The downside for porn is that much of the time, 16 x 9 formats are useless, adding in a ton of extra stuff in the frame that isn't important.

Nice quality videos there :)

I think that regardless of how you output the file, the source counts for a ton. Saying that you can get comparable finished product from a 6MP camera and a 22MP camera is just silly. The 22MP is getting soooooooooo much more source information that it's image will just be better, regardless of the final size. Why do you think almost all major publications shoot cover shots with 4x5 and 8x10s rather than 35mm???

The same holds true for the video production. A camera in HD will get a better source to work with than an SD unit. When you downsample it is noticable.

I agree with you regarding the depth of an HD unit... it has a more realistic feel to it than SD.

Alex, this only has to do with people that are rendering their 16x9 source into a 4:3 frame. If they weren't lazy and rendered it into a 16x9 frame, there would be no extras. I personally hate letterbox when you don't have to have it. it only matters when the output screen is 4:3 (which most monitors have no issue with anymore as the file resolution is much smaller than the monitor's max res.)..... my wife's iPod plays letterbox because it has to when I rip a DVD for her to watch on it... my apple cine screens are 1920x1280... so they play 16:9 inherently without problem.

I am not the most knowledgeable when it comes to using Final Cut, but I do know how to take a 16x9 source and output it at 16x9 (I shoot with two SD Canon GL2s and one HD Canon HV10 so I work in both formats... I really do want an HVX200 though... looks slick!!!).... I figured that part out in the first week. In fact, when you do it properly, a 16:9 will render much, much faster at the source ratio than when you render it to 4:3 as it has to create the entire frame that way.

People that render letterbox either don't know any better, havent' taken the class on how to make it work the right way, or just like the look of having somewhere to put their copyright info so it's not on the image, just over the black instead.

That film stock was sexy!!!!! I know there are filters where you can make your digital capture look like that... but honestly that was cool!!! Sometimes you just can't beat old school technology.

Alex, 16x9 is great for filming three-ways especially since you can stretch the three models out in a ménage à trois and fit all or most of the action in the frame!

FTV moves to 1440x1080 or '1920x1080' 8000kb/sec HD in December:
examples:

http://content.ftvgirls.com/samanthahd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/nikitahd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/mariahd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/laceyhd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/karahd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/fayehd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/katehd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/mlhd8.wmv
http://content.ftvgirls.com/terahd8.wmv

:thumbsup :thumbsup

HD at that bitrate and resolution is a bitch to edit though.:mad:

i guess it is with film the same ways as digital SLR's.. the dynamic range is much less then that of film, which makes for overexposure and this is very visible in your first clip shot with the digital HD cam, her skin tones are burnt, have red and orange tones in them.. in the film, the highlights are clean skin colors....nice.
shit i hope the chip manufacturers find a solution for that soon...imagine shooting with a color film or black and white dynamic range digital equipment..my wish for xmas..

for glamour nothing will look better than film - we walk around all day seeing the world in HD - that's the goal of HD technology - but i don't think that's the goal of art/cinema/erotica - to just replicate what we see in our everyday world.

same thing with still photography - film is best.

Rob, your aspect ratio on those videos is all fucked up!

frame rates seem off on just about all the samples on this page ...
HD is a bitch to compress to a Wmv format

I was wondering if it was just me... didnt' want to say anything as Rob doesn't like me very much... but here's the weird part.

On my PC it looks just fine.... on my Mac.. I ran it with Quicktime and with Windows Media Player 9 and they are all compressed (left and right).. I am thinking it has something to do with the files working in the expanded (rectangular) pixel aspect but being rendered in the square aspect???? Don't know... kind of odd to have the 2 computers though and looks fine on one and not on the other. Made me go back and look at some of my HD source video and it seems fine on both.

i just ran a few of those FTVGirls clips on my 13" widescreen viao and they looked super!

Aspect ratio is off in the FTV samples. It displays as 4:3.

You're right. The aspect ratio is incorrect in those videos. Many HDV cameras shoot in 4:3 (1440x1080) with a pixel aspect ratio of 4:3 (i.e., non square pixels). It's a bit confusing at first and it's a common mistake. The actual size you see on your display is the 'raw' pixels * the pixel aspect ratio. So if you have 1440x1080 'raw' pixels and each pixel has a 4:3 ratio, then the final result is a 1920x1080 video (1440*(4/3) =1920), which is 1920x1080 with a total aspect ratio of 16:9). If you have VLC player installed, you can change the pixel aspect ratio to 16:9 and the videos look great. :thumbsup

Hopefully Alison Angel is also getting the 8000kbit/s 1920x1080 videos?

bumping the HD...
Rob and anyone, tell me which HD/HDV camera you shoot with and why you love it or not..

JP... hit me up ICQ???

Get a better video card.

What type of projector are you using? I have a 150in 16/9 screen and am using a CRT Sony. Looks amazing at 1080p.

We've used an HVX for a little over a year. The main reason we shoot HD is for the future value of our content... in 3 or 5 years time, hi-def content that's true HD (as opposed to HDV) will almost certainly be more valuable than SD or HDV content.

There is a noticeable difference between DVCPro-HD, the Panasonic codec which is 100Mbits/sec, and HDV, which is 25Mbits/sec. More data, more resolution, better color depth. BUT... after you've downconverted to Windows Media for the web (or Quicktime or H.264 or whatever), much of the difference is lost.

The one other thing we've found... the Panasonic "film gamma" setting (on both the DVX camera that is standard DV video and the HVX) makes for really amazing, film-looking video. We started using it about 8 months ago, and our members have commented on the improved quality of our videos. Also, our members seem to like the native 16x9 format, and we've switched all our videos, including those still shot in regular DV, to 16x9.

The footage looks sick. Your male talent/camera must be a big dude because those cameras weigh a fucking ton! Gotta watch dust though, you can see spots everywhere when you use those things in HD, check the smudge on clip 3.

Good stuff jay :)

not at all. your machine is choking on the bit rate :)