White Paper 034 Addendum 21 (rev 2): Menu settings for Panasonic DVCPro100 AJ-HDX900

Alan Roberts

Abstract

Assessment was made on a engineering sample of the AJ-HDX900 (no serial number), a multi-standard HDTV cam-corder. It is very similar in form and function to the SDX900, sharing many features and having a very similar menu set, and seems to be a replacement for the HDX400. Production models may differ slightly from the pre-production model initially assessed for this addendum.

The camera is switchable between 1080-line and 720-line HDTV standards, and between the base-normal frame rates of 29.97 and 25Hz. It can also be switched, in 1080 mode, between interlace (50i, 59.94i) and progressive (25psf, 29.97psf, and 23.98psf in both 2:3 and 2:3:3:2 pull-down) modes. In 720 mode it can also be switched to half-frame rate, and thus can generate a “film look” in the camera at system speed. It has specific “film-look” gamma curves that incorporate many of the contrast handling features of earlier cameras, making it a great deal easier to set up. The camera has 3 2/3” ccds (1280x720, progressively scanned) and records using small-format conventional DVCPro tape at 100Mb/s (in “long-play” mode).

There are two versions of the camera, suffixed P and E; as far as I can tell they are identical in every way, except that the E version is expected to be used mostly at 50Hz while the P version will be used mostly at 60Hz. This is apparent only from the factory default settings of some menu items.

It is significantly smaller and lighter than the familiar Beta camcorder and is useful mostly for portable, single-camera work. It has many internal menus for setting the performance, such that it can then be used without external controls. It is not well suited to multi-camera operation. Monitoring and connectivity have been improved over previous Panasonic models; it will genlock to either analogue HD Y or analogue composite (PAL or NTSC as appropriate); there are two video outputs, one switchable between HDSDI, SDI (appropriate down-conversion), and composite (PAL or NTSC), the other between HDSDI and HD analogue Y for monitoring; it has a IEEE1394 (Firewire) output that will feed and control an external recorder.

There is a 7-second video cache memory. Using this, it is possible to record to tape up to 7 seconds of events that occurred before pressing “Record”. The same circuitry is also used to provide a “slow-shutter” in which adjacent frames are summed to produce smeared pictures and reduced noise (or extra gain).

Video compression is still DVCProHD, 6.7:1 for all the NTSC-related standards, 6.3:1 for all the PALrelated standards. The camera section has 14-bit adcs that deliver better noise performance than in earlier models.

In this setup, the gamma correction and knee are adjusted to capture about 2.5 stops of overload, and 1 stop of underexposure, to mimic film performance.

Some typographical errors have been corrected in the first revision.

This second revision includes settings intended to match the camera to the BBC’s ‘docs’ settings for the DSR450.

Download White Paper 034 Addendum 21 (rev 2) : Menu settings for Panasonic DVCPro100 AJ-HDX900

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