Please
watch here for Fall Surprise....
OK,
It's NOW 6th of September and the
Fall
Release is Here...
Sony will begin selling its first
high-definition video camcorder this year, the company says.
The new camcorder will go on sale in
Japan on October 15, and worldwide around CES in Las Vegas,
January 2005, Sony says. While the camcorder is compatible
with Japan's HDV high-definition digital video format, users
cannot store video on Sony's
Blu-ray Disc format. At least not at first.
The HDR-FX1 camcorder is Sony's first
step in
promoting high definition video as the standard format for
home-use camcorders, but its price makes it too expensive for
most families initially, the company says.
The price will be over 5 grand to put it
into use when the camcorder goes on sale in the U.S. says
Masashi Imamura, senior general manager of Sony's IT & Mobile
Solutions Network Company. The release day for the U.S. market
in LATE November has not been decided, but the camcorder will be
on sale internationally by January 1 2005, he says.
Making Movies
The HDR-FX1 has three recording modes:
HDV (high-definition video) mode, which has 1080 horizontal
interlaced lines with 1440 vertical lines resolution at
widescreen 16:9 aspect ratio; a DV mode, which also features a
16:9 aspect ratio, and has 480 horizontal interlaced lines and
720 vertical interlaced lines; and a DV mode with 4:3 aspect
ratio has 480 horizontal interlaced lines and 720 vertical
interlaced lines.
Each mode shoots at 60 frames per second
with video data rates after compression running at 25 megabits
per second, Imamura says. The camcorder records video in MPEG2
(Motion Pictures Expert Group) and audio in MPEG1 AUDIO Layer II
in HDV mode and uses miniDV cassettes that provide 60 minutes of
recording time, the company says.
The camcorder has a 0.33 inch, 1.12
megapixel CCD (charge coupled device) that has 1.07 megapixels
of effective resolution, a Karl Zeiss lens, and a 12x optical
zoom. The color monitor is a 250,880 pixel, 3.5-inch liquid
crystal display screen. The camcorder weighs 4.4 pounds without
batteries.
Three batteries are available; a 4.6
POUND battery provides 65 minutes of recording time on both HDV
mode and DV mode; a 5.9 Pound version provides 130 minutes of
recording time on HDV mode, and 240 minutes of recording time on
DV mode. The 7.1 pound NP-F970 provides a maximum of 205 minutes
of recording on HDV mode and 215 minutes of recording time on DV
mode. The batteries are sold Separately, However.
The camcorder has the best resolution and
features that Sony can make at the moment, but the HDR-FX1 is
still a work in progress, Sony says. Improvements will be
incremental over the next ten years of the formats projected
life.
Setting the Standard
Canon, Sharp, Victor Company of Japan
(JVC & Panasonic), and Sony agreed on HDV as a standard for
Japan in September 2003. HDV has many features common to DV,
allowing companies to use some of the same mechanical components
in production today.
Backward compatibility is an essential
element to promoting HDV, as people realize they can still use
their miniDVs, says Shoji Nemoto, president of Sony's Solutions
Network Company.
The camcorder's price means that Sony
does not expect to sell beyond semiprofessional and high-end
consumers, and the company will only be initially producing a
few thousand units a month, says Kiyoshi Shikano, corporate vice
president of Sony Marketing Japan. We will increase
production depending on demand and popularity.
The rollout of high-definition television
broadcasting internationally is encouraging TV replacement, Sony
executives say. The U.S. has already begun HDTV broadcasting and
the U.S. Federal Communications Commission requires all TVs to
be equipped with a digital TV tuner by 2007. Japanese public
broadcaster NHK began digital broadcasting in December 2003 and
will achieve national coverage in 2005. Australia and Korea have
already started test broadcasting. This rollout will stimulate
consumer demand for HDV products, Shikano says.
Camcorder prices will drop over the next
three years as the other HDV backers release models, Imamura
says. JVC released its first HDV compatible model in July 2003.
Many others from HDV backers and other companies will follow,
perhaps some in time for the year-end shopping season, he says.
Panasonic Japan will introduce this new
format in their Flagship line which currently in Japan is the
NV-GS400 and
will in all likely hood redesignate this HDV format with a new
model number. First word is that the Pana HDV will
try and beat the weight penalty and bulky size of Sony & JVC with a mini HDV
version and will be closer in dimensions & weight with the current
MAMBA2 camcorder.
Further, it has been reported that Pana & Sharp's HDV cams will
be less than Canon, Sony & JVC.
OFFICIAL RELEASE ....
HERE
P.S. It Was Appreciated That Sony Thought Of Giving Us The BLACK
version of this new FX1 cam...
We Will Do A Comparison Of The FX1 Cam with JVC HD1, Pana DVX100A and
even the Mamba2...
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