Second camera video

I realise that this is a forum for Video excellence, but I wanted to share this short video. Not because it is amazing in itself, but because it is amazing in how it was produced. It wasn't shot by me, but I am in it!

What I find so interesting about this video is that it is shot with a Panasonic FX01 digital compact camera. This is a tiny, tiny setup:

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0602/06021404panasonicfx01.asp

But the image quality is very impressive (although here it is downsized and compressed) and at 848x480 pixels at 16:9 it looks very nice indeed when projected on a standard video projector (1024x768).

Of course this quality would never cut it for broadcast etc. But for giving talks and other stuff it is fantastic. Plus the system is so tiny it is easy to carry as a second camera.

This video was shot by Peter Rowlands while we were in West Papua. All these shots were taken when he had a DSLR in his other hand! Plus the main aim of the FX01 was for shooting stills. Yet with little effort it was easy to produce some pleasing footage. There is no post production colour correction. This is exactly as shot with the FX01 and a Magic Filter (of course!).

I am just amazed that something so small can do such a good job, and I thought it was worth sharing.

Alex

p.s. This is my first time posting a video on Wetpixel - so I hope it works.

That is remarkable. We all need one on an accessory shoe on top of our housings. And be patient, next year it will probably be broadcast quality.

I was downright impressed.

Very nice indeed..

Well done to Peter for throwing that 'cat amongst the, What do I get next Pigeons'

Dive safe

DeanB

I'm amazed to be honest. Very nice vid. Most of the footage appeared to be very shallow - but even so like I said I'm amazed at the quality.

Cheers, Simon

That's amazing for a stills camera. As solid state replaces tape, the line between video and stills cameras looks like it's going to become very blurry.

Alex, do you know if Peter was manually white balancing?

I'd be interested to know how much video could be fitted on the biggest available memory cards. Anyone know what the bitrate of the video is? This might even make a reasonable "dailies" camera.