Help from NX users, bummed about Output Options...

[Bassman]

Hello,

I am looking at an HD upgrade and am looking at going from my DV storm to the NX Express.

I am also looking at the Sony EX-1 for a camera choice.

The formats I would like to shoot in are 1080p 24/30 and 720p60.

My questions are about component output from the NX card to and external monitor.

It looks like 1080p is out of the question, but what has really shocked me is the lack of component output from the NX card using 720p60.

Has anybody tried to shoot and edit with this type of footage with the NX card?

Is there a way to change project settings and still get the right output while also being able to monitor on an external monitor?

This is going to be a deal-breaker for me to use Edius in HD if I can't shoot in 720p60.

I am bummed, shocked and hoping to find a way to make it work.

Thanks!

[gdame]

Hello,

I am looking at an HD upgrade and am looking at going from my DV storm to the NX Express.

I am also looking at the Sony EX-1 for a camera choice.

The formats I would like to shoot in are 1080p 24/30 and 720p60.

My questions are about component output from the NX card to and external monitor.

It looks like 1080p is out of the question, but what has really shocked me is the lack of component output from the NX card using 720p60.

Has anybody tried to shoot and edit with this type of footage with the NX card?

Is there a way to change project settings and still get the right output while also being able to monitor on an external monitor?

This is going to be a deal-breaker for me to use Edius in HD if I can't shoot in 720p60.

I am bummed, shocked and hoping to find a way to make it work.

Thanks!

OK, I feel your pain. I too am getting an EX-1 and wish that I could always veiw the native signal of my timeline and footage in its full resolution and rate.

But some of these hardware limitations are not so surprising when you really think about it. The NX board is really just a sort of ADVC adapter strapped onto an OHCI firewire port. Look in your device manager and you will see it listed there. The ADVC portion of the NX is seen as an AVC device, the same as if you connected a camera to you basic OHCI port.

The benifits to have an analog / digital video converter (hence ADVC) connected to the OHCI port is to allow a realtime streaming output to an external monitor. With DV this was easy, as it was a worldwide standard for over 10 years. But in the beginning even DV was difficult and expensive. Canopus pioneered new ground with the Rex and since Sony owned the DV codec back then, Canopus had an expensive DV to Analog chip (DVBK1) produced by Sony to provide that smooth real time output. Canopus also tweaked things slightly with the native DV stream coming in and converted it to their codec for efficiany & performance without sacrificing quality. The Rex was a DV/DVCam hardware product that eventually was replaced by the Storm 1. Then a year or two later by the Storm 2. Get this! Files captured by the Storm 1 or Rex were not compatiable with the Storm 2! That got a lot of people (my customers) up in arms.

Today we have codecs flying around that were not even conceaved when NX was engineered. The fact is that GV/Canopus has again produced and an amazing hardware product that allowed us to work in realtime with HDV. They then maintained the succesful model of providing an intermediary codec to boost efficiancy and performance without sacrificing quality.

For now users that have adopted cameras that utilize newer, advanced codecs will have to enjoy the NX board for what it was designed to do. At a price of $1,400.USD for the NX Express bundle which includes Edius Pro 4.5, NX for ADVC function and FireCoder all in one bundle is an incredible value. Any other products that have been out and support full 1080p output are at many times the price of NX. My Velocity boards and software alone where $18,000. Yeah, it does 1080p but only has SDI in/out! So I still need yet another digital to digital/analog adapter.

To me, being able to view a 30p format in a scheme such as "30p over 59.94" is again a reason to praise GV/Canopus' forsight into blending software and hardware conversion technologies so well together and allowing a product a long life cycle. BTW, My two year old VelocityHD was discontinued a year ago. Only one year after I bought it along with a bunch of my customers. I have a $6,500. DSR-1500 sdi deck connected to it so that I can get a 1394 DV signal from it!

Hang tight and see what NAB brings. I am sure that GV/Canopus are not sitting still. Products like BlackMagic Design's Intensity Pro and MultiBridge Pro/Eclipse are paving the way for what I hope is the next generation of products from Grass Valley.

In the meantime, enjoy your EX-1 and your NX for what it CAN do.

[Bassman]

Thanks for your reply George,

Please let me follow up on some things.

I have not purchased and EX-1 yet, and I have an NX board purchased, but not shipped yet.

When I learned about the component output capabililties, I thought, did I make a mistake buying this board for use with the EX-1?

I made a mistake reading the product page and never really zero'd in on the fact this board does not list 720p60 as an output option. I just assumed it was there.

I really want to shoot in 720p60.

I talked to support last night and could not get a definitive answer about how to monitor 720p60 footage.


Is there a way to work with 720p60 footage with the NX and monitor your work as well as keep the integrity of the original framerate when you get to the encoding phase?


This is really the deciding factor for me to keep the NX or sell it.

Thanks

[GrassValley_KH]

EDIUS NX has a 1280x720/59.94p output preset.

This was added in v4.5 for the JVC format in mind, but can also be used in this example.

You will find it under NHX-E1 output for 60Hz.

[Bassman]

Thaks for your post Kenneally.

So the NX can output 720 60p!

This is not listed on the "video outputs" section of the NX web page.

Maybe the page has not been updated to reflect the 4.5 release.

This is good news.

[GrassValley_KH]

Thaks for your post Kenneally.

So the NX can output 720 60p!

This is not listed on the "video outputs" section of the NX web page.

Maybe the page has not been updated to reflect the 4.5 release.

This is good news.

Under Outputs, it lists:

HDV - 1080/59.94i, 1080/50i, 1080/30p, 1080/25p, 1080/24p, 720/60p, 720/50p, 720/30p, 720/25p, 720/24p, 720x480/60p, 720x576/25p, 720x576/50p

The collective lists of outputs share the same BNC terminals in the end, aside from actual format encoding.

[Bassman]

So please clarify for me.

The HDV outputs listed on the NX webpage refer to the component outputs?

So this means that the NX will send a 1080p30 signal out to an external monitor?

But only at 1440x1080 resolution.

So if some footage from the EX-1 needed to be edited, one could use the 1440x1080 30p setting, edit with component preview, then change the settings to 1920x1080 for encoding.

This would retain the integrity of the original footage (1920x1080) right?

If this is true, then I have no reason to be bummed and I was mis-informed about the capabilities of this card.

Please clarify this with an over simplified, thorough response so I can know this for sure.

Thanks

[GrassValley_KH]

Yes, you can do this, as was explained a couple of times in the other thread.