&tI just exported a few of the stills from the Spook short in full resolution. I want to make a few comments about the HDV shooting format: It's hardly an ideal format for shooting, but since everything is making a slow transition to High Definition we are stuck with transitionary formats. The main reason HDV isn't that good is the simple fact that Sony wanted to keep the current media used to record video, that being MiniDV tapes. They had to work out a way to fit roughly twice the resolution of DV onto the same media, and they way they did it was with compression. Although DV has it's own compression scheme, HDV's compression is much more heavily compressed. Although arguably they are using a smarter compression codec, that being MPEG2, the compression is lossy right from the get go. The other cheeky thing they are doing on most their camera's is capturing the footage at a 4:3 ratioed frame of 1440 x 1080, then squeezing that out to the full 16:9 ratioed frame of 1920 x 1080 during editing.
I don't really see the point in taking all these shortcuts, because under heavy analysis of the raw footage, artefacts and compression mashes are clearly visible until the image is shrunk down to 50% of the original size - giving you good looking footage that is 960 x 540, which is only a little more resolution than the 720 x 450 resolution of (widescreen) DV. So in the end you get slightly more resolution and detail over DV, but the compression and artefact issues almost negate this advantage.
Take a close look at the stills I've attached, remembering these three factors - The stills have been heavily color corrected (not a major issue for judging the image quality), the stills are further compressed with JPEG, and have been deinterlaced. At least in the future we will be able to do away with rediculous pixel shifting and up rezzing. Shame on you Sony (and other HDV supporters).
A Month of Reflection
7 months ago
2 comments:
HDV as a format has been torn apart by so many people. Speaking as someone who has only shot in DV, do you actually consider it worth shooting HDV or would you rather stick with DV considering all the extra issues HDV has.
One format I'd like to play with is DigiBeta which, despite being on Standard Definition, is something I'd take over HDV any day. 90Mb/s compared to DV/HDVs 25Mb/s, and still widely used in the UK for shows that are too costly to shoot in HD, like Doctor Who. Cameras cost an absolute fortune though.
If you want the best of both worlds though, HDCam, and beyond, that's where it really gets awesome. Be nice when stuff like that comes into our price range though, or we ascend into it's price range.
Well I'd probably stick with DV unless editing HDV is not a hassle for you - with the increased file sizes and processing times, you do get slightly better resolution and seem to get slighter better color correction (even though it's craptacular 4:2:2 color compression).
DigiBeta is nice, much better color compression too, I believe it can do full 4:4:4 which isn't compressed.
HDCam and beyond, like what that RED camera uses, will be very nice. Should definately come down in price as HD stuff like televisions becomes fully mainstream.
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