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Question about a documentary's cinematography

  • Thread starter Thread starter Destro
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Destro

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Hi!

I have a question about a camera question about a possible documentary of mine. I'm really hoping for something like Panasonic's HVX200, it's for sure that XDCAM is out of our price range. I'm interested about the HVX200 over the other semi-pro cameras because of the DvcProHD- format. I don't know much about the HDV compression but it seem to me that it's a real pain. Am I really off base with this one? If we'd shoot HDV, how do I have to prepare for it?

I know, the P2 cards aren't the ideal solution for LOW budget documentary, but I'm thinking if we could also have the firestore hard drive. It would suit better for our needs. Do you have any experience shooting documentaries with the HVX200? I think we can shoot the whole thing in two months. (I'm worried about the storaging also.)

The documentary has lots of interviews (just people talking to the camera), possibly some time lapse and nature stuff also. Not much handheld work. I everything works out as planned, we're also having SUPER 8, 16mm and also 35 mm film in the documentary.

I'm hoping my iMac 2.1 ghz with 1.5 ram and 800 hard drive can manage the DvcProHD. I'm using FCP 5 studio (universal).

I'm also hoping to get into some festivals and I'm really worried about the picture quality in large screens. Other HDV cameras, the JVC GY's have better resolution as also the Canon XL-H1 does.

What would be the best choice people? Remember, this is going to be a low budget student thing, though the people involved are really resourcefull. There might be a chance to get the HVX200 for a really good deal. Otherwise, I think we'll have to go for DVX100 or XL2 (for better resoulution). There are of course the old DvcPro cameras, but I'm not really fond of them in these sorts of projects.
 
All the cameras you mention make a comparable picture so the choice should be what you think is for you. None will degrade your picture. HDV is a great fomrat that many use daily and have no issues. The biggest problem with these film festivals is not what you give them but how they project it.
 
Thank you for your answer.

I'm not familiar with the HDV codecs but I have an impression that they can be troublesome with editing (I'm running FCP 5.1).
 

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