For hd cam, I'm a noob! Even if the setup of this camera is pretty easy, I'm looking for tips on setting up the camera right to get the best possible video quality for different occasion.

What settings should I use to film outdoor familly scenes? Should I use 60I - P30 - P24 ??

Different settings for indoor or low light situations?

Let me know what you pro's know!!! THX !

For hd cam, I'm a noob! Even if the setup of this camera is pretty easy, I'm looking for tips on setting up the camera right to get the best possible video quality for different occasion.

What settings should I use to film outdoor familly scenes? Should I use 60I - P30 - P24 ??

Different settings for indoor or low light situations?

Let me know what you pro's know!!! THX !

Well first, im not a pro. But I find to use the 30p setting in almost everything I shoot works well. 24p is nice, but looks too fake for me. 60i is also nice in direct sunlight, but even 30p is recorded in a 60i container...

I say go what you feel looks the best. This is an art not a science....

anything but 24p is my first rule of thumb, although you might want to check it out for extreme low light conditions.

i usually shoot in shutter priority mode, 1/60th of second shutter speed, but you really need to experiment with some of the manual controls... run a series of controlled panning and zoom shots, maybe off of a tripod.

Well first, im not a pro. But I find to use the 30p setting in almost everything I shoot works well. 24p is nice, but looks too fake for me. 60i is also nice in direct sunlight, but even 30p is recorded in a 60i container...

I say go what you feel looks the best. This is an art not a science....

Can someone please explain to me what the red text means? I just picked up an HG20 and am trying to get familiar with it.

Thanks.

FI'm looking for tips on setting up the camera right to get the best possible video quality for different occasion.

Also, always use the "FXP" mode, as this will yield the camcorder's highest quality at 17mbps. (For the HG20/21 and the HF11, the highest mode is "MXP", which the HF100 doesn't have.)

Can someone please explain to me what the red text means? I just picked up an HG20 and am trying to get familiar with it.

Thanks.

It means that in 24p and 30p the video is stored as 60i using pulldown (2:3 and 2:2). This is for compatibility reasons (although not so sure it's really an issue nowadays).

You can remove pulldown using various editors, or you could leave it in. 30p looks fine in 60i container.

The decision between 30p and 60i is not trivial since it depends on personal preference and targeted final output. Some differences:

- 30p is slightly sharper than 60i since it captures one full picture. Here's a typical scene that works best in progressive: http://vimeo.com/1061969
- 60i has more fluid motion and panning is therefore little bit more foregiving
- 30p is 1 stop better in dark / low-light scenes. Example: http://vimeo.com/942017
- 60i is still more common / 'compatible' and doesn't require special care for recognizing the Canon pulldown removal (depending on software)
- progressive mode is 'better' if you want the video to be distributed on a PC/internet/progressive display since you don't need to deinterlace (and can't mess it up either easily).

I typically mix 30p for low-light and 60i but ymmv. 24p is pretty tough to get smooth motion (you really need a tripod).


Regarding other recommendations it's very similar. Lots of settings and depends on personal preference. I prefer lowering contrast to -1 and I often switch W/B mode in bright daylight to get best results.

I typically mix 30p for low-light and 60i but ymmv.

how does that look when it's rendered out to a 60i format, like on a dvd?

how does that look when it's rendered out to a 60i format, like on a dvd?

Looks fine. Reason is that basically a single 30p frame is split into 2 interlaced frames (as opposed to capturing 2 half frames slightly apart). And that's 'compatible'.

Not different really from 60i except that you won't get inbetween motion (so won't be as fluid as 60i).

That said I don't necessarily recommend mixing 30p and 60i as it might have the potential to create issues in software. However shouldn't be an issue (I had no problems with mixing in Vegas/tmpgenc xpress). Only thing to watch out for is creating deinterlaced output from 60i 2:2 material (30p). You only want to blend the fields or if software allows choose source is progressive.