Hpx500 2/3” P2 Hd $14,000??

[JCTV]

Apparently Panasonic has taken off the gloves in the battle for HD camera and has introduced the HPX500. It seems they are trying to fill the gap between the HVX200 and the HDX900. It shoots every format known to man, SD & HD, and cost - $14,000!!

Yes, it’s P2, Yes, a lens and the cards are extra, but there will be no competition at this price. How many local news station bean counters will be chomping at the bit to buy the camera?

The foggy world of HD acquisition has just gotten thicker….

Here is the press release:


PANASONIC UNVEILS AG-HPX500 2/3” SHOULDER MOUNT P2 HD CAMCORDER,
A NEW VALUE BENCHMARK FOR FULL PRODUCTION QUALITY

SECAUCUS, NJ (February 13, 2007) – Panasonic introduced today the AG-HPX500, a new shoulder-mounted P2 HD camcorder that teams the full production-quality of 2/3” 3-CCDs, DVCPRO HD, 4:2:2 sampling and independent frame encoding with the versatility of interchangeable lenses and the creativity of variable frame rates.

Offering the highly popular features of the incredibly successful AG-HVX200 P2 HD hand-held camcorder but with many new enhancements, the 8.2-pound AG-HPX500 features progressive 2/3” 3-CCDs to assure outstanding image quality, superb low-light performance, and wide viewing angles. The HPX500 records in 32 high definition and standard definition formats, including 1080i and 720p in production-proven, 100 Mbps DVCPRO HD. The AG-HPX500 records on removable P2 solid-state memory cards in 1080/60i, 50i, 30p, 25p and 24p; in 720/60p, 50p, 30p, 25p, and 24p; and in DVCPRO50, DVCPRO and DV. The camcorder features a high-performance digital signal processor (DSP) with 14-bit A/D conversion and 19-bit inner processing that handles HD /SD format conversion simultaneously – ensuring spectacular images in all video formats for applications ranging from news acquisition, independent filmmaking, corporate video, sports and much more.

“The full 2/3” production quality AG-HPX500 sets a new value benchmark and will quickly distinguish itself as the workhorse camera for the vast range of professional applications,” said Robert Harris, Vice President, Marketing, Panasonic Broadcast. “The camcorder’s P2 HD solid-state reliability, IT system flexibility and workflow speed, combined with the DVCPRO HD quality is unparalleled in the pro video industry.”

The Ultra Reliability and Fast IT Workflow of P2 HD

Offering solid-state reliability with no moving parts like tape or disc-based systems and a faster IT workflow, the AG-HPX500 has four P2 card slots and can record up to 64 minutes in DVCPRO HD,128 minutes in DVCPRO 50 and 256 minutes in DVCPRO on four 16GB P2 cards. The camera also supports Native Mode recording in 720p that can significantly increase record times. Other key operational benefits provided by P2 HD technology includes instant recording startup, clip thumbnail view for immediate access to video content on all cards, and a host of recording modes including continuous, card selector, hot swapping, loop, pre-record (three seconds in HD and seven seconds in SD), one-shot and interval. The camera also features an SD memory card slot for saving or loading scene files and user settings.

The Creative Flexibility of Variable Frame Rates

Drawing on capabilities originally developed for the VariCam, the HPX500 features variable frame rates for undercranking and overcranking to create fast- or slow-motion effects. In 720p, users can set frame rates in 24p, 30p or 25p in any of 11 steps between 12fps and 60fps (or 50p). In addition, with the camera’s advanced 1080/480 24pA mode, users have the option of using 2:3:3:2 pull down, which allows most nonlinear editing systems to extract 24 frames on ingest.

The camcorder is equipped with eight gamma modes to address a wide range of shooting situations, including Cine-like Gamma to create film-like recordings. Key interfaces include IEEE 1394, USB 2.0, HD SDI/SDI, analog component and four audio XLR inputs. The HPX500 also offers a 4-channel 48-kHz/16-bit digital audio with options to select audio sources. The camera is also equipped with a variety of shooting assist functions and presets.

The HPX500 provides a Chromatic Aberration Compensation (CAC) function that allows the camera to automatically compensate the registration error that is caused mainly by lens chromatic aberration, and minimize the circumjacent blur. Lenses that work with the HPX500’s CAC function include Canon KJ10ex4.5B IRSD PS12, KJ16ex7.7B IRSD PS12 and KJ21ex7.6B IRSD PS12; and Fujinon XA17x7.6BERM-M58B and XA17x7.6BRM-M58B.

The AG-HPX500 will be available in May 2007 at a suggested list price of $14,000.

About P2 HD

P2 HD products offer solid-state high definition recording without the mechanical wear and environmental limitations of tape, hard disk, and optical disc based systems. P2 HD ensures the highest reliability, especially in challenging conditions of extreme temperature range, shock, and vibration. P2 HD products provide a significant reduction in maintenance costs, longer useful product life, and immediate access to recorded video (no need to digitize, ingest or create proxy video files) and metadata. P2 HD provides the reliability of solid-state production; the immediate connectivity to existing IT infrastructures; the speed, ease of use and portability of P2 cards; and the interoperability with leading NLE systems.

About Panasonic Broadcast

Panasonic Broadcast & Television Systems Co. is a leading supplier of broadcast and professional video products and systems. Panasonic Broadcast is a unit company of Panasonic Corporation of North
America. The company is the North American headquarters of Matsu****a Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. (NYSE: MC) of Japan, and the hub of its U.S. marketing, sales, service and R&D operations. For more information on Panasonic Broadcast products, access the company’s web site at www.panasonic.com/broadcast.

[Max Girth]

Yes, it’s P2, Yes, a lens and the cards are extra, but there will be no competition at this price.

The PDW-F330?

It's the same front end as the HDX900. It's a nice camera to be sure, but I get annoyed that it's marketed as a 1080 camera when in reality it's a (nice) 720 camera.

[natspop]

At any price it's still Panasonic. Try getting that thing serviced.. Nice camera to be sure, but in the end, it's a Panasonic.

[SimonW]

The F350 is the main competition for this new camera due to the variable framerate features.

The price of the P2 cards cannot be ignored because they have to be purchased in order to use the camera. Also add in the cost of a 2" viewfinder.

[Skipcam]

Panasonic announced yesterday that they will begin shipping a 16 GB P2 Card that will hold 21 minutes of HD 1080i. Cost is expected to be around $1200. Also announced they expect to ship a 32 GB card by next November, cost unknown. Don't know if the HPX will shoot 4:3 in SD. Still, P2 is a problem for freelance work load. How do you give the client the product without giving up the (expensive) cards?

[wtv]

Skipcam, that's excatly why I am buying a F350 next week.

[wtv]

Finally 200 posts...........

[Star Video]

Workflow is actually pretty smooth. Ever work with an HVX200? After you do, you will be like f**k tape! P2 is way better, tape is old school, linear technology. these cards are basically drag and drop into your computer. No digitizing or any of that crap. And from an editors perspective, much less of a headache. You can simply view your thumbnail clips in the camera, as all of you know, and delete the crap scenes.

My friend has a P2 camera, a lot of times, producers bring the drives, and somebody just swaps cards and downloads them while the shoot is going on. The cards stay with the camera. Sometimes, a producer brings cards, but most of the time, a drive.

The workflow is not an issue where i've dealt with it, and another important note, just like the Z1U, tons and tons of shooters have bought this camera in my market. A lot of people are using it, especially some HD TV producers. It's cheap, and it's nice quality video on a shoestring budget...

I think this new camera will work, and work well...

Service? Well, no heads to clean or replace. I don't see any service that needs to be done except maybe for masking dead pixels or tightening a loose connector...How often does that happen?

[Canonman]

Workflow is actually pretty smooth. Ever work with an HVX200? After you do, you will be like f**k tape! P2 is way better, tape is old school, linear technology. these cards are basically drag and drop into your computer. No digitizing or any of that crap. And from an editors perspective, much less of a headache. You can simply view your thumbnail clips in the camera, as all of you know, and delete the crap scenes.

Yeah, like XDCAM HD, but more expensive. And it's still not a true 1080 camera! I'm gonna have to let you test drive the F350 sometime and you'll forget about P2 once you taste the difference.

cm

[Canonman]

Skipcam, that's excatly why I am buying a F350 next week.

Way to go WTV!

cm

[dhart]

Wow, quite a price point for a 2/3" HD camera. Even with having to purchase a viewfinder (like you were going to be able to use the camera without one!) seems like a pretty good deal on a shoulder mount HD camera. Looks like Panny is beating Sony to the punch before NAB. Could force Sony to rethink pricing on their forth comming 2/3" camera.

Like that it handles just about every HD/SD format known to man. Also nice that it will support H264 compression, very nice codec. That Chromatic Aberration Compensation is an interesting concept.

P2 cards are a drag but at this price maybe we could come up with a work around like loaning traveling producers HDs to drop their material on. Actually the price is getting so low on HDs they may in fact be becoming cheaper than a bunch of tapes or DVDs. Just a thought.

[SimonW]

Looks like Panny is beating Sony to the punch before NAB.

Well, lets just wait and see what Uncle NAB brings shall we?

Sony's strategy is spot on. I just wish my neck wasn't in a noose so I could tell you!

[dhart]

Well, lets just wait and see what Uncle NAB brings shall we?

Sony's strategy is spot on. I just wish my neck wasn't in a noose so I could tell you!

I shall be awaiting NAB with "bated breath" :-)

[Max Girth]

I've had my XD since Sept. 2 weeks ago I used the HVX as a B cam.
P2, compared to XDCAM, drove me bat****. Having to download cards to the P2 store every 40 minutes of shooting, and then having to dump the P2 store after every 8 card dumps was maddening. I needed an assistant very badly for that crap.

I'm sure P2 is awesome coming straight from tape...but it was most definitely a step down from XDCAM for me. Much greater than I ever would have anticipated.

[freedom]

Ever deal with 35mm 400' reels? I forget the run time, it's been a while but something like 5 minutes. 16mm 400' runs 11 minutes. AC has to dive into the changing bag after you shoot your mags.
Many producers love anything 'film style'. Just look at the 24p craze, the P + S Technic film lens adapter that gets slapped on XL-1, DVX, etc. The p2 card is being looked at like a film mag re-load. Instead of loading a magazine in a changing bag, you dump to a computer.
You can discount that all you want, you can just say no, ba humbug; but there's a lot of 'cache' behind the panasonic 720p film style system.
I'm afraid we're going to have a fractured market for a long time to come. I hate to be forced to choose sides and I don't want to own several different cameras.

[Star Video]

I know that sucks, but look at how cheap an HVX200 is?

[Max Girth]

Ever deal with 35mm 400' reels? I forget the run time, it's been a while but something like 5 minutes. 16mm 400' runs 11 minutes. AC has to dive into the changing bag after you shoot your mags.

Actually, yes I have. I was an assistant cameraman for almost 10 years before I ever touched a video camera when I started operating Steadicam. FYI, 35mm/400' is about 3.5 minutes at 24fps. But on a 35mm shoot, you're going to have not one, but TWO assistant cameramen keeping that camera fed. I've AC'd by myself on 35mm shoots, and sometimes the production is waiting on camera dept. then.

My point is that I can shoot tapeless XDCAM alone, and it's all the benefits of tapeless. P2 requires a lot more overhead.

BTW, my background is film, I shoot almost exclusively 24p, and know all about the rest of your point. One of the nice things about 24p video up until P2 was that you were FREE of the limitations of short run times and reloads...we now have 24fps material in a lot more run & gun situations than before.

This becoming a little blown out of proportion on my behalf...I expected a much easier time with P2 and in the end thought it was a hassle, in my particular situation. Your milage will vary.

[Ruff]

I just had the Panasonic rep really pushing this camera... but in the end the production company I was helping out went with the Sony F350. No card cost, and importantly... no archiving cost. (and it is available today).

I also come from a film background... and unless you have the support crew - forget about P2. It is not easy at the moment for a one man freelancer. Maybe it will be in the future... but not today.

Case in point today. Shooting aerials in the morning for a corporate. Finished up... then before I left the hanger got a call for news, jumped in another machine and took off to do the story. Dashed back and just made the feed in time. It was a bit rushed, and I was pushed for time... but at least I did not have to worry about P2 cards, and laptops and hard drives.... I was shooting tape! Two tapes, two clients, easy... just waiting to see what the 2/3" XDHD is like now...

[Stoney]

Looks to me like it boils down to these points:
1) Sony Discs are more convenient than P2 drives
2) Sony 1/2" is not as desirable as Panny 2/3"
3) Sony costs about $10k more than Panny.
4) Archiving footage costs vary with medium

[Max Girth]

Looks to me like it boils down to these points:

2) Sony 1/2" is not as desirable as Panny 2/3"

I've gotten a close look at HDX-900 material native at Yahoo! Music a few weeks ago, on the Panasonic 17" HD-SDI monitor, the same monitor I just bought for my F350.

The material looked great, but I didn't for a second think it was better than what I already have, resolution or latitude-wise.

[Stoney]

Technical or not, most in the biz want to see 2/3" camera chips. Maybe 1/2" can do the job but nobody questions the industry standard. I, for one, think 2/3" is more desirable just on lens selection, alone, not to mention better depth of field. However, I understand where the F350 makes many owners happy, image-wise.

[Hiding Under Here]

I did a job with the HVX200 camera a few weeks ago. In fact there were two of them there and I set the m both up. I generally don't work without my equipment but I was slow and the rate was competitive. We had a three man crew -- me, an audio tech and an assistant to handle the downloads. I paid virtually no attention to what the assistant was doing as my job was pretty difficult. I had to set-up two cameras shooting the interview subject. We were on the 42nd floor of an all glass office tower on a sunny day and the biggest light I had was a 400 Watt Joker.

I put ND .06 on the windows behind the subject to cover both shots, one head-on and the other a little off to the side. I keyed with the 400 through a Small Chimera, backlit with a Kino Flo and filled with a second Kino Flo. The windows did the rest of the work. It was the first time I had used the 200. But the menus felt familair because they are similar to the DVX100A. It is a serious pain in the arse working with push button menus and a small, no adjustment lens. The producer had scheduled something else to shoot in the middle of our set-up. So just as I was getting a good feel for things, I had to move the cameras and shoot the other distraction, then reposition the cameras and again work to coordinate them.

In the end I would have to say that I was very impressed with the HVX200. It looked great. Flesh tones had an honest look to them. Both shots looked wonderful. I even had to turn one of the cameras around at the end and shoot re-asks. That shot, too, worked out well.

The downloading was all done by the assistant. It was odd standing there shooting thinking that if the download wasn't finished and we filled up the second card that we would have to suspend shooting until the files had been dumped out of the first card. But the producer -- not me -- had chosen the format so I had no real stress on me to get it done. The producer told me he "loved" using the cards because the info went straight to his laptop and he could get started cutting right away. However, later in the week another friend/producer called asking to talk about HD formats for his new venture. While he liked the idea of the P2 system, he worried that he had nothing to walk away with after a shoot. That provoked anxiety in him. What if the computer fell and ruined the files? What if it were stolen? Similar risk hovers over tape or any other format. But with the P2 downloads some people are skittish about what it is they actually have after a shoot without a hard primary or back-up.

[SimonW]

But with the P2 downloads some people are skittish about what it is they actually have after a shoot without a hard primary or back-up.

Exactly. I think it is like walking a tightrope. Errors might be rare, but that kind of statistic doesn't help much if you are the one to suffer a problem. I'm simply not prepared to take that risk. There are enough posts around the various forums from people who have suffered from corrupt clips or cards to suggest that it isn't worth taking the chance.

[Baltimore Shooter]

And guess who the Producer will blame for a corrupt file that wasn't usable, and then refuse to pay. They won't blame it on the camera, the cards, the portable hard drive or the laptop.

No, they'll lay the blame squarely on the cameraman, who won't see a dime from that shoot and may even lose the client. All over a corrupt file. Wanna stake your career on a file?

Warren

[Jonathan]

I've gotten a close look at HDX-900 material native at Yahoo! Music a few weeks ago, on the Panasonic 17" HD-SDI monitor, the same monitor I just bought for my F350.

The material looked great, but I didn't for a second think it was better than what I already have, resolution or latitude-wise.
Is the stuff on your temp demo reel from the 350? That stuff looks amazing, I am sure part of it came from a talented staff on lights but I almost wouldn't believe you if you said that all that concert footage came from the 350.

[Max Girth]

Is the stuff on your temp demo reel from the 350? That stuff looks amazing, I am sure part of it came from a talented staff on lights but I almost wouldn't believe you if you said that all that concert footage came from the 350.

The stuff at the head of the temp reel is indeed 7 F350s from July of this year. That was a big job for me, and I did all post on it as well. The rest is a mix of HDV, DVX-100, and film.

[Run&Gun]

P2 is still not a viable solution for an independent freelancer(owner/operator). I just got back from a two week shoot with my VariCam(there were actually two of us) and we were swapping tapes out at blazing speeds sometimes(as fast as the tape would "pop" and we could hand it to a runner), and P2 just wouldn't have cut it in any way, shape or form in that situation, unless you had an almost limitless supply available. P2 will(and does) work in some situations, but not the high-end ENG freelance market, at least not anywhere in the near future...

The 500 sounds very interesting, but I think Panny is shooting itself in the foot trying to push P2. They could have had a "killer" mid-level HD camera if it had been tape based(just look at how populer the HDX-900 is. Do you think it would be flying off the shelves as fast if it weren't tape?).

[Jonathan]

The stuff at the head of the temp reel is indeed 7 F350s from July of this year. That was a big job for me, and I did all post on it as well. The rest is a mix of HDV, DVX-100, and film.
Where can I see full versions of the live concert? What lens did you use? You are very talented from everything I have seen so far.