Video Camera Quality

[Cynandre]

Skyman

I see that the video quality of a cheaper camera is not as good as that of an expensive one. The video of a cheaper camera looks pixelated.

In a still camera the pixel quality is defined by 3 Megapixels, 5 Megapixels etc.

How is the video quality defined in a video camera.

I see that the 3CCD cameras also mention the Megapixels of the still pictures the camera can take - for example, the Panasonic NV-GS400 takes 4MP pictures. Does this have any bearing to the video quality.

Chris

[Skyman]

Skyman

I see that the video quality of a cheaper camera is not as good as that of an expensive one. The video of a cheaper camera looks pixelated.

In a still camera the pixel quality is defined by 3 Megapixels, 5 Megapixels etc.

How is the video quality defined in a video camera.

I see that the 3CCD cameras also mention the Megapixels of the still pictures the camera can take - for example, the Panasonic NV-GS400 takes 4MP pictures. Does this have any bearing to the video quality.

Chris

i don't know that cheaper cameras look pixelated. I am guessing that the cameras you have seen that are pixelated are still cameras that are producing video, or cameras that are not performing as they should for some reason. with all the marketing hype it is easy to get the two confused. Basically a proper video camera will have a tape (this is the easiest way to spot a hypbrid from the real deal without going into things like file formats frames per second, pixel audio sampling etc) i feel that this post is going to become a long one, so for simplicities sake i will only be talking about the digital video cameras (in my opinion hybrids are toys but they definately fulfil a need and there are hybrids that provide quality equal to a vhs tape(and for many people this is all they need in terms of quality) In terms of video camera quality, we are really talking in video formats. MJS will probably be able to post a more comprehensive list but essentially we have to main types of camera sd (standard difinition) and Hd (high definition) (more to come going to lunch)

[Skyman]

sorry about that i got busy at work. then there are the tape formats, (low - high quality) digital 8, mini dv, dvcpro, dvcam, digibeta (i think there are more but honestly if you are looking for higher quality than digi beta then you need to learn more than what you can from a forumn) in terms of 3ccd this is a broadcast standard that enables much more accurate colour control etc than a single ccd camera (so that colour grading accross multiple scenes and takes can occur. basically a 3ccd camera has you guessed it 3ccds (one each for red green and blue) the extra information recorded allows editiors to manage colour from multiple cameras as well. there are now consumer 3ccd cameras and single ccd hd cameras that are aimed at the non broadcast market. now it is going to get a bit confusing. if you are looking at widescreen there are 3 types 1 true widescreen 2 anamorphic (the picture is squashed on recording and stretch out on playback and letterbox (standard screen but with black bars on the top and bottom) now each video tape format has its own horizontal and vertical resolution for example vhs standard (not widescreen) is 640X480 whilst mini dv is 725X576 this is despite the fact that a ccd on a mini dv camera might be 1024X1280 or similar so: The tape type, format of the camera sd/hd etc and the aspect ratio (true, anamorphic or letterbox) determine the picture quality not the resolution of the ccd. I have actually shot films on $10,000 broadcast cameras that then had a few scenes shot on a little panasonic ds38 (old model now) and many professionals can't tell the difference when the lighting etc is ok, but in those tricky situations it becomes really evident. to that end it really depends on what your budget is and what you intend to use the camera for. and qulity is also related to the lens the camera has and things like does the microphone pic up the sound of the focus motor (i have seen otherwise great cameras suffer from this). if you want to understand more check out video courses or your local pro video store. Videocraft has outlets in most capital cities (in Australia)

[MJS]

Boy am I glad that you took that one. I give the same explanation every year iin class to my 180 students and all the parents again around the holidays. In a nutshell, if you want good stills and good video, buy the separate cameras. The hybrids store the compressed video stream as an MPEG-4 or smaller compression file on their drives. I'll take the MiniDV (DV25) until they can store that or better on the smaller drives.

Skyman, are theey selling the JVC 5000 series camera with the firestorm or similar hard drive set up down by you. I'm thinking of looking at one for school, shooting long running shows and what not. It wouild be nice to not have to import the files when editing.

[Skyman]

Boy am I glad that you took that one.

Skyman, are they selling the JVC 5000 series camera with the firestorm or similar hard drive set up down by you. I'm thinking of looking at one for school, shooting long running shows and what not. It wouild be nice to not have to import the files when editing.

I left a lot out partially because i replied over 2 days and partially because the answer is a little complex.

It looks like we do have the JVC 5000 series:

http://www.jvcpro-australia.com/JVCP...=11&prodID=242

whats more it is a lot cheaper than i expected (and i have a contact with the importer so should be able to get it cheaper!!!) still gotta make a few more tweaks on the mac though. it is running nicely but i think i can still tweak a bit more grunt out of her. Also it is a bit of a re learning curve for me. i have been using premier pro so much at work of late that fcp feels a little foreign (also my g3 was running version 2 and there is a lot more to fcp4.

[MJS]

One of my seniors is headed off to Purdue University next year and will be using Final Cut Pro in the broadcast program. We're going to get him set up with a Mac notebook of some type and the program. I guess I'm going to learn a little about it after all.

Good luck with it all.