Canon HV20/30 1980vs 1440

[Ian Sharpe]

http://www.hv20.com/showthread.php?t=7918

Some interesting stuff about HDV & 'true HD'.

I noticed that my HV30 was only producing footage that gave 1440x1080. At first I thought it might be VS11 dowsizing the image, however a bit of googling reveals a different story. Apparantly HDV is stuck at 1440x1080 since that is the HDV format. \cameras that record in 'true HD' as its been market as record 1980x1080 are in AVCHD format recorded at 17mps (HDV is at 25mps) & at this point of time typically do not give as good an image as HDV & are extremely hard to edit.
That is the one reason I bought a tape based HD camera ease of editig. The mininum specs for editing AVCHD are supposed to be quad core!!!.

Anyway back to the HV30, even though it records at 1440x1080 , there is no mention of that in the handbook & 1980 x 1440 is actually referred to , so I do think that this is totally misleading by Canon & is an attempt to counter all this 'true HD' hype. People who buy a hi-def camera also might not know about all this & certainly might not know how to check the image size. I do feel a bit ripped off, however given that I have no trouble editing & the picture is amazingly better than standard DV, I can live with it .

cheers

[Ken Berry]

You're up very early in Braidwood! I do so too to walk the dogs... What's your excuse???

I have a HV20 but I knew before I bought it what format it shot in (1440x1080i) and I had particularly decided in advance, after studying the types of HD camera available, that I only wanted to consider a mini DV model. So I don't feel cheated. Like you, I find the image startlingly good when played in HDV format either from the camera itself using the HDMI port on it or transferred to USB stick or external hard drive and played over my PlayStation 3 via HDMI on my Samsung 115cm true HD (1920 x 1080p) LCD HDTV. The HDTV of course up-converts the incoming signal with no apparent artifacts.

I agree with you that AVCHD cameras are a technology which needs more work. I particularly blame the camera companies for pushing them onto an unsuspecting public who think it sounds great to record their videos onto an SD card or hard disk in the camera, but thinking their computers can handle it. I think it is an exaggeration to say that only Quads can handle AVCHD -- I have a Quad, and it can. But I also have a stock standard HP Core 2 Duo 17" laptop which can as well. But that seems to be the minimum. Even people with the older dual core machines find the going very hard and slow.

The camera makers are even more blameworthy in my view for either not having ensured that there were editing programs out there that could handle AVCHD. There weren't, and the software manufacturers have been scrambling ever since to catch up. At least Panasonic made the effort and distributes its AVCHD cameras with an unfortunately simplistic capture and editing program of its own devising, which does however work. And against this backdrop, for all its other faults, VS11.5+ (as updated) does a pretty good job, though there are some anomalies with AVCHD that still need ironing out (being able to establish your own AVCHD template with Make Movie Manager being a significant one -- though I have at least found a work-around...) And of course its SmartProxy allows users with older, but still pretty powerful, computers to at least edit AVCHD...

I would *not* agree with the information you read about AVCHD, even at 1920 x 1080, not being as good as HDV at 1440 x 1080. As I said, I use a HDV camera, so why my interest in AVCHD? Well, we used to have another Moderator here who was clearly our high def guru. But for various reasons, he has been unable to participate on the Board for around 3 months. But more and more people are buying these AVCHD cameras, are having problems, and are coming to the Board seeking answers. So I figured I had to have a go, novice though I was at the time with things HD. Two of these users have sent me samples of their AVCHD captures -- one only a week ago sent me an entire DVD filled with it so I can experiment to my hearts content. (It seems to confirm what other S9 owners had already found -- that the Panasonic S9 AVCHD camera output for whatever reason does not seem to be fully compatible with VS11.5+, but that is another long story...)

However, with that video in particular, played back in its native format on my HDTV via the PS3, the quality is superb. It was certainly not worse than my HV20 output, though the good news for you and I with 1440x1080 cameras, is that to my eyes at least, I could not say it was perceptibly any better quality.

Moral of the story: don't feel too cheated. I'd reserve that for a situation where you actually had bought an AVCHD camera!!

[Ian Sharpe]

Ken,

wow, I didnt realize how early i was, damn this internet thing, I must get a life!!!.

Whilst on the subject of the Canon , since you have the HV20 which I assume is pretty much the same as the HV30.

Have you tried recording HDV back to the Canon??

I did with a small clip & for some reason , it starts OK, goes for about 30 secs & then the the image dissapears for about 20 & then reappears (this is the image on the cameras screen) The tape is still recording BTW but just with no image . VS11 is still going OK too. Then it a happens again as well.
Funny thing though is that the clip created by VS on my PC during this process plays OK without a hitch.

I tried lots of things, first editing the original footage to cut out the bit where the screen goes blank, that didnt work. I just get the same problem again but only a bit earlier now.

I changed to a fresh balnk tape, same thing.
I am still using the rial version of S11 so maybe that has something todo with it.

Have you had these problems, other than that VS is very good & stable.

cheers

[Ken Berry]

It's a Canon thing, apparently. The same thing happens with Canon HDV cameras using other programs. Adobe Premiere Pro does it too, for instance. The matter is discussed on other forums, and I raised it here in detail a couple of weeks ago.

The very curious thing is that there *is* a solution, and that is to use VS10+, but with a patch for it applied which was originally brought out specifically for the HV10!! So what I do is finish all my editing in VS11.5+ (though I guess I could do it in VS10+ too, but I also produce an AVCHD hybrid disc, and I need VS11.5+ for that). Then I save the completed project in VS10 format (having already done so in VS11 format). In File > Save as, you will see a drop down, if you are not already aware of of, allowing you to choose between VS 9, 10 and 11 formats. I then open it in VS10, and select -- exactly the same as in VS11.5+ -- Share > HDV recording. And it has worked perfectly every time I have used it. You give the new file a name, it produces a new HDV file in transport stream format (which VS11.5+ says it is also doing), and then, with your camera attached via Firewire and in PLAY mode, the whole thing is recorded to tape. And it plays back beautifully on a HDTV using the camera's HDMI connection.

The other curious thing is that I have found the TS file produced this way is smooth throughout, whereas I have had problems with every HD project using VS11.5+. In every case, no exceptions, producing a HDV file (for storage currently, against the day when the price of Blu-Ray burners and discs becomes reasonable), works. But there are quite noticeable little lurches or blips associated with nearly every, though not all, transitions in the project. Using the same project (saved in VS10 mode) in VS10+ does not have a single blip. So to my mind, that is two more strikes again VS11.5+... And I suspect it probably has something to do with the new capture thread introduced by Corel in VS11 (the IVI Capture Component). Otherwise, one would have assumed that the HV10 patch would have been worked successfully into VS11 from the start.

Two footnotes to the foregoing: (1) In installing VS10+ on my Vista Ultimate Quad, I have not applied the Vista patch, just the HV10 patch. I have no idea if this is important. Vista just says it is disabling Aero, as I know it also does with the Vista patch applied anyway. But for the current exercise, it works flawlessly for exporting to camera without the Vista patch.

(2) Users with non-Canon HDV cameras apparently have no problem with VS11/11.5+ in exporting back to their cameras. So I am wondering if Canon have used something not quite standard in the HDV format their cameras use e.g. slightly different flags in the Transport Stream...?

[Ian Sharpe]

Ken thanks for that, it make sense then. Only prob is I dont have or have ever had VS10. I had VS9 but to my knowledge it wont capture HD.

This could be a serious hurdle in my effort to abandon the Pinnacle platform, as I dont have any other way of archiving edited footage since I dont have Blu Ray & VS11 doesnt support Blue Ray anyway & HD is dead in the water now too.

Will Ulead issue such a patch for VS11 or will VS12 over come this, I know you cant probably answer this but it would be nice to know.

BTW here is a good forum on HV20/30 > You may know it already??

http://www.hv20.com/

[Ian Sharpe]

Ken,

having searched & read your earlier post on this , I am not sure that we are having the same problem.

I actually get the footage recorded to the HDV tape, for say 30s, then the screen on the camera goes blue (but still records) It then comes good again but repeats the process.

I dont remember seeing a 'check the hdmi cable' error message but I will check again when I can.

cheers

[Ken Berry]

It didn't say 'check the hdmi cable' but 'check HD input'. In other words it was suggesting that the format of the HD video produced by VS11.5 as output for sending to the camera was not acceptable to the camera. And the recording process would actually start with the square block STOP symbol on the camera screen changing to the PLAY arrow. That would happen for a few seconds -- though never as long as 30 -- a few frames of video would appear, the process would stop and I would get that message superimposed over the little control panel window which appears when the actual export process is about to begin.

So I believe we really are talking about the same problem. Indeed, if you search that forum you gave the link to, I am almost certain you will find reports of similar problems, not only with VS11, but with other packages trying to export to Canon HDV cameras. As I have already said, I have first hand experience of that with Adobe Premiere Pro 3 -- and that's a problem also well discussed in the Adobe forums. With Premiere, the export process always started well and would go for various times but always for several minutes. But then it would just terminate...

As you guessed, I have absolutely no information about the release of VS12 or what it will cover. The fact that it is imminent, however, suggests that Corel is unlikely to release any further patches for VS11/11.5+. So I am not sure what to suggest. I also hope that VS12 will have a fix similar to what the HV10 patch did for VS10. But then again, I would have thought Corel would have incorporated that patch into VS11, but if they did, then something else they wrote into VS11 screwed up its operation. So who knows if that will be rectified in VS12...

Until I discovered the possibility of hybrid AVCHD discs, and screwed up the courage to spend a further $678 to buy a PlayStation 3 just a week after I had splashed out $3000 on the new HDTV (gulp! ), I too had seen export back to camera as being the most sensible way of watching my edited HD video on a HDTV. But I was lucky enough, of course, to have VS10. And now the heat is taken out of it for me, now that my PS3 will play the edited video either in its native HDV format or as an AVCHD disc.

By the way, VS11.5+ can indeed produce Blu-Ray discs as well as the late lamented HDV format discs.

[Ian Sharpe]

hI Ken,

I tried again & I am definatley not getting any 'check HD input' error messages, in fact I dont get any error messages at all , all that happens is that the screen on the camera goes blue, ie the image drops off, but then comes back on again & off agian until the end of the process.

Very odd, & frustrating, I was beginning to like VS & was hoping that I could leave the Pinnacle platform, at this stage until I can try VS12, I will wait til I try Pinnacle 12 (since there are no trials with Pinnacle).

cheers

[Ken Berry]

Do you get the little control panel and mini preview screen with the control buttons under it as the recording to camera starts?

And let us know how Pinnacle 12 goes. Always good to keep up with what the competition is up to!!

[skier-hughes]

http://www.pinnaclesys.com/Studio12UltU ... 8231628159

[Ian Sharpe]

Ken,

yes I do get the control panel on VS where you can rewind the tap etc.

anyway I sort of had some success, I recorded 1 minute of footage, captured that into VS, saved it to another file name (unedited), imported that file into the timeline & tried to copy to HDV. It worked no dropouts at all for the full 1 minute. So I tried editing the footage, simply, I just replicated the 1 minute clip 5 times on the timeline, so I had a 5 minute file, I then put simple fade transitions between each clip. Saved that file to another name, imported that into the timeline & went into the save to HDV option, did the whole thing, it took lots longer this time since it was a bigger file, got to the VS control panel, pressed go & it all went OK UNTIL it hit the end of the first clip where the transition was & then the image disappeared off the camera screen until the whole 5 minutes was up.

Bummer, eh, there must be something happening to the file during the editing process that the canon doesnt like!!!

[Ian Sharpe]

Graeme,

thanks for the link I already had that one, pity you cant just try the damn thing free, but you have to buy the thing to try it & given Pinnacle form over the past couple of years I am not willing to do that at this stage.

If Ulead have enough confidence in their product to offer trial versions then why cant Pinnacle?? You draw your own conclusion from that IMO & it doesnt look good for Pinnacle.

[neonbob]

Anyway back to the HV30, even though it records at 1440x1080 , there is no mention of that in the handbook & 1980 x 1440 is actually referred to , so I do think that this is totally misleading by Canon & is an attempt to counter all this 'true HD' hype. People who buy a hi-def camera also might not know about all this & certainly might not know how to check the image size. I do feel a bit ripped off, however given that I have no trouble editing & the picture is amazingly better than standard DV, I can live with it .

cheers

First... ANY cam that outputs through fire wire will be 1440x1080 since it is a limitation of the fire wire itself. Second, 1920x1080 is pretty much a sales gimmick for consumers who seem to believe that it produces a cleaner picture (it does not). 1920x 1080 uses square pixels and 1440x 1080 uses elongated ones (ratio 1.333 to 1) and most of these 1920 cams operate on interpolation anyway. Put it this way, I have yet to see a pro HD cam like the A1 or an EX go 1920x 1080. They're all 1440x1080

The Canon cams are in fact 1920x1080, but you just can't get it out through the fire wire. If you capture LIVE through HDMI with the Black Magic Intensity card you will get 1920x1080 http://www.blackmagic-design.com/products/intensity/

[Ken Berry]

Ian -- I (almost) rest my case regarding my comments that for some reason on other the encoding of transport stream video by VS11.5+ obviously uses some code which the Canon HV series does not like. But I am willing to bet that the VS version follows the international standard since other HDV cameras accept it as re-encoded and exported to them.

neonbob -- the HV series only films to 1440 x 1080 frame size, and does not use 1920 x 1080, interpolated or not. More to the point, VS10, as patched, prepares a transport stream video using 1440 x 1080, which is accepted by the camera. I don't think it would accept it if that were not its native format.

[neonbob]

neonbob -- the HV series only films to 1440 x 1080 frame size, and does not use 1920 x 1080, interpolated or not. More to the point, VS10, as patched, prepares a transport stream video using 1440 x 1080, which is accepted by the camera. I don't think it would accept it if that were not its native format.

Sorry Ken... that's untrue. The CMOS sensors in the HV series cams (HV10,HV20.... and I *THINK* the hv30) are in FACT 1920x1080, and you can get that out of the HV cams with a HDMI live capture. What goes on the tape and comes out through firewire is 1440x1080.