Panasonic HDC-SD1

[Mydel]

Hi! I've just have a quick question. Im thinking about buying Panasonic HDC-SD1 camera. Anybody haround have one? What is the real life performance?
I looked at this camera in circit city and they sell it 1299$ with 4GB SD card included.

Thanx

 

[LethalWolfe]

Currently nothing supports the format that camera shoots so I can't recommend getting it (or any other tapeless consumer camera).


Lethal

 

[Mydel]

Currently nothing supports the format that camera shoots so I can't recommend getting it (or any other tapeless consumer camera).

Yeah I realize that but I hope that format it will be supported in iMovie 07....It looks like more and more cameras is using that. At least from Panasonic and Sony

 

[LethalWolfe]

Currently nothing supports the format that camera shoots so I can't recommend getting it (or any other tapeless consumer camera).

Yeah I realize that but I hope that format it will be supported in iMovie 07....It looks like more and more cameras is using that. At least from Panasonic and Sony

Support will eventually be there, but no one knows if it's "just around the corner" or not.

A couple of other considerations are the cost of the SD cards (4gigs gets you 1hour of video) and the cost storing/archiving the video (are you going to keep it all on a HDD, burn it as data to DVDs, etc.,). If you go on a trip how many SD cards are you going to need before you dump the footage onto your laptop (assuming you own a laptop and want to bring it on vacation with you)? If you are using a DV or HDV camera $3-5 gets you 1 hour of shooting time plus a permanent copy of your footage and tapes a easy to find in pinch (most drug stores carry them and I've even seen them at some gas stations).

Also, since AVCHD is a very, very compressed codec that means it'll be more proc intensive for computers to handle. Render and export/compression times are going to be pretty sucktacular. Considering how much they already suck for HDV I don't even want to imagine what AVCHD is going to be like.


Lethal

 

[Mydel]

Support will eventually be there, but no one knows if it's "just around the corner" or not.

A couple of other considerations are the cost of the SD cards (4gigs gets you 1hour of video) and the cost storing/archiving the video (are you going to keep it all on a HDD, burn it as data to DVDs, etc.,). If you go on a trip how many SD cards are you going to need before you dump the footage onto your laptop (assuming you own a laptop and want to bring it on vacation with you)? If you are using a DV or HDV camera $3-5 gets you 1 hour of shooting time plus a permanent copy of your footage and tapes a easy to find in pinch (most drug stores carry them and I've even seen them at some gas stations).

Also, since AVCHD is a very, very compressed codec that means it'll be more proc intensive for computers to handle. Render and export/compression times are going to be pretty sucktacular. Considering how much they already suck for HDV I don't even want to imagine what AVCHD is going to be like.


Lethal

Yes I agree with you, however storage will be not an issue soon. External hard drive are not very expensive these days and HD DVDs will be affordable soon. I worry about rendering though. Thats why I'm really interested in "real life" expirience with that kind of cameras.
I know that tapes have multiple advantages but Im still not convinced. I just remember times when VHS tapes where everywhere in my home and that was pretty depresing expirience
I will wait, see what others report....and than decide but thanx for your imput

 

[seniorstinky]

Yes I agree with you, however storage will be not an issue soon. External hard drive are not very expensive these days and HD DVDs will be affordable soon. I worry about rendering though. Thats why I'm really interested in "real life" expirience with that kind of cameras.
I know that tapes have multiple advantages but Im still not convinced. I just remember times when VHS tapes where everywhere in my home and that was pretty depresing expirience
I will wait, see what others report....and than decide but thanx for your imput

Mydel,

Seems like you have a bit too much future vision (ie. storage will soon not be an issue, iMovie 7 hopefully will work with this).

Let me tell you why I've stuck with tape:

1) Archiving - No way I want all the video I've captured stored on my computer. Most of it is not worth the "cost" of putting onto my HDD. Still, I "may" want to use it in the future (which is why I catalog all my tapes). Which brings up the point of how would you catalog your files on your HDD?

2) Quality - DV seems to still be the best quality compared to HDD/flash/DVD storage. Take a look at the prosumer cameras (let's say over $1500) and tell me how many of them don't use tape (I only know of one that doesn't use tape). Non-tape uses more compression on their video than tape. More compression likely means more quality loss.

 

[Mydel]

Mydel,

Seems like you have a bit too much future vision (ie. storage will soon not be an issue, iMovie 7 hopefully will work with this).
.

I know I know.....I'm always living in a dream and NEVER learn from my mistakes ( like buying 1 gen of Apple products )