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Is HV30 still the best choice?

G

Gloor

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Hi, I'm planning to get a camcorder and I was recommended HV30 as it is currently the best under $1000. Would that be still true?

I am going to mainly use for video reference for animation which is a overkill I know but I also want to have a nice camcorder for occasional holidays etc. so that is the reason why I decided to pay a bit more.
How quick it is to export the footage to .mov for quicktime? What software would I need? Also, I recently had a camcorder that was around $400 and the footage was worse than from my digital camera 🙂. The resolution was also not that good and it had the linny thing issue which I had to solve by DEINTARLACEing.

How would HV30 be for me and what is going to be easier etc.?

Any suggestions pls?

Thanks
 
The HV30 is still a very capable camera, although with the slew of AVCHD cameras that Canon has released, it's no longer the only kid on the block.

Without getting into the whole debate of which codec is better HDV(HV20/30) and AVCHD(HF11, HG20,etc.), this is really going to depend on you.

The HV30 records to miniDV tape and will require you to capture from the camera to a NLE, such as iMovie, Final Cut Express, Final Cut Pro, etc. You should already have iMovie on your computer.

The HV30 is a good consumer camera, but like the rest of Canon's lineup, there are advantages, disadvantages, and compromises to be made that only you can decide.
 
Can the Avid Media Composer capture vid off the HV30? New to all these formats so, forgive me. thanks.
 
Thank you.

I've read that HDV is still superior to AVCHD when it comes to picture quality. I also heard that HDV can do only 1440x1080 and that it stretches the picture later for 1920x1080 but that is something i don't understand. Is it streched by the camera or by a video editing tool or ?? Do I lose the quality when trying to get those extra pixels?
What would be one of the main disadvantages with the HV30? I read the review but didn't notice anything major so have I missed something?
Btw, I need it for EU market therefore I'll be PAL (25) or film (24). Mainly film though I think 🙂


Gymnut said:
The HV30 is still a very capable camera, although with the slew of AVCHD cameras that Canon has released, it's no longer the only kid on the block.

Without getting into the whole debate of which codec is better HDV(HV20/30) and AVCHD(HF11, HG20,etc.), this is really going to depend on you.

The HV30 records to miniDV tape and will require you to capture from the camera to a NLE, such as iMovie, Final Cut Express, Final Cut Pro, etc. You should already have iMovie on your computer.

The HV30 is a good consumer camera, but like the rest of Canon's lineup, there are advantages, disadvantages, and compromises to be made that only you can decide.
Click to expand...
 
Gloor said:
I've read that HDV is still superior to AVCHD when it comes to picture quality.
Click to expand...
I've read that God created the world in 6 days.

But seriously, of course there are some HDV camcorders that are better than some AVCHD camcorders. General statements like "HDV is better than AVCHD" without detailed explanation of why are usually written by people who own HDV camcorders.

Dear God, has this turned into yet yet yet yet yet another AVCHD versus HDV thread? Let me know on your day off (God, that is).

Andrew.
 
Gloor said:
Thank you.

I've read that HDV is still superior to AVCHD when it comes to picture quality. I also heard that HDV can do only 1440x1080 and that it stretches the picture later for 1920x1080 but that is something i don't understand. Is it streched by the camera or by a video editing tool or ?? Do I lose the quality when trying to get those extra pixels?
What would be one of the main disadvantages with the HV30? I read the review but didn't notice anything major so have I missed something?
Btw, I need it for EU market therefore I'll be PAL (25) or film (24). Mainly film though I think 🙂
Click to expand...

Yes, the program stretches it out for you. You do lose quality in the process, but it isn't very noticeable. Both iMovie and Final Cut will know how to handle the footage.

P-Worm
 
Thank you P-Worm

Courtaj - your post is not helpful at all. You could have noticed that I am a newbie that is turning to others for advise so I can make the best buying decision. Here is one of the articles where it states that HDV is still superior to AVCHD when it comes to picture quality.
http://www.camcorderinfo.com/content/Canon-HV30-Camcorder-Review-34401/Format.htm#

and a quote :

We don’t expect HDV to keep its edge too much longer. At some point, maybe even this year, engineers will figure out how at least match its quality. Most of the AVCHD camcorders for 2008 are recording in 1920 x 1080, while HDV is forever locked at 1440 x 1080, then stretched for playback. The gains that the “full HD” camcorders make in resolution are expected to be offset by the lingering compression artifacts and other headaches of AVCHD, but it’s only a matter of time before they crack the code.
/quote


As you can see, my thread was about HV30 as few months before it was supposed to be the best choice as HV20 was an award winning camera and Canon's HV30 should continue that reputation. My lack of knowledge led me to these forums to ask others if they would still recommend HV30 as the best thing for the money. I care about picture quality and that is why I lean towards HDV as so far I've read everyone said that the picture is just better quality than AVCHD. If you have another opinion please do express it and help me with my decision.
Sarcasm and silly jokes won't help me understand why should I consider AVCHD. If you believe in something better that is better than HV30 then pls do tell me and pls do educate me as that is the reason why I am here.

I hope you know understand where I'm coming from so its gonna be easier for you to help me.

Thanks for any further advice.
 
The Camcorderinfo.com review you link to is from January. Also, if you do a search in this forum you'll find a number of threads where the HDV vs AVCHD issue has been thrashed into submission, usually with people agreeing to disagree, but helpfully some people have actually run side-by-side tests of comparable (by price) HDV and AVCHD camcorders.

Sure, you're a "newbie," but from my perspective this is just another in a long line of "HDV or AVCHD?" threads that frankly is beginning to seem pointless.

Good luck,
Andrew.
 
Courtaj said:
The Camcorderinfo.com review you link to is from January. Also, if you do a search in this forum you'll find a number of threads where the HDV vs AVCHD issue has been thrashed into submission, usually with people agreeing to disagree, but helpfully some people have actually run side-by-side tests of comparable (by price) HDV and AVCHD camcorders.

Sure, you're a "newbie," but from my perspective this is just another in a long line of "HDV or AVCHD?" threads that frankly is beginning to seem pointless.

Good luck,
Andrew.
Click to expand...

Ok, lets leave the HDV vs AVCHD aside and please tell me if you think that HV30 would be the best choice right now or if you have something better to offer. That might help me better than HDV vs AVCHD 🙂))
 
Canon's HF10 / HF100 / HF11 and Sony's SR11 / SR12 rival the HV30 for PQ and (here's the comment that gets me flamed) possibly surpass it some areas. Take a look at the camcorder.info reviews of these cameras. But don't believe everything you read. Find a store with a generous returns policy and try before you buy: see which you like the most. PQ is a lot but it ain't everything: the editing and archiving workflows for HDV and AVCHD are a little different (not better, not worse, just diffferent), too.

Andrew.
 
Courtaj said:
Canon's HF10 / HF100 / HF11 and Sony's SR11 / SR12 rival the HV30 for PQ and (here's the comment that gets me flamed) possibly surpass it some areas. Take a look at the camcorder.info reviews of these cameras. But don't believe everything you read. Find a store with a generous returns policy and try before you buy: see which you like the most. PQ is a lot but it ain't everything: the editing and archiving workflows for HDV and AVCHD are a little different (not better, not worse, just diffferent), too.

Andrew.
Click to expand...

Thank you, I'll have a look at those and might come back with some questions 🙂)

Have a nice day
 
Stay away from the sony's for now. I tried out an 1080 sony but it only offers interlaced recording: which is very lame. The canon offers progressive format playback which in my opinion is way better and much more future proof. With the interlaced you don't get good playback on computer screens today, it's rubbish to deinterlace things, and generally I think recording and keeping it progressive all the way through the process is the best answer. Therefore I would say any of the canons that do progressive recording are best. Sony's picture quality is great, but the format is out of date in my opinion. Also, whatever it was - AVCHD, or the camera itself, it wasn't really "up to" full HD quality in the compression if you ask me - too much artifacting, and again, the interlacing aspect just ruins it.

One persons opinion of course...
 
Courtaj said:
Canon's HF10 / HF100 / HF11 and Sony's SR11 / SR12 rival the HV30 for PQ and (here's the comment that gets me flamed) possibly surpass it some areas.
Click to expand...

Speaking from experience, I've tried them all (well, except the new HF11) as well as the Sony HC9, SR10, SR12 and Panasonic SD9. Search my posts and you'll see what I thought. I kept the HF100.

Basically there is almost no difference between the HV30 and HF100 in color, exposure, artifacts, etc. If anything there is a very slight advantage to the HF10 in sharpness (but most people won't see it). I found there to be almost as much difference between to identical HF100s as the HF100 to the HV30. The BIG advantage is size and ease of use. I prefer the smaller, "file-based" HF10 over the larger, linear tape-based HV30. I also prefer Canon's use of SD cards and price over Sony's MS cards and Sony price (also Canon has a richer/warmer image to Sony). The SD9 is worth a look as well, though the Canon is the winner in low light without contest!
 
I can't comment directly on the HV30 since I have the HV20, but you would not have to worry about the footage being worse than that from a digital camera. The footage, even on the HV20, is very high quality. The biggest concern for getting any HDV camera is the ambiguity of Apple's continued support for FireWire, which is required for getting footage out of the camera. USB is only used for getting stills off of the MiniSD card. So far Apple has released 3 new notebook models; one kept FireWire, one dropped it, and one never had it. After their next round of desktop updates it should become more clear whether Apple really is phasing out FireWire or if their last omission was solely to differentiate between the MacBook and the MacBook Pro.

P-Worm is correct that you don't have to do anything to get the output back to 1920x1080, although I thought that the camera itself re-stretches it rather than your software editor (since it also displays full 1920x1080 if you go HDMI out direct to your TV).
 
Thank you all very much. I think the winner for me is still HV30. I'm gonna do the purchase after xmas so I will have a final check just in case someone is not gonna release something upper fantastic 🙂))

Thanks for all the feedback.
 
CMD is me said:
Speaking from experience, I've tried them all (well, except the new HF11) as well as the Sony HC9, SR10, SR12 and Panasonic SD9. Search my posts and you'll see what I thought. I kept the HF100.

Basically there is almost no difference between the HV30 and HF100 in color, exposure, artifacts, etc. If anything there is a very slight advantage to the HF10 in sharpness (but most people won't see it). I found there to be almost as much difference between to identical HF100s as the HF100 to the HV30. The BIG advantage is size and ease of use. I prefer the smaller, "file-based" HF10 over the larger, linear tape-based HV30. I also prefer Canon's use of SD cards and price over Sony's MS cards and Sony price (also Canon has a richer/warmer image to Sony). The SD9 is worth a look as well, though the Canon is the winner in low light without contest!
Click to expand...

I completely agree with you about the HF100. And, editing off SD cards is so much nicer then dealing with tape, you really need to try it to see how much more sense it makes and how much time it can save you.
 
Hmm, HF100 vs HV30. That is gonna be hard to decide.

Well, I wanted to ask you about the import thing from those cameras.

In my experience, I had a camera that I needed to import a file .MOD which I later exported to .MOV. It was kinda simple
So the question is : How different is it with the tape (HV30) and memory stick (HF100)?
I have MP early 2008 with 8GB of ram so the processing power should be sufficient.

Can someone describe the difference and complications when importing with those 2 methods, please?


Thank you very much
 
HV30 or HF100

Gloor said:
Hmm, HF100 vs HV30. That is gonna be hard to decide.

Well, I wanted to ask you about the import thing from those cameras.

In my experience, I had a camera that I needed to import a file .MOD which I later exported to .MOV. It was kinda simple
So the question is : How different is it with the tape (HV30) and memory stick (HF100)?
I have MP early 2008 with 8GB of ram so the processing power should be sufficient.

Can someone describe the difference and complications when importing with those 2 methods, please?


Thank you very much
Click to expand...

The answer is: it depends. I haven't done anything with PAL so if someone has some insight on that please chime in. When it comes to the 24 fps film mode you have to work some mojo no matter which route you go. This is where it gets a little confusing. First some background...

Old school video was interlaced. So in the US every 1/60th of a second the video would display half of the new frame. Interlaced video consists of a bunch of lines which we'll say number 1,2,3,4,5,6, etc... So for interlaced video the first 1/60th of a second would be 1,3,5,7 and then the next 1/60th of a second would be 2,4,6,8, which would complete the whole image.

Now the confusing part with the new cameras is that they shoot 24 frames per second (instead of the 60 half frames per second of interlaced video) BUT due to the limitations of HDV and AVC (I might be off on this part... feel free to correct) the full 24p image contains too much information in each frame. So what they've done is they break the 24p image into an interlaced video stream to keep up with all of the data. So when you put the footage on the computer, your software has to be able to take the interlaced video and take the 1,3,5,7 frame and the 2,4,6,8 frame and combine them into one progressive image (its called reverse telecine.) There's some other mojo that goes on too, but that's the general idea.

So regardless of HV30 or HF100 you'll have to go through the reverse telecine process if you're going to edit.

HDV will require that you capture the video in realtime via firewire. AVCHD you transfer via USB, so you will save time going with the HF100. The nice thing about HDV is you have an archive on tape so you don't have to use up disk space.

That was probably way more info than you needed/wanted and if anyone has any corrections or a more concise way of explaining please do.
-T
PS If you're looking at the HV30 I'd highly recommend looking into the HV20 or whatever the PAL equivalent is. You can get an HV20 on Ebay for under $500. Hope that helps!
 
So, if I have 10 minutes HDV it will take 10 minutes to put it on the computer before I can start the process of reverse telescine?

Well, thank you very much for the explanation. Ill see after xmas and then will take the plunge 🙂
 
JES Deinterlacer

Gloor said:
So, if I have 10 minutes HDV it will take 10 minutes to put it on the computer before I can start the process of reverse telescine?

Well, thank you very much for the explanation. Ill see after xmas and then will take the plunge 🙂
Click to expand...

Correct. That link from Lethal should be able to help you walk through it if you're using final cut pro, but other software will vary. A good free program that will do the telecine process is JES Deinterlacer.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~jeschot/home.html

But depending on what software you're using to edit/capture it may or may not help.
 
I've got a Sony SR11 and its very good in my opinion but not the best. My key complaints are the auto focus and low light PQ.

That said I really do like the features on the camera, the overall PQ and the size, this thing is bullet proof and should give me years of service.

RE: AVCHD vs HDV- I prefer the AVC format and think that the coming years will see all camcorders go HDD based. It just makes sense and is very easy to use and store.
 
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