The purchase coincides with upgrades to Dolphin Stadium in
Miami, which recently installed one of the largest high definition video boards
in pro sports, along with some of the longest ribbon boards in the world.
Jeff Griffith is director of programming and production, and says, "Whether
it's a community event or a new commercial, wherever the players are, we bring
the Varicam and HVX200 right along to capture the footage. We're asked to do
all kinds of video work, so we needed cameras that are just as versatile."
Griffith's video team shoots in the 720p format accepted by their super-sized
stadium video boards, but can also take advantage of the camera's ability to
shoot 1080i too. The HVX200 was added, he says, because of its ability to shoot
high-quality HD content as well as for the operating convenience of the P2
solid-state memory it can record to. "Using P2," he says, "if I don't want a
clip I can delete it. We can shoot off our hard drive and the footage is
already designated by clips."
Panasonic's AJ-HDC27 VariCam replicates many of the key features of film-based
image acquisition, including 24-frame progressive scan images, time-lapse
recording, and a wide range of variable frame rates (4-fps to 60-fps in
single-frame increments) for "overcranked" and "undercranked" off-speed
in-camera effects.
The Dolphins crew edits the DVCPRO HD footage on Avid nonlinear editors.