On Wed, 8 Jan 2003 04:56:15 -0500, "Sanman" <me@you.com> wrote:

[...]

>Since I've got you here... Why do pro's use cameras with a DV compression

>that is twice the bitrate as consumer cameras? I mean, the quality I see

>coming from consumer megapixel and 3 chip DV cameras is so friggin' good,

Actually, it is very good compared with what we used at the

"amateur" level only a few years ago, but it is not very

good compared with the best pro gear out there. The level

of annoying artifacting, soft color resolution, etc. that

the best "D25" suffers from is kinda painful to watch,

once you "see" it...;-) See for some examples (if you dare!)

www.David-Ruether-Photography.com/vid_pict_characts.htm.

>it's mind boggling why broadcast pros need to use something twice the

>quality, just to broadcast it through a system that will ruin it anyway, and

Improving the source material always improves the final

video image, regardless of the quality level of the final

medium (which is why commercial VHS movies on a 240-line

limited medium look so good, and so much better than DV

copies to the same medium). Given good source material,

the picture quality on the 340-line limited broadcast

system can look wonderful (on a good TV...), and the best

540-line limited D25 still is annoying to watch on the same

TV even if viewed directly and not broadcast - and with

broadcast, it looks worse (though not TOO bad, and "good

enough" for some purposes...;-).

>show it to people who will not, really, they will NOT notice the difference,

>if there is any. Look at "America's Funniest Home Videos" and "Real TV"

>etc. The crappy video quality in those shows in no way hinders the ratings.

You are right - most people are not critical of image

or sound quality (though some of us are...;-). It was

interesting to see the PBS program on Lance Loud this

week, where 20 year old film footage was mixed with

what appeared to be good DV and excellent studio (video?)

footage. The original broadcast film looked technically

terrible; the new DV looked OK; the studio work looked

wonderful - and the differences in the quality levels

were "painfully" evident, at least on my TV... Yet

that original material was considered "broadcast quality"

only 20 years ago... But, would you like to be stuck with

that low level of quality for all broadcast material now?

It is bad enough that some stations compress their material

to the point where edges "buzz", blinking eyes turn into

"steel-wool", and other visual atrocities... Can't wait

for the further-compressed broadcast HDTV to appear...! ;-)

>Why don't the networks stick to the [higher] DV compression and spend the money

>they save on tape to reduce the amount of commercials we put up with?

They are likely to do the former, but not the latter...;-)