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For the cost, we could not have gotten this level of quality otherwise. We used this camera to shoot our short film and it proved to be awesome. The P2 cards were a little tricky to work with, but certainly less difficult and more portable than film; without the added expense of telecine. I believe its got the depth of 16mm, plus it shoots in 24p. When we saw our final projection, we were just amazed.Great cam for the money.
This camera uses P2 cards or you can plug in a Firestore (you have to drop another 2K for that). It takes far less time to get the footage into the system. I couldn't fathom going back to SD minidv.One last thing: I hope they make a higher resolution screen/viewfinder. This is a better setup for tripod work, but less than ideal for shoulder shooting. This is another drawback and a serious consideration. Its bulky and slightly delicate because you have the Firestore plug right next to the headphone jack, right in the same area as the record button. I am using it with a Firestore in a chassis rig ($350) underneath the camera. Of course, this is compressed, but still very good quality HD footage.
This could cause a serious problem if you accidently jar the plug while reaching for the record button. The whole process of setting up a Firestore with the camera's menu system, and navigating the Firestore menu to record and organize footage is a little more involved than just using mini-dv tape, but the convenience of recording to a hard drive is wonderful. I have noticed that it is sometimes hard to get things in focus because you just cannot see the fine detail needed. For the price, however, this is great for many types of shooting.
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