The next step in your switch to multimedia?

Well I hope that unlike it’s big brother it can: autofocus, have auto exposure, doesn’t require external batteries, doesn’t require big external monitors, has controls in places that your hands go so that you can use them while things are happening.

Ho-lee cow. Wow.

I’m with Jonathan ergonomics. Wow.

Going back to my study and put away Holgas and Leicas. Wow.

John…Is this camera coming from the same people that are developing ultra HD for theater production?

It is this a joke?

Here is the link to the Red site.

And here is the 7Mb .pdf brochure…

Does it come with its own editor?

Don’t mind researching, shooting, interviewing but oh that editing!

Just saw this post and figured it was about Scarlet. The Red is mindboggling but too heavy. I’ll be eBaying my stills cameras when Scarlet comes out I reckon. The thing shoots 3k Hi Def…and I for one am sick and tired of lugging blocky digi-cams and video gear and swapping. This fits in a pocket and gives you both.

Its Game Over for stills.

Its Game Over for stills.

Is it really? Agreed this is an amazing little camera, but I think there will always be a place for still images and I say that without any nostalgia or romanticism.

Video footage does things that still images can’t, but there are times when a still simply has more impact and conveys more understanding.

Of course when the Scarlet comes out, I’ll be dying to get my hands on one.

Unless I am stupidly mistaken, Sion may mean to imply it’s Game Over for still cameras. If Scarlet lives up to his and my still frame expectations, that is.

sion, when paper starts being able to play video, then it’s game over.

It’s game over for stills.

Do you remember that old quote which all of us got tired to repeat – photography is not about gear, but about thinking? Well, it is still valid.

Photography is a language, not the stupid result of a machine click. Photography is an human gesture, a thought heavily compressed and described into an image. A still, a carefully chosen one. You cannot shoot everything and later grab a “still”. Well, you can, but… It is not photography. It is an accident.

The game is just beginning for stills… Photography had finally grown up.

Paper does play video already (your screen?)...

It’s just ANOTHER game.

i’m sorry, anderson, but i reread that three times. maybe i’m daft, but that made no sense. the second part did, but then you lost me again on the third.

yes, to a capacity, photography IS about gear. “drawing with light” to be precise. i believe the definition for this is “videography” and while new developments like this camera are likely to convince you that still images are growing up, i think this smacks of overly sentimental hype.

sorry john, but my screen is now paper? is that your way of saying it’s a portal from which to garner information? then yes, i would agree with you. but i’m pretty sure that magazines are still being published and that we trade in a lot of paper. the still image is a part of our civilization in every degree, from diagrams to pamphlets to billboards. i find it rather ethnocentric to assume that because we’re using new technology, it’s game over for stills. in case you have not noticed, a large part of the world is not middle class or rich and often, do not have computers, iPhones or other technologically advanced devices within their means. is that to say that we’re evolving past informing thousands (if not millions) of people? is that not the purpose of photojournalism to reach the masses and inform and enlighten? then why are we reducing ourselves to a form that is limited only to those who have the means to purchase these computers, these digital papers, as john put it?

to think the evolution is changing because these stills move is a bit melodramatic. moving frames have been around for quite a bit of time, yet because it’s moved to a new format it’s supposed to eradicate the very thing that sprung it? give me a break.

just because we’ve made lasagna doesn’t mean we won’t still order pasta.

wait, has anyone taken into account whether people WANT nothing but video, or at least, video of these events? will this method be able to capture the attention span of people who are assaulted with the same thing on TV in commercials. is it different now that we can have it in our pocket? look at the success of e-books. people still prefer their words on paper when it comes to that. i think, to a degree, the same will be said of photography or still images.

the means also bring into question the validity of the content. photography has taken huge blows to it’s credibility in the last eight years, but it has also solidified itself as a reliable means of communication and proven it’s ability to garner attention. what came out of abu ghraib was not a video, not a dylan-esque folk song, not a thesis: photographs.

the mindset of the society in which these new developments are occurring must correlate within the typical capitalistic framework of supply and demand. if we only create the supply (new technology) without the greater demand, then you know what that means. it’s business 101.

Mustafah,

I never said stills are dead (I never said I am dead).

They just aren’t on paper anymore (because most of the publishers using paper as a support have given in).

9 times out of 10 I see interesting pictures on my screen and not in magazines.

But to get back to the original post: the Scarlet Red seems to be an interesting camera/ tool/ toy/ pencil/ brush/ etc…

Sion’s right about stills. More importantly, if I can shoot 24 or more individual frames per second (which the Scarlet and Red can do) then nothing’s an “accident” and they definitely aren’t frame grabs. I’m stoked about this. It’ll mean lugging around a bigger laptop and more hard drives but such is life.

Been pounding the stupid table for years about still photography evolving into motion picture still editing. If you think that’s nuts, start preparing for retirement.

that seems to be the catch phrase of the year, but no one has addressed any of the points i brought up concerning this. i think there are a lot of questions being unanswered and not only in this post, but about this entire shift in general. whether you are for it or against it matters little in the face of stark reality: they are developing these devices and people want to use them.

i’m hesitant to jump on either band wagon at the moment and will weigh on the side of reason and middle-ground. not preparing for early retirement, or am i throwing all my eggs into the basket.

Concentrating on the fact that Scarlet has a Still Mode may help to demystify the situation. I mean, in my stupid mind, it’s simply a still, as well as a motion camera, in one package. The fact that it can be used for both functions at the same time is a bonus. Imagine top of the line DSLRs, with their dozen or so frames per second bursts, as stepping stones to Scarlet.

It’s a still camera with a high frame rate. It does not mean anything regarding photography, it is more about what it means to the photographer.

This not some interlaced video camera. This camera works with larger format progressive digital captures laid out linear at 24 frames/sec or more. How is this any different from shooting burst captures with a 1DS/D2H, aside from a higher frame rate.

Sorry guys, but I will have to be brief – piles of stills to edit :).

1. photography is not about gear, but about translate thinking into a still image. Of course one needs another, the same way literature needs a pen. But let’s not take a hand for a brain.

2. Photography has grown up, which means that now photography is mature and free to occupy its own, proper an unique role in visual communication. Of course photography field is shrinking, but loosing generic ground means gaining a specific one – the still image field is getting narrow, but deeper also. Still imagery is now ready to the big dive, definitively affirming itself as an unique way of expression. In a few years, when a demand for a still image shows up, it will happens because of the unique capacity of photography in translating reality, not because it is cheaper, or simpler, or lighter, or smaller….

3. A still grabbed from a video is an accident. At least in the realm of stills. If a camera – and not you – is deciding which portion of time is captured – and which is not, so the result is indeed an accident. Read accident as a consequence of an act that happened independently of human intention. The video grab can be considered spectacular, revealing, fundamental, but not photography. Photography means to transform reality in one single image, so it demands intention in choosing one specific moment. It can’t be different, otherwise this cat here should be considered a photographer.

4. And don’t get me wrong, this little camera is really fantastic, by the way. If I shot video, it would be great… :)

Not so brief at all….

Well buddies, I am in the furnace (estoy en el horno). The problem is not what i think about this innovation, the real shit is what the editorials chiefs think about cut budget. If they can choice to contract one young guy to use one little advices and then cut a shitty frame so they can use both, the film for internet and the “still” for the paper, well, this will be the end of my work as photojournalist. At less here in my country the editors don’t respect the photograph, the word quality is only to name a view or a direct shot of some situation in focus and well exposed. They only think in $. Someone knows a well 101 class for video in the web?

http://www.video101course.com/

Video is interlaced, HD is progressive full frame non-interlaced. It is the interlace that makes it video, other wise is it is still images captured at a high frame rate digitally, the same as 35mm film is run through a film camera at 24fps.

This piece of kit is a game changer for all editorial photogs. Anyone who can’t or won’t see that is playing ostrich.

I’m stoked about this and am looking forward to buying it.

Sion, you’ll have competition on eBay soon, mate.

Let the “accidents” begin!

This piece of kit is a game changer for all editorial photogs. Anyone who can’t or won’t see that is playing ostrich.

I’m stoked about this and am looking forward to buying it.

Sion, you’ll have competition on eBay soon, mate.

Let the “accidents” begin!

1. RED announced three new products yesterday, the 5K Epic, the 3K Scarlet and Red Ray. Can you point out features that you think photographers would be most interested in?

Ted: I talk very publicly and very bluntly about what our camera is, and it is essentially, a digital still camera that can shoot video. It doesn’t think like a video camera at all. It shoots RAW like a digital still camera and it can compress that RAW using a very advanced hardware compression engine that turns that still RAW into something that can be recorded at a very high frame rate on a compact flash card. And every [camera we make] does that.

Has anyone figured out what kind of major computer upgrades will be necessary with these new gizmos? Here comes mucho terabyte storage. Do you think?

I showed an engineer at work this camera. He likes it from a technical stand point and, on his own, said it was a game changer.

But we also rapped about stuff Gregory is bringing up. How much HD video can CF cards hold? The biggest one I saw at B&H.com was 16GB. Are there bigger models out there or in the pipeline? Will I have to buy a new laptop to process this HD video in the field? Will there be a miniDV tape adaptor?

This is a great quote:

“2. When RED One was released last year with the ability to pull high-resolution still images from video footage, it caused a buzz in the photo community about the potential death of the decisive moment. Is RED’s encroachment of the still image market an intentional one?

Ted: No, not at all. We’re huge fans of the still world. We just see this as pieces of the puzzle evolving, as the convergence of the two worlds. We have the highest level of respect for what digital still cameras have done in the market. In fact, we’ve paid a lot of attention to that in terms of what we’ve done because we believe that we’re on the same path. When you see things projected from our RED One camera in 4K and how far we can go with a similar type of sensor and a similar type of logic, this RAW-processing logic, but applying it to slightly different toolsets that are used for motion instead of stills, it’s all the same stuff. You’re just using it slightly differently.

We’ve talked to National Geographic and Discover and guys shooting with video and digital still at the same time, and they’re asking, “Can we shoot with just one camera and potentially pull stills for our magazine?” The answer is, absolutely.”

I also saw the Scarlet isn’t HD.

John,

In the seventies, once Henri Cartier-Bresson told me that should Robert Capa be still alive he would at Magnum have switch to TV tape instead of doing photography.

Daniel

Gregory, hard drives no longer break the bank and are getting cheaper. The one I linked dropped by $20, while its size increased by 250GB, within the last six months. No need for stupid enclosures anymore. Bill, next cards to ship will be the 32GB and 64GB flavors. As for Capa, he was born multimedia.

This is probably well known to Capa fans, but I talked to a cat at ICP (about those negs found in Mexico City) and he said Capa was considering a full shift from stills to movies. Eventually, though, he incorporated the style of movies to his still stories. Interesting how he was multimedia eh?

A well-known photographer/editor told me years ago that the wire services thought mistakenly that digital photography vs. silver base film was the magic bullet against TV. The problem was that, no matter how fast digital photography got, it still couldn’t compete with the immediacy of TV. Photography had to find other markets.

Personally, I don’t belive in the so-called platypus photographer, that is just a poor version of a cameraman or a photographer, either way.

At this point in time, we need to concentrate on other issues like: no more work for hire, no orphan works bill… I don’t think it will be long before photographers start saying enough is enough.

well said, roberto. i think we will eventually cease ignoring the fact that photographs not seen are useless, and in order to reach the broadest base and thus, inform the most people, may not lie in the advancement of gathering methods, but the ways we distribute it.

Advancement of image gathering and distribution methods is what it’s all about, since the cave woman put stupid dust in her mouth and blew it over her hand…

All the gear and no idea!!

At 24 frames per second it sound like it’s the editorial photography profession that’s going to die! Any idiot who points the thing in the right direction will get the shot! (Even me!)

So the news media will simply kit out their journalists with these cameras (as some are already doing with digital stills) and send them on a quick course in pointing the camera in the right direction!

Be careful what you wish for!!!

The cave womans pic will still be around when all our hard drives, Blu-Ray DVDs, negatives and transparencies have half-lifed into the soil, along with all the photographers.

Unfortunately Nicola and Stupid hit the nail on the head, Mark. You can have this gear and no idea and still get the picture. To be honest you could also argue that the idea of the ‘decisive moment’ was simply a means to overcome the technical limitations of still cameras.

In the hands of skilled operators it became the stills cameras greatest asset, but now thats no longer the case when the moment can be scrolled and grabbed. That means whatever perceived ‘skill’ we had to sell in the marketplace is now gone.

I recall reading once that Allsport, the sports photo agency, once had 19 photographers covering the Olympic 100 metre final, an event which lasts just under 10 seconds. Standing outside the stadium was an articulated truck with transparency developing gear. This was so they could cover all the angles and distribute the images quickly.

At the 2012 London Olympics you won’t need 19 photographers or a truck. You just need 19 remote Scarlets and one guy sitting in a cubicle with a laptop using Final Cut Pro in multi-cam mode, or ‘better’ yet, just stream the feed and get people to pick their own moment…call it ‘Citizen Sports Photography’.

Photojournalism came into its own not with the stills camera, but with the stills camera combined with the print distribution system. Now that distribution system is going the way of the dodo, so the underpinnings of the current medium will go too.

That means the medium we’ve taken for granted for about 70 years will be fundamentally redefined – because the economic model which supported photojournalism as a skilled profession will no longer exist.

However…Nicola hints at what will still be required, and valued. “Any idiot who points the thing in the right direction will get the shot!”

Indeed. As long as the idiot knows which direction to point it in.

Most don’t.

And thats where we come in.

I hope you are right Sion, I guess it depends on how much value is put on quality and how much on cost! You should know by now that I’m on your side!

By the way, I love your ‘Blingapore’ time lapse video shot on the G9! It’s inspired me to try using mine to shoot video during the Brighton Festival…not that I have your video editing skills (I don’t even know what “graded with Adobe After Effects” means…yet!).

I was not going to add anything to this thread but just could not let pass that misinformed reference to the “so-called platypus photographer, that is just a poor version of a cameraman or a photographer, either way.”

You should say this to Tim Hetherington, for example. Tim was in the first Platypus Workshop class in 1999, and has had great success in both video and stills. Mind you, Tim had talent before he came to Platypus. Like Rick Loomis, who won a Pulitzer last year for the LA Times based on video he shot, or David Leeson of the Dallas Morning News, or Gail Fisher, now at National Geographic, and many others who attended Platypus. None of them have surrendered their still cameras.

People should stop freaking out about technological changes and start figuring out how to make it work for them. The tools might change but the song remains the same: having something to say that is worth looking and listening to. Mind you, I am biased as I flipped the mental switch over ten years ago, and have not looked back.

Personally, I am just as passionate about my still photography as ever. Matter of fact, even though I now use some of the most advanced tech tools and programs for HD production my still cameras are all film, as my projects are not on tight deadlines. I guess you could say that I am a half-Luddite.

This is a tough profession. Complaining about reality instead of adapting is ultimately self defeating. For those who know nothing about storytelling with the moving image and sound, it is extremely hard to do well, and involves more than pointing the camera in someone’s direction and pressing a button. The same sensibilities required to do great documentary still photography also apply here.

They are two different animals: stills are spatial, occupying time; moving images are temporal, fleeting but leaving impressions as they pass. Stills suggest what happened, moving images and sound allow you to tell stories. Being able to do both can actually make you a better storyteller with stills. But the still image has a power that moving images will never possess, and so will not go away. It remains the basis of memory.

This is an exciting time to be a visual storyteller.

Roger, you nailed it.

I’m hoping to fetch myself a little G9 to explore the movie functions and learn new tricks.

My last little vid cam was terrific and I made some interesting little movies about my kids and how they play but my son broke it with a soccer ball and so I’ve been without for some months. Very much looking forward to returning to the moving image. Have some ideas for new shorts and want to start soonest.

Your smart words a most encouraging indeed. More tools for us to play with. That’s a good thing.

For those of you who may not yet be familiar with CURRENT TV, I strongly suggest you check it out.

Hey Paul, thanks very much, and nice camera choice, the G9 has been in my sights as a carry-around. I know folks who do neat things with these little cameras.

As for Red Camera’s new Scarlet, my partners PF Bentley and Dirck Halstead were at NAB this week, and there will be a (shameless plug) report on the new gear upcoming on The Digital Journalist. As always, these reports highlight the relevant tools for our profession.

I was a bit disappointed to learn from PF that Scarlet lacks professional XLR audio connectors, and has only mini-plug. Bummer…a deal breaker for us, despite the amazing specs of the image sensor. Audio is right up there for us, and a mini-plug connector on a camera being used for daily pro work is a letdown. Perhaps by the time Scarlet is released next year Jim Jannard and his team will change their minds abut XLR connectors. I currently use Sony CineAlta PMW-EX-1 tapeless camera, and that is true HD at 1920×1080, with stunning picture quality. But a lot can happen within a year!

The G9 is a cracking little machine. Had it for about a month and have shot more video than stills with it.

It shoots surprisingly decent Hi-Def (ish) footage to an SD card. Crack on with that and a handheld sound recorder like the Zoom H4 and you’re good to go. And there’s its nifty timelapse function which is fun:

http://tinyurl.com/6kcgoz

Next stop the EX1 or EX3, then the SLR’s go on eBay…or maybe I’ll keep one, for nostalgias sake ;)

Cool video, Sion…those little cameras really allow you to play around without carrying all that heavy stuff. The EX3 has some important improvements over the EX1, like viewfinder and control layout, and of course interchangeable lenses. But the picture quality is the same.

Okay Sion, I have a couple of quiet little projects I’d like to do (with the G9) before I jump into serious video and was intrigued by your mentioning the audio recorder. I cannot afford a zoom too so was thinking more along the lines of one of those neat little stereo Olympus thingies. Now, my question is how to synchronize the devices? Do I use some sort of hap hazard clapper thing? What’s the trick?

Sion, my computer won’t even display the video. Is it on YouTube or something?

Nice vid Sion.The red looks like a good tool. I think stills will be around for a long time yet. I figure until mobile devices truly get up to speed, newspapers are still going to be the norm for most on morning commutes. Mobile devices are improving all the time but still bandwidth on most cellphones are pretty low the tops speed here in Japan is about 4-7 mbps. The package charge for transfer info is pretty high at the moment about the cost of a monthly newspaper subscription. Who knows what will happen in a year or two. Interesting times.

For serendipitous street shooting, we’ll always have stills.

Roger,

Just because someone is a great photographer, does not necessarily make him a great cameraman. Yes, there are always exceptions.
If a photographer wants to venture into another medium, by all means do so, but let’s call each thing by its name.

I never liked the term multimedia, and especially Platypo. It sounds like thouse neg/slide files that used to get categorized as Misc. (whatever that means)

Whatever the case, the real problem with photography, is that we have failed miserably in educating the general public about what we do, how we do it, and the value behind it (and why it should be respected.) And that is vastly more important than any gadget.

Well, I think it’s exciting having new tools to work with, and that doesn’t mean we abandoned the old ones…

Ok, this maybe a naive and uninformed question here, but with HDV cameras aren’t you limited with regard to shutter speed, unlike a DSLR ? If this is so and you start pulling frames for normal stills purposes surely the quality is not going to be anywhere near the quality of a DSLR ? I can understand that for editorial though HDV is the way to go for lots of publications as the web seems to be the way publishing is headed.

yea, blingapore! :)))))

left a comment Barrister ;))

running
b

Bill, the video is hosted on Vimeo. Try this:

http://www.vimeo.com/909026

Barrie – true, using HDV, you are hobbled to a certain extent by the (relatively) fixed shutter speeds of the vid-cam, ideally you need to be shooting progressive footage and the resolution of HDV isn’t great in comparison to current SLR’s.

Whats ironic though, is that the first Kodak digital camera used by hordes of newspapers had a file size SMALLER than HDV and those images made the paper, no problem. Obviously for daily newsprint use the killer app was the speed of getting images back for deadlines, but now with newspapers coming out in print and Web, with effectively 24-hour rolling deadlines, the ability to repurpose HDV stills from video becomes compelling because it satisfies multiple outlets and deadline pressures.

Grab the stills first for the paper and the Web, then follow on with the video later. Also with handheld devices, file size is becoming less important.

But as Roger says, both methods are not remotely similar to be honest, so you are in danger of coming back with the worst of both. Storytelling skills remain key, which is why for example, ‘Iraq in Fragments’ is a stunning piece of work even though its shot on Standard Def Mini DV. The thing oozes photographic and storytelling skill.

I think the future of hi-res stills is very viable and lies not with print, but with HDTV. There, SLR and larger format stills have the edge because one of the killer apps of HDTV is the resolution and great image quality. Thats why people are buying them by the barrel load.

YouTube and mobile phone footage looks crap on an HDTV…but I’ve seen B&W and colour stills on an HDTV and they’ll make your tongue hang out. I’m convinced theres a viable audience out there for material shown in this way. Ken Burns cracked it, so theres no reason others can’t.

I reckon the way to look at it, is multimedia is just that – multi. Figure out what you want to do and pick up the right visual tool.

Paul, I haven’t used the G9 with a recorder, but have used this method when using multiple cameras and limited mikes. Spark up the camera and recorder, then get the subject to clap while being filmed (or yup, use a clapper-board).

Then when you drop the vid onto the edit timeline, just match the camera clap frame with the recorder audio spike on the audio track to sync both.

Obviously you need to get them to clap on camera every time you change shots (assuming you’ve turned the camera off to save tape/card room).

“Just because someone is a great photographer, does not necessarily make him a great cameraman. Yes, there are always exceptions.”

Roberto, I totally agree with you. The percentage of people who excel is very small, like the profession in general. But if someone applies him/herself and seeks training to get a push in the right direction, the rest is up to them. I have seen people who had never used a video camera get training, educate and dedicate themselves, and go to the top (Kimberly Acquaro, Academy Award nominee for Best Short Documentary 2005 “God Sleeps in Rwanda” ).

“I never liked the term multimedia…”

That is the term applied by the industry as a whole, and I once had the title of multimedia editor at a newspaper I worked at, never been a fan of the term multimedia myself.

”...and especially Platypo”...so have a lot of the folks who have attended the workshop. David Turnley hated being called a platypus ;-) The name came from Tom Burton, who is now director of photography at The Orlando Sentinel in Orlando, Florida. Back in the 19th century when the platypus was found in Australia, zoologists were stumped and could not classify it because it was a mammal that laid eggs. Same applied to a photographer that shot both stills and video…so the name stuck.

I do not think there is a problem with photography, except perhaps because so many have a camera the majority think the quality of a photo comes from how expensive the gear is. You will never be able to escape this perception. Especially now when it is possible to make a technically perfect photo every time, and the process has been de-mystified. Even then, it has just been in recent decades that being a photographer became looked at as a profession and not a trade.

Consider writing. Everyone who has gone to school and tried to write an excellent essay knows how difficult it is to do. All you need is a pencil and paper. We all recognize what is bad writing. But in photography, a mechanical process, there is no standard about what makes a photo good or bad. That both makes it unique and infuriating on some levels, but also liberating. You do know it when you see it, or rather, FEEL it.

I will say about educating the public as to the value of what we do, back in the 1980’s and up to the mid 1990’s I found France to be the one place where being a photo reporter was considered respectable. Never forget trying to find my way on a Paris street to the Gamma Liaison (now Getty Images) headquarters and a few blocks away an old lady sweeping the street knew what the agency was about and how to get there. The siege of Sarajevo was raging, and Sygma (now Corbis) photographer Antoine Gyori’s photo of a rough scene in Sarajevo of a man kneeling over the body of his slain son, was plastered on billboards throughout the city, in the Metro and above streets. I could not imagine that here in the USA. They usually gutted the photo report to make it as inoffensive as possible. It is even worse today, as we all know.

All the best to you…..

Sion,

You’ve been banging on about this convergence for a while and it seems to be gaining pace now, especially that the Scarlet is about to be launched. One can see all sorts of possibilites opening up. I mean the cost of this gear has been a bit prohibitive up until now at this standard. It’s a pity Scarlet doesn’t take Nikon or Canon lenses though….

What’s to stop you publishing a really high quality A/V presentation of your work from your own website – taken on your DSLR- that people can see on their HDTV screen ? Can that be done yet?

What is the HDTV resolution? Is it 100ppi, as for computer screens, or should it be the same as print at 300ppi? Also, what dimensions? I’d like to make a hi-def soundslide presentation for viewing on an HDTV. I’d put it on DVD and sell it.

Anyone in the know?

Now Blu Ray DVDs are set to be the standard, theres no reason why you cant sell an HD photo presentation on DVD. Not sure if you could publish an HD presentation on the web, you might have bandwidth issues, although you could argue as the web is mostly computer monitors (not TV screens), chances are its pretty hi-res already.

But its all to play for. According to Wikipedia

http://tinyurl.com/jos5m

the top resolution at present is 1080p, which is 1920×1080, which is just under a 6MB file. In 2015 however, we’ll be getting Quad HDTV (3840×2160), which is just under 24 MB.

As long as the images ppi is bigger than 72, I’m not sure it’ll make any difference as long as you have a decent sized SLR file. Contrast and saturation are also the key to eyepoppin’ HD telly, and most SLR images have that in spades.

Now its time to make all our heads hurt:

http://web.mac.com/jb.net/PS-FCP/PixelTests.html

I haven’t read it yet, but its the nitty gritty on getting your stills to look good on telly, because the pixel shapes are different, or something…you need to read this too:

http://www.larryjordan.biz/articles/lj_grfx_look.html

I’ll get round to it, but am currently too jetlagged…

Sion,
I was thinking more like a podcast sort of thing. A lot of these media/TV players have hard drives. You could download your electro book onto a hard drive and play it back at leisure, all in lipsmackin’ HD. Maybe you could encode it just like the BBC does with their iPlayer software. Far fetched or a possibility ?

In fact I think you can do it right now with Apple TV. Simply amazing, you can download pictures from anybody and look at them on your HDTV system. Does this mean you can self publish without going to print now ?

Hey there,
Saw some mention of the G9 in the thread. I was shooting stills one night of a house fire and grabbed my G9 to see if it could do a good job shooting video. I alternated between the two while covering the fire. I think the results are really good for a camera that size. Uploaded them here:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/989831/house_fire/

Things you’ll notice with this camera include: No external microphone input, no zooming while shooting video, no contiuous autofocus. Not going to be good as a primary camera, but definitely good enough in a pinch.

The tools might change but the song remains the same: having something to say that is worth looking and listening to.

Absolutely right Roger.

See these machines are just tools, in the hands of a technophobe/photovideo/lets try something different kind of guy they are as useful as a hammer without a handle.