mdrejhon 8 #1 January 5, 2006 Hi, I am not a vidiot, and don't plan to be anytime soon, but you skydivers must be drooling over this. It's probably only freeflyer quality, but at HDTV and 5.1 megapixels (simultaneous video and photography in only 8.3 ounces), it probably would look stunning on a projector in the debrief room - depending on how good or terrible its compression codec and anti-shake technology is. http://news.google.ca/nwshp?tab=wn&ned=ca&ncl=http://gear.ign.com/articles/678/678900p1.html&hl=en It's a mere half-pound memory card camcorder (21 minutes of HDTV on a 1GB SD card). From the photos of the camcorder, the lens seem to be be big enough to work okay for light gathering capacity, but I guess the proof will be in the electronics quality. I know that the codecs for memory card camcorders are gradually getting better and starting to get better than DV-quality (at least for video with little motion compared to DV through a lens of similiar quality), but if the codec isn't going to keep up with fast images, this camcorder would be worthless for skydiving. Guess some freeflyer here will have to give this camcorder a skydive test. Nontheless, the future looks exciting -- ultra lightweight HDTV camcorders! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pope 0 #2 January 5, 2006 I agree--it's exciting to see the direction things are going with HD/HDV. Unfortunately, What a company says their product can do and what it actually is able to do are usually completely different things when it comes to "HD" Camcorders. I'll wait until the second or third round. pope Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mdrejhon 8 #3 January 5, 2006 True. The promised IMAX camcorder that's the size of a grain of sand -- but end up taking only VHS quality images from a device the size of a washing machine. I figure, they'll have this sorted out by the time I'm experienced enough to fly camera. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
quade 4 #4 January 5, 2006 I'm not going to get all -that- excited about a 720p camera. Show me a 1080p camera at that same size and weight and I'll get -really- excited.quade - The World's Most Boring Skydiver Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mdrejhon 8 #5 January 7, 2006 QuoteI'm not going to get all -that- excited about a 720p camera. Show me a 1080p camera at that same size and weight and I'll get -really- excited.I used to work in the home theater industry, so... Yes, good point, assuming apples versus apples -- Keep in mind that 5 megapixels taken from a big sharp lens downsampled to 720p and compressed from a good codec (high bitrate) looks much sharper than 1080p taken from 3 megapixels taken from a small lens. 1080p requires 6 megapixels for full resolution (2 megapixels times 3 for the individual RGB elements), plus a lens that doesn't blur any of this at all. So either it must be a 3 CCD of native resolution, or a single CCD at three times resolution (bayer pixel arrangement), to more-or-less eliminate the CCD resolution as a limiting factor. The earlier 720p camcorder that uses only a single 2 megapixel CCD is actually not maxing its resolution -- You need at least 3 megapixels to max 1280x720p sharpness (1280x720p is one megapixel -- but because of bayer CCD's and interpolation, you need about 3 megapixels to max the sharpness of 1280x720p), and from the results I've seen in the home theater industry, I can clearly see that earlier 720p consumer camcorders aren't "that sharp" -- much softer than the studio 720p camcorders, and much softer than digital photos taken on higher-megapixel camera and downscaled to 720p for comparision to a freezeframe from this 720p camcorder... The best computer-based 720p I've seen are the 100 megabyte WMV clips from www.wmvhd.com -- Looks much better than the worst 1080p video I've seen. I'd like to see a camcorder that PROPERLY records the full potential of 720p with minimum interpolation. The current consumer 720p's aren't good, I've seen much better 720p working as a contractor in the home theater industry. A good downsampling algorithm from 5 megapixels is definitely one piece of the equation, but lens, codec, etc quality definitely plays a role -- and this brand (Sanyo the cheapie) isn't that well known for videophile quality. However, as the manufacturers throws more pixels, better lens, better scaling, and better codecs, I do believe 720p will eventually start getting much better looking in a consumer camcorder. (i.e. more akin to resizing a 6 or 8 megapixel digital photo down to 720p equivalent resolution; it suddenly looks much less "soft" from excessive interpolation from a bayer CCD) But, yes 1080p done properly, is REALLY SWEET. (If max sharpness is preserved -- from incoming photon to final display, that is -- picture quality is never better than the weakest chain) I'm not getting that excited either, yet, but as professionals know, the past crop of 720p camcorders have been decidedly ho-hum and I definitely know 720p consumer camcorders have further big leaps to make in the sharpness and quality department. So don't dismiss 720p completely just yet. For example, many of today's good 1CCD DV camcorders are much sharper than yesteryear's 3CCD DV camcorders -- and the DV resolution has not changed. I expect such a major evolution to occur with 720p, especially if it is encoded in the video file at 4:4:4 component sampling or even merely 4:2:2 format. Even with the same lens and electronics quality, there are cases that 720p at 4:4:4 and 4:2:2 look sharper for color-filled images than 1080p recorded at 4:1:1. (The digital video file format will dictate limits on this - I do not expect a consumer camcorder to be able to do 4:4:4, however) 4:1:1 looks ugly when you're filming, say, a flower field of tulips from a distance -- because of color bleeding and smearing effects. That's an example what I witnessed on one model on an earlier crop of 720p video cameras. Ugh! MPEG4 versus HDV versus proprietary, quality of codec, overcompression, etc. It all gets frustrating. Clearly, lots of improvement yet to be made, but forgiveable since HD in a consumer camcorder is still a novel and new thing... Bottom line. Hopefully the consumer camcorder manufacturers get their act together.... :) Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
billo 0 #6 January 7, 2006 Mark, Great post...feel free to hang in this forum more often! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mdrejhon 8 #7 January 9, 2006 When I become a vidiot at maybe 300-400ish jumps. We shall see about that. (If I ever have ANY business using a camcorder in freefall. ) If so, then better'd WATCH OUT. You've been warned. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
