad HD mainstream was plainly evident. For a few years, camera manufacturers seemed to vacillate, appealing at first to the top-end, cinema-oriented HD shooter, and then — with the advent of HDV — focusing more closely on the relatively unsophisticated needs of the prosumer.
That changed in a big way at NAB 2006, with manufacturers introducing a bevy of technically advanced products including Ikegami's 1000-line CMOS imager in its EditCam HD camcorders. Such advances in imager and camera technology, whether disc, memory card, or tape-based, hold great promise for all of us who are on the frontlines of HD production in the real, often unglamorous, worlds of news, television, and corporate productions. As more of us in the mainstream migrate to HD in the months ahead, we can thank the camera gods above who reigned over this year's NAB: Thank you all for the new empowering tools at our disposal.
