Sony HDR-HC1 HDV Camcorder Review

Media (7.5)
In accordance with HDV camcorder standards, the HDR-HC1 records to MiniDV tapes. There are major benefits here: the tapes are cheap, they’re readily available, and they are compact. However, we’re scoring HDV down half a point for media over regular DV because of the importance of using high grade tapes with HDV. All tape formats suffer from a problem called dropouts, when a frame isn’t recorded because a scratch or other defect with the tape. With MiniDV and many other formats, dropouts are not a huge problem, because one lost frame when you’re working with 30 frames a second will not be noticed by the human eye.

The HDR-HC1 and all HDV formats use something called key frame compression. This means that every half second the camcorder takes a key frame, somewhat like a reference frame. The next 14 frames after that frame are based on how the video changes from that original frame. With DV, every single one of the 30 frames is a keyframe and holds all the information. Theoretically, this means that with HDV if you loose a frame because of a dropout, you’re going to loose a half second of video, it will just display as black.  However, the problem is not a serious as the theory suggests - not many have reported it or lost critical footage. The higher grade "made-for-HDV" tapes do reduce dropouts, when one occurs the camcorder's LCD and VF will freeze (blank out) for half a second but the FIREWIRE HDV output contains quite a bit of useful frames and often just 3 or 4 (out of the 15 GOP) are damaged. This is a small glitch compared to what people first feared would happen on a tape dropout. Another way around this is to capture the HDV output over FireWire or component directly to a laptop or external hard disk. DVRack is about to release their HDV upgrade and other manufactures of "Pyro Firestore" type portable HDDs that accept DV are being upgraded to work with HDV feeds.

However, if you use a higher grade tape it will significantly reduce the number of or possibility of a dropout. Sony has even made a special MiniDV tape that is specifically designed for HDV shooting. Of course, this tape doesn’t come cheap, it costs $13 per tape vs. about $6 per tape for standard MiniDV tapes. But if you are shooting something important it is really important that you use the high grade tape to minimize the chance of a dropout.

Editing (6.0)
Editing HDV video is almost there, but support for the format is still limited. Currently the following Non Linear Editing programs support HDV:

• Adobe Premiere
• Final Cut Pro HD
• Sony Vegas Video
• Ulead MediaStudio
• Avid Express Pro HD and Avid Express Studio HD
• Canopus EDIUS Pro 3


While that list includes almost all the important NLEs, there are still major problems with editing HDV, though I imagine in two or three years all of these will be solved. The first is that there really is no way to playback HD footage except through your HDV camcorder. There is no HD DVD standard yet (there is a classic consumer electronics format war going on between the two HD DVD camps, Blu-Ray and HD-DVD). This means that while you will be able to edit your HDV video, it will take either a computer or an HDV deck or camcorder to play it back as HD video. Neither of those are practical solutions for distribution of video. The second problem is that there is not a huge number of HDV compatible accessories which are affordable. There is only one HDV deck, the HDR-M10U, made by Sony, and it costs $3,700. HDV is a lot of high-resolution video data, and a powerful computer is needed with fast RAM technology and disk storage. In addition, there are no NLE accessories such as video mixers, titlers, color correction boxes, etc. which support HDV. Lastly, a good HD monitor which will be able to give you an accurate representation of the video shot is very expensive.