I've been trying to grasp consumer camcorder technology during the last month, but a clear grasp of one facet has eluded me: resolution, as it relates to progressive or interlaced signals.

1. One thing that confuses me is the number of points during the process that an element can be either progressive or interlaced. That is, to be clear:

A camcorder records footage in either a progressive or interlaced mode, outputs the footage in either a progressive or interlaced mode, and then the footage eventually plays in a television that has either a progressive or interlaced mode. Is this correct?

2.

A standard-definition camcorder could be said to be shooting in 480i. The framerate they are shooting at is 60i.

Some higher-end standard-definition consumer camcorders (say, the DVX-100) can shoot at framerates of 24p. Can these cameras then be said to be shooting at 480p?

Let's move to HD:

The HV30 (for example) can be said to be shooting at 1080i (by 1440, not 1920), at a framerate of 60i. If I put it in 30p or 24p mode, would we be shooting at 1080p?

If anyone can help me better understand, it would be much appreciated.

You might read these three pages which will explain a lot:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/480i
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/480p
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frame_rate

From the manual:
Briefly, it gets converted after recording and as it is recorded to tape.




Rich

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It can, assuming that a decoder can reconstruct 24p from 60i. At the lower level video is still 60i with 2-3 pulldown or 2-3-3-2 pulldown.
Same thing. 24p is internally 60i with 2-3 pulldown, 30p is 60i with 2-2 pulldown. It will become 1080p24 or 1080p30 if a decoder recognizes it as such and recovers progressive frames from interlaced carrier. If not, this is just 60i video.

Ok, so:

Step 1: Shooting-- can happen at either a progressive or interlaced framerate. "24p" takes 24 unique stills per second. 60i takes 60 unique fields per second.

Step 2: Recording (simultaneous with Step 1)-- to tape, hard-disk, whatever. Depending on the model, this step can happen in progressive or interlaced, regardless of the way in which it was shot. IE, with the HV30 example, it was shot at 24p, but is recorded at 60i using pulldown. On another camcorder, might it not be "true" progressive recording? IE, 24p@480p or 1080p?


Is this the case? Or is the case that, some 24p modes don't even capture 24 unique stills a second, they just blend the 60 fields in a certain way?

And is it possible for 24p to be recorded to tape? Or must it always be converted to 60i first (and then decoded later)?

Thanks again guys, really appreciate the help

Actually frame rate is not only related to resolution but it is an equally valid type of resolution which is called temporal resolution. The higher the framerate the higher the cameras temporal resolution which means a sharper picture if fast motion is encountered. Although still photographers ignore temporal resolution video on the otherhand is all about motion. According to ATSC specifications 60 frames per second is the highest temporal resolution that can be played back.

Yep, this is exactly what happens in case with Canon HV/30, HG10, HF10/100. Very similar to what happens to a 24fps movies when broadcast on TV.
This happens too. For example, Canon XH-A1 has interlaced CCDs and builds one progressive frame out of two fields. So the resulting frame has less resolution that if could have it a whole frame was captured once at a time. The HV20/30 and the XH-A1 are cameras from different classes, so in reality the A1 produces about the same resolution as the HV, and is better in all other regards.
Sure, the HX-A1 records 24p in its almost native form, but not exactly native. It records it as 48i, using fields, but with two fields comprising one frame. Very similar to how 30p is recorded in HV30 or 25p is recorded in European HV20/HV30. This scheme is called Progressive Segmented Frame I don't know of any affordable consumer camcorder that records in 24PsF, your best bet would be a European model with 25p mode that is recorded in 25PsF fashion.