Remember way back when, or well just a couple years ago really, when we only had that one standard video connector? To most people in the US, it was the yellow RCA plug that matched up to a yellow jack on our television. Video professionals had it pretty easy too. Just hook up a single BNC cable from the Video Out port to the Video In port on a monitor. Oh, those were the good old days. Now we have a whole collection of different connectors and video formats, not to mention about a dozen variations of each. So, in what promises to be a lengthy article, I will try to break down all the confusion and describe many of the video connectors that are in use today.

…continue reading All Those Video Connectors

Ever since Panasonic enabled color output on the viewfinder port of the VariCam H back in 2005, we’ve been waiting for them to actually release a color viewfinder to go along with it. Every high-end 2/3″ Panasonic camera since then supports a color viewfinder, but until now there hasn’t been a Panasonic part to put there. Now, with little fanfare, Panasonic is finally showing prototypes of their color finder, the AJ-CVF100G. Read the official press release here.

There were two at NAB – one on a VariCam 3700, and one on a VariCam 2700. The exterior looks almost identical to the black-and-white finders (which should please people dismayed by the large size of the Sony C35W). While the NAB floor is not the best place for doing critical image evaluation, my first impressions were quite favorable. The images were very sharp and extremely focusable, even with minimal peaking (though it is possible to set the peaking to 11 on this finder, if you want your image extra crispy.) Color seemed good as well. I was worried what artifacts the LCOS technology used in the finder might produce, but I couldn’t detect any disturbing flicker or color separation. I was told that, like the other color viewfinders on the market, you’ll definitely want to protect the screen on this one from direct sunlight. It would be nice if Panasonic would supply it with an auto-capping shutter, but it looks like that will be left to third parties.

One exciting feature of the AJ-CVF100G is support for every common HD format (meaning that you can expect to see it on a variety of non-Panasonic cameras in the not-too-distant future). It should be available this summer for a list price around $8,495.

From my perspective, if there were themes to NAB this year, it was 3D and 35PL glass. There were a multitude of 3D rigs on display; some of them quite clever, some rather old school and some, well, shall we say… “logically challenged”.

Then there were a few groundbreaking solutions aimed at the masses. Panasonic showed a concept camera that essentially looked like an HPX170 with binoculars on the front. Affordable HD 3D. Years away from reality, but a sign of things to come. Neat. This camera was a component of a top-to-bottom 3D initiative announced by Panasonic. Here’s the press release.

There were plenty of 3D display systems from other manufacturers as well. Sony showed a very nice 3D LCD panel that attracted quite a crowd.

…continue reading Reflections on NAB 2009

AJA has just announced their new KI Pro tapeless video recorder. I’m really excited about this little box, which has a host of new features that are really amazing. It is a rugged field recorder that encodes video directly to 10-bit Apple ProRes 422. The ProRes HQ codec has really impressed us, with quality only paralleled with the highest end HD acquisition formats. AJA has done a great job working with ProRes, first with the IoHD and now with the KI Pro. The box is a fully functional recorder going directly to hard disc (HDD or SSD), or on to ExpressCard 34 media cards. Yes that’s right, it can record to your SxS cards or other ExpressCard 34 media. For video inputs it has SD/HD-SDI, HDMI, and Component video. It also takes timecode input, 2 audio XLR inputs, and is powered by a standard 4-pin XLR cable. With all of these options you can record the output of just about any camera on the market, and even attach it to a camera with an optional accessory.

…continue reading AJA’s New KI Pro Portable Recorder

Panasonic has unveiled new lower cost P2 cards. The cards support very fast read/write speeds, but at a reduced life span. The new cards are E-series (E for Economy) P2 cards and will be available in 16, 32, and 64 GB models. When used at full capacity on a daily basis, the cards should last for 5 years. If used to half capacity (not sure who does that exactly) they should last 10 years. No worries though, the life span of the cards can be tracked with the P2 format software or in the camcorder’s LCD/viewfinder. Amazingly these cards sport a 1.2 Gbps transfer speed, which is even faster than the current 64 GB A-Series cards. That means faster download times to a laptop. The 16 & 32 GB cards should be available in May for a list price of $420 and $625 respectively. The 64 GB will be available in August for a list of $998. That’s about half the price of the A-Series cards. Rental houses may stay clear of these cards, but as an owner/operator this is a great situation. In 5 years, we’ll all want a bigger, faster P2 card anyway. Check out the full press relesase here at Panasonic.

Who says tape is dead? Well not Sony anyway. This week at NAB, the new SRW-9000 HDCAM SR Camcorder will be shown at the Sony and Abel booths. It’s a compact one-piece body camcorder with a 2/3″ 1080p CCD sensor. In 10-bit 4:2:2, it will record at 1080/23.98P, 24P, 25P, 29.97P, and 1080/50i/59.94i. Oh, AND it can also record 4:2:2 1080/50P/59.94P. That’s right it will record 1080P 60P just like the F23, but is considerably smaller.

There are also several option boards that will expand the feature set even more: a Dual Link SDI output board for 4:2:2 1080P 60P output,  a variable speed recording 1-60 FPS board that also allows for 3 seconds of pre-cache, and a 4:4:4 RGB recording and output board with support for the S-LOG gamma mode. Check out more information here at 1394 BBS (Japanese website) and follow Sony’s NAB 2009 mini site as well as this blog. The SRW-9000 is planned to be available in December.

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We’re always connecting piles of accessories to our cameras. Soon there’s nowhere left to plug one in. House of Power makes a clever breakout box to power multiple 12v & 24v accessories from any camera with a V-lock battery mount.

The breakout box and all House of Power products can only be seen at Abel’s Booth C8537 at NAB.