By Staff, February 18, 2005
Grace & Wild, Inc.,
the largest full service creative technical resource
in the Midwest, has made a recent purchase of eight
Panasonic AJ-HD3700B D-5 HD mastering VTRs to be used
for various high-definition production and
post-production tasks by two of its operating
divisions, Postique and hdstudios.
Postique (Southfield, MI) is a premiere video post-
production boutique servicing national and regional
advertising accounts, and specializing in visual
effects, editing and telecine for broadcast
commercials, music videos and interactive media.
hdstudios (Farmington Hills, MI) is the largest single
source provider of production, post-production and
media delivery services in the Midwest. Leading the
country in high-definition services, hdstudios offers
a complete high-definition television center; and is
able to shoot, transfer and edit and deliver
programming in HD or standard resolution. Projects
comprise commercial spots, long-format entertainment,
live events and business communications.
The company has taken delivery of four AJ-HD3700Bs
(two each at Postique and hdstudios), and will install
the remainder between the two facilities throughout
the year.
According to Jeff Fleck, Postique's senior editor/HD
specialist, since initiating assignments with the
AJ-HD3700B, the VTR is proving equally versatile with
film-based and tape-based material.
"D-5 HD is the highest-quality HD recorder around, and
whenever clients are interested in originating film
transfers and/or HD mastering, we advise them to
choose the format," Fleck said. "Its compression is
much less that HDCAM, so consequently the quality is
higher. As the HD3700B provides eight channels of
audio, a nice benefit is that your can encode Dolby
surround when transferring to film without any further
D/A, A/D conversions."
He continued, "The Panasonic VTR is operating
seamlessly with our film transfer (the Spirit) and
on-line (Quantel's EQ) systems and is compatible with
standard-definition tapes, a critical consideration as
Grace & Wild has been working with Panasonic D-5
equipment for years."
Fleck said that over the past few months, the
AJ-HD3700Bs have been used on several national
advertising campaigns for Doner Company (Southfield,
MI) clients, including Minute Maid (the Simply Orange
brand) and Circuit City
.
"Regardless of whether their work originates in film
or HD, we?re encouraging clients to move to HD post
vs. SD," Fleck said. "Not only is the quality better,
but they will also have an HD master available for any
subsequent release -- and they?ll be familiar with the
process."
Paul DeMars, General Manager, hdstudios, post
production, echoed many of Fleck's sentiments.
"Working in D-5 HD affords less compression and fewer
artifacts," he said. "Most of our commercial work is
currently being done in D-5, so it makes for a nice
transition that we can use the HD3700B to record both
formats (D-5 and D-5 HD)."
DeMars noted that hdstudios' production arm is already
utilizing the D-5 HD VTR for HD recording in its
on-site studios. "HD is poised to hit hard, we?ll be
ready with the HD3700Bs," he added.
The AJ-HD3700 Series D-5 HD recorders are designed for
challenging program mastering, high definition
telecine, television commercial, and multi-format DTV
and HDTV program production tasks. Panasonic's D-5 HD
recorders have established an unprecedented reputation
for image quality and have been selected as the HDTV
delivery format by major U.S. broadcast and cable
networks.
The AJ-HD3700B is a true universal international
mastering recorder that can record, edit and playback
both 625 PAL and 525 NTSC D-5 cassettes as well as D-5
tapes from all previous versions of this
widely-adopted production machine. The AJ-HD3700B can
record, edit and play back in 720p/59.94p, 1080/23.98p
and 1080/24p HD formats. Its progressive image
recording of 24-fps film sources without frame-rate
conversion enhances artistic image expression and
allows high-quality digital mastering of film content,
such as movies and commercials, into formats suitable
for broadcasting and DVD packaging.
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