Camera Review Sony HDV Z1U
As a filmmaker, I dreamed of the day that I could toss my standard def camera for a high Def one. I started pricing them about 5 years ago and one hundred grand was the best price I could find. It took a couple years until it had come down by half to fifty grand. Even then, I was never going to have the kind of a budget to own or even rent such a camera. Then, in late 2004, Sony broke the $10,000 barrier and released the FX1 and, in 2005, the Z1U, bringing the dream of owning an HD camera to regular people like you and me. Over the last year Panasonic, JVC and Canon have followed suit giving microfilmmakers everywhere broader options in cameras and more tools to tell stories at a much higher quality than they used to have. Since I owned a Sony PD-150, which I liked a lot, I naturally leaned toward the Sony HDV camera. I did my homework on all of them and in the end I decided to go with the Z1U. It has its ups and downs but over all it has lived up to the hype.
There are a lot of reviews available on the Z1U. As a shooter I found that those reviews glossed over a lot of things that effect me in the practical day-to-day use of this camera. In this review I have glossed over a few of the features that will make your jaw drop in awe in favor of giving you a perspective that has some practical value to the microfilmmaker. That way when you drop a few grand on getting this camera you at least know all sides of the picture.
Ease of Use
If you have picked up a Sony video camera before, you can probably start shooting on this camera with no problem in about 2 minutes. If you have been using other brands, it might take you 5 minutes, but what's an extra 3 minutes between friends?
The menu functions are easy to understand. Scrolling through them will give you a pretty good understanding of what the camera is capable of. Once you've got that down you can find manual controls for most of the important features somewhere on the camera.
The manual control features are easy to get to and with practice you will be able to get used to adjusting them without having to look. The iris control has intermediate stops which prevent the jumping issue that you had with the PD150 when you manually dropped down the iris. I still wish it were on the lens itself, but that maybe in a later model.
One feature that I was pretty excited about was the color control options that are on the camera. However, I have to say after working with them for quite awhile, I gave up and decided to it was easier to do it in post. Maybe after a few more months of production with the camera, the light will come on in my head and it will all make sense, but, until then, I am staying with the factory presets.
Moving the LCD screen from the side of the camera to the top was a brilliant move. When you are shooting this will become apparent quickly. You can get a quick look at what the camera is capturing from either side of the camera without obstruction. Since I do a lot of interviews for documentaries, it became important to me that I can have a left or right framed shot and can catch how it looks on screen without having to set up a monitor. When you are reviewing your shots its nice to be able to have the deck controls side by side with the monitor and not have to twist your hand in an awkward position.
Depth of Options
Record Modes
Now many filmmakers have been looking for a camera that not only is HD, but which also offers true 24p frame rate. I don't fall into that category. My belief is that most of the viewing of my work will be done at either 30i or HD's 60i. Thus I personally don't really care if I shoot my material at true 24p or not. However, I wish I could have that option for certain productions without having to go through a rather complicated conversion shuffle in postproduction. What Sony did with the Z1U was offer a wide range of options for shooting making their camera both NTSC and PAL. When you shoot in PAL mode on this camera you are capturing 25 frames a second or 50 when you're in HD mode. Most other cameras on the market that claim to have 24p options are really capturing the shot at 30p and dropping frames to simulate 24p. The exception to that rule, at the moment, is the new Panasonic HVX200. If you choose to shoot in PAL mode you can convert it to 24p in post by only dropping one frame a second which should give as close to a film look as you can hope for without one of those two Panasonic cameras. The Z1U is one of the few cameras in this price range that offers 1080 x 1960 resolution (even if it is MPEGII), which gives you the best possible resolution when you get the money to uprez it to 35mm. (In fact, the Hollywood film Fever Pitch used the Z1U as B-roll footage for the F900 and was able to intercut between the two seamlessly. Granted, there was a bit of post correction required to get the Z1U footage to match up with the F900, but you get the point.)
Lens
One of the nicest things that Sony did with the Z1U was to put the Carl Zeiss lenses on it. This is a beautiful piece of glass that will blow your mind away when you consider how little you have to pay for it. Unlike previous DV and DVCam cameras targeting the same market, this lens gives you a clear focus range with a wonderful depth of field that you had to really fight to come close with using the PD150. If you add wide-angle lenses or a 2x lenses you will add more options to get that look that you typically see in film productions. Sony has also dropped the continuous ring on the zoom lenses, which will allow you to hit marks in a push or pull shot with much more accuracy. Unfortunately, to my disappointment, the focus ring is still a continuous ring, which brings back flashbacks to issues I've had with Canon cameras and their stock lenses! Luckily, they do have a focus range indicator in the viewfinder, which helps, as well as a frame enlarger for fine focus prior to recording. The shot presets are a feature that filmmakers will love. It allows you to set two focal points in a shot and jump between them with automated precision. When shooting dramatic scenes this could be the difference between 2 takes and 10 takes.
Presets
The 6 programmable presets are something that many cameras that cost much more don't have. You can preset your camera settings for up to six different lighting or mood situations. This can be done while waiting for your actors, which will then allow you to move between setups much faster without breaking the flow of the actors. There is an option to go all-automatic, which may seem like an easy way out for many users, but I don't ever recommend you do that since you will obtain the sharpest images you can in production if you tweak things a bit. The more you work at getting a clean image in the field, the more time you will save on trying to fix it in post. This in turn allows you to spend your valuable time on polishing more important elements, like your films tempo, look, and overall story presentation.
Audio
Gathering good location audio is very important. The Z1U has a pretty good stereo mic that is built in. It's great for getting wild audio. The real advantage however is the two balanced XLR audio inputs. This means you don't have to go out and get a converter box that lowers the quality of your sound and input it as RCA audio. The problem is there aren't any ways to use the built in mic at the same time you have a wireless lav or shotgun plugged in to one of the XLR inputs. Getting one track of wild natural sound is important, so adding on the optional externally mounted on camera mic is a must. The camera also has solid manual controls for audio, which is good because the auto levels have a tendency to boost every sound in range of the mic to something you can hear. If you keep a good eye on the levels and adjust them manually for each location, you will really get good sound of what you really want: the person, animal, or thing which is right in front of the mic.
The one caveat about the audio is that it is compressed at a 4:1 ratio and recorded using MPEG-1 Layer II audio compression. While this is higher quality than most MP3 audio, it is not as high a quality as uncompressed PCM audio. As such, editing audio in post is much less forgiving than if you had uncompressed audio. Bottom line, if you're going to shoot in HDV, make sure you have your mics properly placed, because you're going to have a lot less grace to fix it in post!
Performance
Now, when Sony announced the advent of a sub-$10,000 HD camera, it sounded too good to be true. And, as usual, when something sounds too good to be true it usually is. When Sony brought the price of owning an HD camera under ten grand they did so by making a camera that records an MPEGII stream, which they called 'HDV' (or High Definition Video). This stream is higher quality than most DVDs (or even the resolution of most cable HDTV channels) because it is recorded at a much lower compression rate. However, it is recorded in a clustered compression called Long Form GOP, in which a key frame is recorded only once every fifteen frames. As such, in addition to the possibility of ½ second long dropouts, there is also the risk of digital noise developing when shooting fast moving shots. While this is a potential problem, in my time of operating the camera, I have yet to see that happen. (It should be noted, however, that I haven't been out shooting lions chasing impalas in Africa--yet.)
Compression issues do surface more commonly in the form of compression noise and jagged artifacts around the edges of your subjects, which looks bad when you blow it up for a freeze frame. You may also notice some digital noise in the blacks, which, when they aren't properly exposed, there will be a lot of digital noise. This is not a good thing if you planning to do a lot of night shots without proper lighting. In full motion however 99.99% of viewers will never notice it. If you've watched any HDTV channels you will notice that these compression issues have become pretty acceptable over the air, which is sad considering how much more powerful the cameras are that many of these programs are shot on.
Weight is an issue that I didn't really expect when I picked up the Sony Z1U. I have been using the PD-150 for years and it has been a wonderful tool for the documentary films that I do. I could take it almost anywhere and just keep it in my hand ready to shoot at any time. The Z1U, on the other hand, is not nearly so light and hand-held friendly. In fact, the first day I tried to shoot hand-held with it, after about ten minutes, my hand went numb! Even as I grew accustomed to the camera, I discovered that I simply could not keep shooting more than ten minutes at a time. Now I am sure some of that is due to the fact that I need to get to the gym a bit more, but, still, being a much heavier camera than the PD-150, it has the tendency to cut off circulation in virtually anyone's hand. As such, I would highly suggest getting a shoulder brace if you plan on using the camera a lot as a free-roaming camera. There are quite a few options for mounts for the Z1U starting from around $100 to $500.
Another minor issue comes from record commencement delay, so that, when you hit the record button, it takes a little long to get the tape up to speed. This isn't really a big deal except when you are trying capture something as it happens. Just make sure you start rolling early. If you are shooting something dramatic make sure the you call 'Speed!' before 'Action!' (And before you call either one, call 'Audio!' and make sure your mics are positioned properly!!)
The built in LCD screen is perfectly located as I mentioned earlier and it works great for getting the general idea of what you are capturing. Unfortunately, the down side is that the resolution is pretty low and doesn't truly reflect the quality of the picture you are getting. For most people this isn't a big deal. However, if you need a very precise representation of what you're recording, I would recommend three solutions to this problem. First, and most expensive, you can get an HD monitor to take with you on set. (Prices are dropping on these, so this might not be as expensive as you might anticipate.) Secondly, you can use a laptop as a monitoring solution in HD with the help of one of the new programs like Redrock Revolution or Video Rack. Finally, and most delayed, would be to go through the dailies each night on an HD monitor or computer screen that has a higher resolution.
Value
Now for many microfilmmakers, the price tag on the Z1U is a little steep. However if you really want to capture your story on a camera that will give you a wide range of distribution options, this camera delivers. When you consider the aspect ratio, picture quality, recording formats and tape cost this camera is worth fighting to get within your budget.
Final Comments
In conclusion, this is a very powerful camera that will take low- and no-budget filmmaking to a whole new level. I put two shots side-by-side, one out of a PD150 (which is comparable to the Canon XL2) and one out of the Z1U, and there is simply no comparison. With the old days of analog tape-to-tape editing gone, the generational argument for having uncompressed source material is mostly dead, especially for those of us who don't have multi million dollar budgets. I researched this camera for over a year after it came out and bought one. The reviews have all been positive. As I mentioned earlier, you can even see shots from it at the end of Fever Pitch. This camera has more field-testing than any other similar camera on the market. I suggest that every microfilmaker at least take a serious look at this camera before going into production on their next project.
WEBLINK: www.microfilmmaker.com
Ó Microfilmaker Magazine & Andy Yardy 2006
SEE ALSO :
Hands-On HDV - Sony Z1 http://www.netribution.co.uk/2/content/view/93/212/