Yo everyone.
I'm shooting with a tapeless VX setup and thought I'd post it on here to pose it as a possible option and to get people's thoughts. This is definitely something more suited to the wild west of SkatePerception (RIP), and I know it'll probably get pretty mixed responses on here but I just wanted to pose it as a possible option for sustaining VX footage in the years to come.
Like all VX users I'd had a ton of tapedeck/timecode issues with pretty much all of my VX's over the past couple years and spent tons on repairs, so last year I bit the bullet and bought one of those DN60 firewire capture devices. I was super hesitant at first because I didn't like the idea of having the device mounted on either the top or the bottom of the camera as I thought it’d get in the way when filming low or using an on-camera light, but with the constant tapedeck issues I though it might be an idea worth revisiting if I could find a bracket mount to hold it on the side of the camera without getting in the way of any buttons.
After a few experiments this is what I'm now using:
A DN60 mounted on the side of the VX1000 with an L-bracket and a 30cm FireWire cable connecting the two (images attached in the insta post attached below).
The device captures to CF cards so you don’t need tapes (a 16GB CF card records 1hr 7mins footage), and takes x4 AA batteries (a freshly charged set last about 3-4hours in the DN60) so it doesn’t use or run down the VX batteries. In fact, the VX batteries actually last longer as the tape-deck isn’t being used at all.
You capture the footage from the device via firewire in the same way you would do off a cap cam, but using the capture controls in Premiere/Final Cut, etc, and the footage is exactly the same as if captured from tape, yet doesn’t glitch at all. Occasionally the device will lag while capturing and drop capture frames (which you can notice through a break in the audio), but rewinding and recapturing the clip will almost always fix it. The DN60 creates it's own timecode and records exactly what would be getting recorded onto tape and it never seems to drop any frames while recording VX input. The firewire is the perfect length at 30cm so it's super study and never comes out or either port. if you want to be 100% safe you can also record to tape and the DN60 at the same time, to save to card and tape, but i've come to realise there isn't really need to because the cards are so reliable.
The ergonomics and weighting of the camera with the DN60 rig is pretty much the same as a normal VX, with the only major differences being it being the slightest bit heavier that the record button is on the DN60 device - so you have to keep an eye on that to ensure a timecode is being recorded (but a red light comes on to signal when it is). It's also little more difficult to reach the ND and exposure buttons mid line, but it's still doable.
I’ve been using this set up for the past month or so to film our next video and not had any problems as of yet. The only issue I had was using the DN60 with one of my VX's but that was because the VX had a faulty firewire port.
Here's an example of some offcut footage to show it's identical to tape:
I'm sure I’m not the first to do this, but I’ve not seen another VX with DN60 side mounted before yet, which to me seems like the most logical placement for it.
Like I said before, I know this will get mixed reviews from a lot of VX people, but honestly I think it could be a viable way to keep VX footage going, and it feels pretty good knowing the footage isn’t going to be glitched when you come to capture it.
It's a shame not to have the physical archive of tapes, but you can always back it up to drives/cloud storage.
I’ll be shooting our next video with this setup and I'll be posting updates about it all via this insta feed, so check it out if you're interested in any updates:
https://www.instagram.com/orwellian.world.landscape/Hope that helps anyone considering this as an option. If anyone has any questions feel free to hit me up on here, or you can DM me on either of the Insta accounts. Cheers!
Topic: VX1000 General Discussion (gear/set-ups, filming/editing, tips/advice, etc.) (Read 148327 times)