Don Greening's blog

A week ago last Sunday we did a 3 camera shoot for a wedding and I must say that the combination of the EX1, Macbook Pro and our little G-RAID Mini made the SxS Pro memory card transfers a total breeze and dirt simple. My wife was the card wrangler and was creating quite the stir over at the venders' table in the back of the room when she dragged out the Macbook Pro and started transferring the files over. She caught the interest of the photographers, DJ, restaurant staff, wedding planner and even the bride's parents as she previewed some of the EX clips using the Sony Clip Browser software after each card transfer. "Amazing new technology" was the most frequent comment. I wish I was shooting with 3 EX cameras instead of 1 EX plus 2 MiniDV tape based cameras. Oh well......

 - Don 

Yesterday we decided to do a low light comparison test between our Sony DSR-PD170 and our EX1. Unless you've been living alone on an island for the last few years you already know that the PD170 is the current low light king in the MiniDV class of video cameras. Heck, it's even the low light champ in ANY class of handheld-style camcorder. There are a lot of folks out there asking the same question I've had ever since Sony originally announced the PMW-EX1: is this an HD replacement for the PD170?

Today I connected the EX1 to my Mac Pro in preparation to transfer the video clips over to Final Cut Pro. I had already installed the Sony Clip Browser and Sony XDCAM Transfer Tool v.2.1 onto my Mac several days ago so now it was just a matter of getting started. 

Today my wife and I walked out onto the Port Coquitlam river dykes to do some scenery shooting with our new EX1. We didn't spend a lot of time there because it was cold and I was a real wimp today. We ended up taking about 10 min. of footage. I didn't try any other picture settings other than taking the camera out of the box and changing the recording setup to 1080P 30fps. I used the highest quality setting of 35 mbps.

For the first time in 31 years the Canadian dollar today rose to become par with its American counterpart. What does this mean for professional content creators in Canada? It means that for the first time in recent memory the price of a bottle of Lindeboom beer now costs the same in Vancouver BC as it does in California. News like this is important.