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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Canon HV20

J

Jeremy Hughes

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1920*1080 native. 24p in a 60i stream. 3 lux low light. HDMI out. $1099.99
I'll second that "WOW".
Slap a 35mm adapter on it and you've got a sweet little set up.
 
The addition of audio input, horizontal form factor, and HDMI makes this a much more capable camera than the HV10.

Has some possibilities for low end, POV, risky situation, and guerilla shooting...
 
Too bad I already bought the Sony HC3....

Oh well, 3 lux low light isn't anything to write home about... But not bad for a camcorder this size. I'm not sure if I'll ever be willing to buy another HDV camcorder. The more I work with HDV (and it's all pretty much been home movies up to this point) the more I hate it. Let's see one of these that records AVCHD or one of the newer HD formats to internal HDD or memory cards. Maybe next year?
 
I feel like my HVR-A1E might be threatened :(
 
My next cam purchase.
 
Theoretically yes... But you're asking a lot of an expresscard adapter to handle an SDI interface card.

Now I have to ask, why would you ever want to do this? The video out from the HDMI on this camcorder is going to be the same processed junk you get in the HDV stream. You might omit a few of teh HDV artifacts (maybe), but I doubt it. If it's like all the other compact HDV cams on the market, you get to see the video stream as it's encoded and written to tape. So if that's the case, then you'll be losing quality by doing this and it won't be anything short of a headache, IMO.
 
AppliedVisual said:
Theoretically yes... But you're asking a lot of an expresscard adapter to handle an SDI interface card.

Now I have to ask, why would you ever want to do this? The video out from the HDMI on this camcorder is going to be the same processed junk you get in the HDV stream. You might omit a few of teh HDV artifacts (maybe), but I doubt it. If it's like all the other compact HDV cams on the market, you get to see the video stream as it's encoded and written to tape. So if that's the case, then you'll be losing quality by doing this and it won't be anything short of a headache, IMO.
Click to expand...

If the sensor is really 1920x1080 native... Uncompressed 1920x1080 4:2:2 beats the pants off of heavily compressed 1440x1080 4:2:0. My understanding is that most other HDV cameras with HDMI do give you the video as it appears before compression. At any rate, the guys on This Week in Media have been going on about this at length.

I agree it is a bit questionable whether you could get away with this over ExpressCard... and I don't think you're going to be able to encode to a decent quality codec in real-time, so how you're supposed to record this data is anyone's guess. (You can't even hook up an external RAID, since your ExpressCard slot is already full.)

This might be an interesting workflow for someone who wanted to build an ultra-low-budget home studio around a desktop machine, though.
 
Chris Kenny said:
My understanding is that most other HDV cameras with HDMI do give you the video as it appears before compression.
Click to expand...

Hmmm... I'm unaware of any that do. My HC3's HDMI output has all the artifacting and color banding of the HDV encoded signal. All the ones I've looked at before buying the HC3 (including my A1 that I owned before) always had heavily processed / already encoded output over HDMI and/or component. This was a huge hope for early HDV camcorders like the Sony FX1/Z1, but alas, they don't do it either over component. Canon has great 4:2:2 output from the XLH1 over SDI though.

Hey, if the HV20 does feed out a true un-butchered 4:2:2 feed over HDMI, then great. That would be a first, but I'll believe it when I see it with my own eyes. But Canon is really setting some new precedents with the HV20 using a progressive sensor with full 1920x1080 res and 24p ability. I never would have expected that from a $1K or cheaper palm-corder. Or at least not this soon.

This might be an interesting workflow for someone who wanted to build an ultra-low-budget home studio around a desktop machine, though.
Click to expand...

Yep. I see no reason why this camera couldn't be fitted to a 35mm adapter and do just as good a job (or better) as many current 1/3" HDV camcorders. If the HDMI output does do what some are hoping (and I see people hoping for this every time a new low-cost HD camcorder comes to market), then that's great for a studio setup. Seeing how you would have to lug a capable capture system with you everywhere you go and keep it within length of your HDMI cable (probably 25 to 35 feet max).

I'm definitely going to take a look at the HV20. If it can shoot true 24p, then at $1K it's a no-brainer for high-risk camera. I wonder how well the autofocus performs at 24p?
 
AppliedVisual said:
Hmmm... I'm unaware of any that do. My HC3's HDMI output has all the artifacting and color banding of the HDV encoded signal. All the ones I've looked at before buying the HC3 (including my A1 that I owned before) always had heavily processed / already encoded output over HDMI and/or component. This was a huge hope for early HDV camcorders like the Sony FX1/Z1, but alas, they don't do it either over component. Canon has great 4:2:2 output from the XLH1 over SDI though.
Click to expand...

Hmm... Some Googling shows I'm not the only one who thinks these cameras feed out the pre-compressed footage. See here or here, for instance.

As for why it hasn't looked better in your testing... well, the output is probably 8-bit/channel (there's your banding right there), and until now all of these cameras have had 1440x1080 sensors (sometimes only 1080i, no less), and often only get that high by playing funny pixel shifting tricks. It remains to be seen exactly how "real" Canon's 1920x1080 is with this camera. And of course just because the footage isn't compressed when it hits the HDMI tap, doesn't mean it hasn't been sharpened or otherwise subjected to the sort of processing that makes cheap video look like cheap video.
 
AppliedVisual said:
Too bad I already bought the Sony HC3....

Oh well, 3 lux low light isn't anything to write home about... But not bad for a camcorder this size. I'm not sure if I'll ever be willing to buy another HDV camcorder. The more I work with HDV (and it's all pretty much been home movies up to this point) the more I hate it. Let's see one of these that records AVCHD or one of the newer HD formats to internal HDD or memory cards. Maybe next year?
Click to expand...


I've tested Sony's HC3 and UX1 (model with HDD and AVC, shares the same sensor) and Canon HV10.
After what I've seen....Sony is still way to go on the consumer market.
I expected far more from Canon, but HV10's picture looks "good" only to someone who hasn't seen HD before. Waay too much noise.
For now Sony's ClearVid CMOS kills Canon's CMOS.

AVC (H.264) will make HDV obsolete. 15Mb/s AVC is equivalent to HDV, but you can't go better than 15 on UX1 (12 on DVD models).

I'm interested to test the HV20 but a bit sceptical, since it shares the same sensor with HV10.
Also, companies like Canon don't think like RED does in terms of "quality meets price".
 
HDMI is always uncompressed. Blackmagic Design certainly imply that the HDMI output of HDV cameras is unprocessed [LINK]. But then they want to sell their product!
 
I think that the HDMI is pre-compression. 1920x1080, 4:2:2, no noise reduction, no sharpening, no compression... Wasn't the component out on the HV10 pre-compression? Wouldn't it be the same with HDMI?

Emanuel said:
My next cam purchase.
Click to expand...

You want it so bad you have to say that a two different websites.
 
Chris Kenny said:
As for why it hasn't looked better in your testing... well, the output is probably 8-bit/channel (there's your banding right there),
Click to expand...

Yep. The output is definitely 8bit from these other cams. Even over HDMI.

and until now all of these cameras have had 1440x1080 sensors (sometimes only 1080i, no less), and often only get that high by playing funny pixel shifting tricks.
Click to expand...

True. But We'll also have to see how Canon's sensor holds up with the additional 480 horizontal pixels. On a sensor that's slightly less than 1/3" in size, incresing the photosite density is going to decrease the amount of light hitting each receptor. The low light performance is going to be dismal at best. I'm curious to see how the HV20 handles noise... The mosquito noise on the HC3 (as well as the HC1/A1) is terrible and for some reason I'm expecting the H20 to be worse.

It remains to be seen exactly how "real" Canon's 1920x1080 is with this camera. And of course just because the footage isn't compressed when it hits the HDMI tap, doesn't mean it hasn't been sharpened or otherwise subjected to the sort of processing that makes cheap video look like cheap video.
Click to expand...

Yep. And I followed your links... The first of which doesn't tell us anything other than the HVR-V1 might be able to do it. It talks of outputs on the JVC HD100/110 and the HVX200/202. Both outputs are "uncompressed", but are heavily processed. In my experience with both cameras - yes, I've used both and still own the HVX. The conversion from digital to analog component back to digital isn't kind to the signal when recapturing due to the level of noise and edge processing that's there. Also the JVC only outputs 4:2:0 equivalent via component. I personally have no experience with the Sony HVR-V1 so I can't comment. However, I'd be very skeptical of this. As for the second link, I've already followed that whole thread over at DVINFO and that discussion is entirely academic. It's the same thread that rears up every time a new low-budget camcorder is due to be released too. I did a bit more serching too and I can't seem to find anyone that can actually confirm the HVR-V1 sends an un-crippled, 4:2:2 stream that hasn't been butchered out of its HDMI port.

So far, all the HDMI and/or component output I've viewed of live feeds out of cheaper (sub $5K) HD camcorders has been seriously over-processed and looks identical to what you get a few minutes later playing the HDV feed back through the same port. It would be great if there's a camera out there that does what everyone seems to be hoping for, but I have yet to see it with my own eyes.
 
I guess somebody with an Intensity needs to do some tests of capturing live and off playback, and then doing a difference check between the two.
 
Also wanted to add that in that DVINFO thread, Douglass Spotted Eagle noted that all the video is heavily processed. It is converted from the native 1920x1080 to 1440x1080 for processing.

There's another discussion at DVINFO that I popped up in the search -- there's 3 or more on this very subject in the V1/FX7 forum. Where two othe members confirm the same thing. One wasn't so sure the HDMI out was pre-comrpession, but all agreed it was heavily processed showing edge and color artifacting and it's pretty noisy too. Most are trying to convert the 1080i feed to CineForm (makes the most sense), but some are capturing / converting to DVCPROHD??? WHY? Perhaps they're just hoping to retain the 4:2:2 color depth at the expense of smaller raster. But so far there's no evidence that the heavily processed V1 image via HDMI is still 4:2:2 equivalent. Seems to me that most V1 owners experimenting with this are skeptical or don't care, most are looking for a way to import directly to a superior codec without futzing around with HDV... Which most NLE systems still require transcoding to another format in order to properly edit.
 
ok so only rigth thing now is go to Andromeda way - hack directly behind the chip with external wire and maybe rip off original lenses from body and add some mount for interchangable lenses :D

maybe some miniRED will be solution for all this mini budget hassle
 
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