Panasonic Adds AVC-Intra to P2 HD Line

[Jerry Jones]

The company will begin shipping the AJ-HPX2000 P2 HD camcorder, the first shoulder-mount camera in the P2 HD lineup, in January and will include 24p frame-rate capability in addition to optional support of AVC-Intra, a new advanced independent frame compression codec. The codec, based on the H.264 (MPEG-4, Part 10) standard, will be offered in an optional board that will be available in July 2007. Panasonic says AVC-Intra provides highly efficient independent frame 10-bit encoding and will effectively double the recording capacity of a P2 card. AVC-Intra will be offered in two flavors: 100 Mbps for highest HD quality and 50 Mbps for more bandwidth-efficient operation. Although Panasonic executives pointed out that AVC-Intra will co-exist right alongside the more popular MPEG-2 based DVCPRO format, they aren't shy about where they think the future of MPEG is. The H.264 standard "leaves MPEG-2 in the dust," said Steve Mahrer, Engineering Manager for Panasonic Broadcast and Television Systems.

http://tinyurl.com/y78tvc

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Jerry Jones]

AJ-HPX2000:

http://tinyurl.com/vrh3a

SWEET.

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Jerry Jones]

StudioDaily has more about Panasonic's new AJ-HPX2000 here:

http://tinyurl.com/tn8n5

"Representatives from Avid and Apple were both on hand to pledge support for AVC-I in future versions of their NLE systems."

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Jerry Jones]

Interestingly, Panasonic executives did not take the opportunity to directly slag the rival codec, which is used in Sony's similarly tapeless XDCAM line-up, which records images to optical discs. Instead, that task fell to an actress on-stage during the presentation, playing a dingy but bubbly blonde newscaster who declared, loudly, "It's toodle-oo to MPEG-2!"

http://tinyurl.com/tn8n5

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Jerry Jones]

Veteran broadcast industry consultant Tore B. Nordahl is on record saying "HDV is in trouble."

http://tinyurl.com/vfgn3

Some of his more interesting opinions:

"HDV is in trouble, I believe."

"Canon, JVC and Sony keep battling to win customers for their (too) many models of HDV camcorders."

"By the end of 2006, Canon, JVC and Sony will each have 3 HDV models, for a total of 9 (more or less) professional models."

"In addition, Sony offers several HDV models in the high-end consumer market."

"Panasonic will soon be in the driver's seat."

"Panasonic never joined the 'HDV club' choosing to tough it out with the HVX200 DVCPRO-HD P2 camcorder (with success) while developing its AVC technology."

"Panasonic's decision not to spend on HDV R&D will pay off big in 2007, when I expect to see several Panasonic AVC-based HD camcorders both for semi-pro and pro use."

But here is the statement from Nordahl that I find most interesting:

"Panasonic badly needs a semi-professional HD camcorder line-up by end of 2006, not to lose market share."

"The current HVX200 sells for about $8,500 with several P2 cards (P2 is really necessary for HD internal recording)."

"Look for new semi-professional AVCHD models selling for as little as $3,000 from Panasonic."

If that statement turns out to be true, then I'd say most people still using SD gear are crazy not to be patient and see what's coming in 2007.

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net

[Dr Mordrid]

I decided to wait as soon as Panasonic announced the AVC-Intra.

Intra-frame compression implies editability advantages over inter-frame because you don't have to do as many calculations when scrubbing etc, and if confirmed it would seriously reduce the CPU load when editing HD.

[Jerry Jones]

For sure, long GOP editing is a huge compromise no matter how you slice it.

Jerry Jones

http://www.jonesgroup.net