Over a year ago I posted a (non-OS news) article about this new geeky & underground, grass-root movement in videography — similar to the artistic explosion digital photography saw a few years ago. We call ourselves “DV Rebels“. Given a slow weekend, I decided to revisit the topic today with some newer videos shot with the Canon HV20/HV30 cameras, these $500 gems that have been the catalysts in the said movement. The HV lines of cameras are so popular that over 220 official music videos were shot with them, among other kinds of art. In the old article there has been criticism about the “motion photography without a story” nature of the videos that were sampled, but I think that since then these hobbyist videographers have come a long way. Have a look inside for some of my favorite HV20/30 videos available today, while you can check even more here.
Note: The embedded Flash videos below are not HD. To view them or download them in 720p HD mode you must click their respective video titles and go to their dedicated Vimeo page.
condition:human, Episode 1
Partly the reason I decided to revisit this article, this is a brand new, Blade Runner-inspired, sci-fi web series written, shot & edited in the living room of hobbyist Trenton Lepp in Vancouver, with a good friend of his in the main role, and with no budget whatsoever. All the CGI also by Trenton! I think the music too! While some better editing was required (scene trimming and audio treatment), it remains one of the most complex and ambitious projects to date in our little community.
Story Of A Broken Heart
Official music video for the band Malbec. Malbec’s ‘The Answering Machine’ EPs are a series of 5 EPs being released over 5 months, the fifth one released today. They are free to download both in mp3, and uncompressed high quality WAV format.
Birth.Life.Death.
Tadas Svilainis’ NSFW video about a tormented soul.
White Red Panic
Ayz Waraich’s piece was the first major scripted HV20-based short movie.
Sunday afternoon
Charlie McCarthy is one of the most influential figures in the movement with many cool videos.
Pitchblend – “Sirens”
An alternative rock music video by Rich Savage.
Reflections of home
Another one from Charlie McCarthy.
Seeing Red
Robots need to let loose once in a while… By Zol.
Breeze
One of Ugurcan Kara’s great videos.
Motiva – “Repülj Madár”
The music video for Motiva’s “Repülj Madár” song, directed by Suta, shows the differences between a Nikon D90 and an HV30 with a 35mm adapter. The Hungarian techno+folk song is available for free download.
The horla
mlzk’s scary horror short film.
Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk
And one of mine, my newest work.
Ich Bin Nicht Ein Roboter
A funny, but well done, techno music video (official), directed painstakingly by Jonno.
More such cool videos here.
I’m really enjoying some of the new 24p video cameras/DLSRs coming out. A lot of shows are being shot digitally now, especially in the sci-fi realm. Galactica’s mini-series was shot with film, but when it got picked up as a series it was done in DV.
Which brings me to a question. Why do we even bother with interlaced standards now? Computer displays, LCD, and plasma all convert everything to progressive anyway.
Edited 2009-04-05 04:05 UTC
Yup, this is why the HV20/30 cameras (and all new Canon AVCHD non-tape cameras too), support PF24, PF25 and PF30 recording in addition to plain 50i/60i. The HV series became popular opiginally not only because of their superior quality at the time, but mostly because of its 24p-like (PF24) ability.
These PF files are progressive recordings wrapped around an interlaced stream for compatibility reasons (e.g. iMovie and even Final Cut Express don’t support native 24p editing), but a capable video editor is able to remove pulldown (for PF24) or drop a field (for PF25/PF30) and edit the native progressive stream.
I’ve got a really old Canon ZR10. It’s 480i only, but it does do 16:9. I’ve been thinking about the HVs if I’m in the market again.
The interlacing strikes me as somewhat amusing, especially since it a solution to a problem that hasn’t been around in at least 30 years (phosphorous after-glow). Especially since it wipes out 30% of the apparent resolution. Like hooking a 640×480 computer screen up to a regular TV. It looks awful.
That’s great that the HVs are still able to handle the 24p though.
Sensors are getting to the point where it’s no longer a question of sensors, but of the lenses themselves. A great time for DV.
well, interlacing is a pretty effective way to reduce bandwidth, and we never have enough bandwidth… cable, broadcast, fiberoptics, doesn’t matter. You cut the bitrate of the stream nearly in half and you definitely don’t lose half the video quality by doing so.
edit: put another way, which would you choose: 720p or 1080i? For almost anything but sports, I’d choose 1080i. They use roughly the same bandwidth.
Edited 2009-04-05 05:13 UTC
I’m not sure that interlace reduces bandwidth. 1080i/30fps does half of each frame every 1/60th of a second. So you’re still transmitting 30 frames per second, just in 1/60th halves.
However, 780p and 1080i are roughly the same resolution. Interlacing, through the optical effect of interlacing loses about 30% in real resolution, making them roughly the same.
But, most HDTVs are LCD or plasma, which is only progressive, so 1080i gets converted to 1080p anyway. If it’s a 24p movie, the 4:3 pulldown converts it to full 1080p, the same way progressive scan DVD players look about 30% better on a progressive TV.
BTW, you gotta watch the HD trailer for the new “Crank” movie! It was shot with the $3500 Canon XH-A1, and they also used the $800 HF-100 models as “crash cams”.
http://www.apple.com/trailers/lions_gate/crank2/hd/
It just shows that it’s the director & crew who make the film and not the camera. Heck, most 2k digital cinemas in the US today don’t have a better quality than an LCD TV, so pretty much any prosumer camera can deliver good enough quality for cinema quality.
However, quality still maters. These consumer HD cameras (especially from Canon, as they have more manual controls) have liberated a lot of people who wanted to express themselves in a better visual way.
Edited 2009-04-05 04:21 UTC
Surely this is a “Page 2” article?
Eugenia swoops in whenever she feels like it to post her stuff. Relevance of topic does not matter to her.
Edited 2009-04-05 18:32 UTC
I think they mentioned this before, if its a full out article (eg theres a read more section) its going to be on page 1. If its a snippet then page 2. Not too hard to understand.
Maybe topic wise, but not everything on here has been OSnews for a while..
Edited 2009-04-05 18:45 UTC
That has been quite clear for some time. OS News has become too narrow a focus. But “look how pretty these videos are, because I used to be the executive editor here, and I like them” simply seems to be a bit beyond the pale.
Edited 2009-04-05 19:06 UTC