panasonic dvc pro

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ravenm

Active member
hey, our station is going to be going to panasonic dvc pro cams by company mandate (as in, we don't get a say)....anyone have any info on them? the good, the bad, the ugly?
 
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<DaveN>

Guest
Ravenm,

We have 12 DVCPro cameras here. They stand up really well with a little care.I shoot most of the time with a 610,(16x9,25mb) Its been tweaked by Panasonic and looks much better than when we took delivery of it. The 6mm tape looks a little fragile to me still, but we've had very few problems. In general a positive experience to be sure.
 
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<Mettacam>

Guest
We switched to Panasonic DVC right after Sept 11, 2001. (Company wide mandate as well.) I've been half way around the world twice with mine and am happy with it's performance. The cameras seem to hold up much better that the edit decks however. We've had many strange problems with ours, particularly on the record side.

If you like I can have my engineers call your engineers.
 
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<done that>

Guest
Shooting w/ DVC is great. Editing sucks. Get ready for major slipping while editing. The tapes look fragile, but stand up well.
 
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<on a budget>

Guest
We have had DVCpro for well over a year and a half with little to no trouble. It should also be noted that we cheaped out on almost everything! So, if low end gear takes a beating, imagine if you spend a little coin.
 
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Dedline

Well-known member
ya gotta be a little gentle with the decks, we've had them go down for little things like carriage misalignment due to someone jamming a tape too hard into there. When the heads go, THEY GO. digitizing video. I believe we had ours for 3 years before some guys came back with unusable tape. no warning, except the playback was digitizing a little bit. any idea what model your going with?
 
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ravenm

Active member
haven't heard yet...our engineer doesn't know...it's a year or so off yet, but i thought i'd get a heads up as to what i can expect. thanks guys
 
2gigch1

2gigch1

Well-known member
About 5 years into the CBS O&O DVCPRO experiment. At best I can say we're surprised the stuff has held up as well as it has. Biggest problem has been the cheap capacitors on various circuit boards fried after 3-4 years of use requiring a lot of work. Various decks go down at times, but not more than I would expect in a hardworking shop.

Personally my camera has been crashed hard in a wet ground interface issue but after the rebuild it has only suffered the occasional slack problem (perpetually weak tape threading system in early AJ700's)

All in all I have been quite happy with the stuff. Besides, after MII, everything is uphill!
 
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<dump>

Guest
make sure all the gear is well taken care of. All of our gear slips in CTL and in Timecode. Audio drops out. And much much more.
 
J

Jason Old

Member
I was the proud user of DVCPro at my last station and had the same camera for over two years. My camera was NEVER in the shop, nor did I ever have any problems with digitized tape. I did have a few edit deck problems here and there, but after a quick cleaning - they did the job. The overall quality of video on the air was very good and, I feel, the format is user friendly (after learning its differences from other formats). The bottom line to me is to... take care of your equipment. Maybe I was one of the lucky ones, but while I was there our station did not have a ton of problems. Also - the cameras are not as heavy as other formats that I've used and am using now (D-9). There are better formats out there, but for what it's worth - DVCPro is a good one.
 
I

industrial

Member
The only problem I have is when using the Mini-DV tapes (with adaptor) in the deck, I have had at least 4 tapes break in the last year. Otherwise, quite happy.
 
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<Memo>

Guest
We switched to DVC Pro cameras in March 1996.
They are good cameras. First thing you will do is shoot blown out pictures. Play with it's Iris levels and view finder before you hit the streets.
Tapes are small and cheap. We have been using them for more than 7 years we had our share of problems. Their lens ring is weak you hit your lens couple of times and it will fall off from your camera.
 
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<Memo>

Guest
Originally posted by Shaky & Blue:
quote: Originally posted by <done that>:
Get ready for major slipping while editing.
Click to expand...
DVCPro decks only slip when editing in CTL. Edit in TIMECODE ONLY, and you won't have those problems.
Click to expand...
True;
I also add that zero (reset) your ctl and than switch to TC and put your in point. This is how we use our old DVC pro Edit decks (aj-D750) If you have the lap tops you don't need to zero your ctl.
 
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<Memo>

Guest
Originally posted by <Memo>:
Originally posted by Shaky & Blue:
Originally posted by <done that>:
[qb]Get ready for major slipping while editing.
Click to expand...
DVCPro decks only slip when editing in CTL. Edit in TIMECODE ONLY, and you won't have those problems.
Click to expand...
True;
I also I have to add that zero (reset) your ctl and than switch to TC and put your in point. This is how we use our old DVC pro Edit decks (aj-D750) If you have the lap tops you don't need to zero your ctl
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
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<newshooter>

Guest
Maybe it's only the camera I'm using, but the only thing I hate about mine is monitoring audio. There's no way to split the channels on the camera while shooting....other than that, the cameras are great.
 
Nooze Hound

Nooze Hound

Well-known member
We just started using DVC when I started about 4 years ago, I've been pretty spoiled with that, I've never had to deal with SVHS or Beta. But about 2 years ago the photogs got new Panasonic DVC cameras and they're just awesome!!! I love the gear we have here!! Now, if management would start to realize why were 3rd... (I can think of a couple!!!) :mad:
 
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