Appendix 1

HD D-5, HD Cam, HD Cam SR
Appendix 3: Current Video Formats
HD D-5 is a very high-quality HD video format. It records at true 1,920 × 1,080 image in a moderately
compressed 10-bit format. It uses a standard D-5 transport and can play SD D-5.
HD Cam and HD Cam SR are Sony’s HD video formats, and are the most common HD formats.
They record an 8-bit digital image at a variety of frame rates in either progressive or interlaced
format. Because HD Cam is somewhat compressed, the colors are not as true as HD D-5 or HD
Cam SR.
2 K, 4 K, 5 K
These are not really video formats, but rather tapeless, digital movie formats. The number refers to
the number of horizontal pixels, approximately 2,000, 4,000, or 5,000. The codices used are Cineon
and Digital Moving Picture exchange (DPX). These formats are normally created by scanning fi lm
and recording the resulting digital frames onto a computer drive or array of drives. While it is possible
to record from a digital camera directly to 2 K and 4 K, this has been highly experimental and not
in common practice until 2007 with the release of the new Red One camera that shoots to drive in
4 K DPX. These formats have been only used as intermediate steps in the production workfl ow. Very
slow fi lm scanners are used to scan fi lm into 4 K and 5 K. 2 K can also be scanned, or a device
called a datacine can “scan” the fi lm in real time. These fi les can be shot back onto fi lm for printing
or they can be transcoded into HD. Film to HD transfers are sometimes made in this way. The fi lm
is scanned to 2 K, color corrected while in the 2 K format, and then transcoded to HD Cam, HD
Cam SR, or HD D-5 and recorded to tape, all in real time. 4 K and 5 K are used exclusively for fi lm
intermediates and are generally shot back to fi lm; however, they, too, can be transcoded to HD.
The Cutting Edge
Predicting the future is a risky business at best. In an area that is evolving as quickly as video and
digital formats, it becomes impossible to even imagine how fi lm will be shot and edited in ten years.
What new digital formats will arrive? Which will survive? How will that affect fi lmmakers and the
fi lm industry?
There are new fi lm scanning systems being developed that might soon make it possible to shoot fi lm,
develop, and “print” the good takes to digital and never go back to the negative, a system called
“virtual negative.” And, a new generation of digital cameras is able to shoot directly to this same
“virtual negative.” Some scenes could be shot digitally, others on fi lm, and everything delivered to
postproduction in the same format and edited together. And none of this is science fi ction; it’s six
months from now, or next month, or now.
There are 2 K and 4 K projectors that can project this “virtual fi lm” and remove “video” from the
digital motion picture image. And could 6 K be far behind?
There are several new cameras that represent a quantum leap ahead. Only with the new drive recorders
and tapeless workfl ow have these cameras really been ably to show what they can do.
The Panavision Genesis 262, shown in Figure A3.7, is a giant step up from their version of the Sony
HDWF 900 Cine Alta. The Genesis is a custom made camera that uses a single 1,920 × 1,080 CCD
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