Digital Toys

Spent the last 3 nights taking a class at Video Pool on working with digital video cameras. I was very impressed with the quality of the picture from the Sony HVR-Z1U, especially in cine mode. The HVR-A1U was fun because it was so tiny. The beauty is I don't have to buy them to use them. That's the whole point of belonging to VP.

Apparently to rent either of them, I have to prove my trustworthiness with one of the other cameras first, so I'll do that over the next few weeks, as I do want to practice some of the techniques we talked about, particularly using the iris, gain, white balance, and zebra stripes. The tricky thing is each camera is so unique and has their buttons in such different places. Not like desktop publishing software, where you can usually hunt around and find what you're looking for eventually...

Was using iMovie at work yesterday and was amused that it has so few buttons compared to Final Cut - even the Express version I've been using. I only used a handful of what was available in Final Cut - found what worked for me and kept using it. Another reason to get some more footage and play with it - force myself to experiment with some of the other editing features.