What’s the hottest HD camera? How hot is HD in the market? Playback asks the people who know cameras

Hottest HD camera rental
‘XDCAM HD is the hottest camera format this summer, with many projects starting to realize the potential of the Sony cameras. As well as the excellent picture quality at 35 mbps [megabits per second], the cameras are rugged, temperature tolerant for extremes of hot and cold. DOPs can take advantage of variable frame rates. Optical storage is definitely a superior way to store data, speeding up workflow because you can ingest faster than real time and provide 100% archivable footage.’

-Joe Freitas, camera department supervisor and rental consultant at Videoscope, Toronto

Hottest HD camera prototype
‘Phantom [from Vision Research] is brand new technology, and we’re still working with a prototype camera. It’s high-def, high speed, so you get 1000 frames per second at full high-def resolution. We have one that’s a loaner right now and it’s been out the door every day of the week since we got it. The commercial guys are lovin’ it.

‘One DOP we work with for Telus commercials previously shot in 35mm, shooting 45,000 feet in a day, worth about $100,000 in processing. Take that versus the Phantom, where the rental averages $4,000 a day, [then transfer] the high-speed footage [to] HD tape, and with one or two tapes around $80 each…do the math. It’s well under $5,000 to shoot a day on high speed.’

-Rob Sim, president, Sim Group, Toronto

Hottest HD year for IATSE
In 2006, a record 60% of IATSE’s 118 projects in Ontario and eastern Canada – including both Canadian and U.S. TV and film projects – were shot in HD, according to Rick Perotto, business representative of IATSE Local 667.

‘And I estimate it will be between 70% and 75% in 2007,’ Perotto says. ‘The difference is the number of feature films shot on HD this year. That 40% [non-HD shoots] in 2006 was predominantly features. Now they’re swinging over and they’re the last to go. What swung over first was MOWs, then series.

‘A lot of my DPs say that HD has a better look than 16mm, which can be too grainy. HD is closer to 35mm.’

-Rick Perotto, business representative, IATSE Local 667

Hotter cameras coming in ’08
‘The hottest camera this summer is actually what will be available in the summer of 2008. No fewer than 16 top camera manufacturers are currently racing to issue a new single-chip, cost-effective digital-cinematography capture device that will revolutionize the entire camera market, rendering images that are higher resolution than HD. Examples of these new cameras are being tested at PS now and throughout the fall.’

-Penny Watier, head of camera, PS Production Services, Toronto

Hottest buzz
Hollywood studios are apparently looking for seasoned 35mm DOPs who have experience on the Panavision Genesis camera (as it enables seamless inter-cutting with most 35mm film emulsions). Keep your eyes peeled for the Red camera, developed by a popular sunglasses designer, per insiders. It’s due on the market in four short months and is hailed on the Red website by Ocean’s Eleven director and cinematographer Steven Soderbergh: ‘This is the camera I’ve been waiting for my whole career: jaw-dropping imagery recorded onboard a camera light enough to hold with one hand…Red is going to change everything.’

-Compiled by James Careless and Suzan Ayscough