Did I just screw myself? HDV Questions....

Question

Hi guys,
I just recently purchased 2 Sony HDR-HC1. My wife and I are event videographers and planned on preparing for the future and getting HDV cams since we needed new ones anyways. My questions follow:
1) If I record in HD, how easy is it going to be able to downconvert to standard def for people without HD-DVD players and HD TVs? Is this done during the pature process? Is it done within FCP? Compressor?
2) If I'm recording in HD and edit in HD, do I just simpley send the project to compressor, treat it like any project (including regular DVDs if it will fit!) and it should work on a HD-DVD player? I mean, Blue Ray/HD-DVD is only media with high data capacity, right?

Answer 1

I have been happily using my Sony FZ1 and HC1 for around a year to produce DV projects. To my eye, the footage that I get now is way better when compared to what my old VX-2000 captured. I'll admit it took me awhile to get my setup right, so I hope my thoughts will help you get to work quickly.
I use the downconvert function of the camera to capture HDV aquired footage into a "DV Anamorphic" sequence. An important thing to remember is to set the camera to downconvert via the "squeeze" option found in the cameras "IN/OUT REC" menu setting. You will then have 16x9 footage that will fill a widescreen tv, and play with a letterbox on 4x3 sets. (You are basically simulating the same capture process that will result from using an anamorphic lens on a 4x3 camera, but the footage is actually much better quality than I was ever able to get on any 4x3 camera I have used in the past.) If you don't understand this process, look at this link from Apple.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=75079
I found that the only way to efficiently view 16x9 footage from the FCP timeline was with a widescreen aspect ratio compatible TV monitor, so if you still only have a 4x3 set that you use for checking your footage while editing, you have two choices. You can upgrade to a 16x9 Broadcast monitor, or you can drop your 16x9 FCP sequence into a 4x3 sequence and render it before you watch. (I did the latter method for awhile, but it gets really tedious.)
As for making a DVD, you export your 16x9 footage from FCP, then import it into DVD Studio Pro or iDVD or whatever you use. I use DVD Studio Pro, and the trick is to make sure that your 16x9 menus and tracks are set to display as "16x9 letterbox". Make sure you also set your Simulator to display properly as well. (This is a good chance to verify that your footage displays correctly on both 4x3 and 16x9 TVs before you burn the disc.)
If you edit your projects in HDV, you can export it to Compressor or Quicktime using a 16x9 DV setting and then import it into your DVD program, but expect it to take awhile. In my opinion, there is no advantage to editing in HDV unless you know that you will be exporting to a high-end format. As you mentioned, there are no viable HD-DVD options yet anyway.
My experience with editing native HDV footage was fine, other than longer render times and the fact that I don't have a HD monitor. I did however, experiment with recapturing DV converted footage back to HDV, and it went surprisingly smoothly. If you already have a bunch of footage captured as HDV and you want to go back to 16x9 DV, I can give you some tips, or you can search this forum for the process.
Hope this helps you out, I expect others will respond with some good info for you as well.
Dual G5 2.0, Dual 23" Cinema Displays, 2.5 GB RAM   Mac OS X (10.4.4)   FCP 5.0.4