Nikon D90 HD Video Samples
I’ve only barely had time to play with the D90 video mode – let alone even get familiar with all the controls and options but here’s a couple videos taken with in HD mode (720p, 24fps, 1280×720) – nothing remotely fantastic, just what I’ve had time to do so far:
A tripod would have been useful:
D90 test: Seabus Arriving from John Biehler on Vimeo.
Peter shooting me in black & white with the 50mm lens…while I’m eating dinner:
Watch it in HD on Vimeo.
D90 HD Video: Lonsdale Quay from John Biehler on Vimeo.
I’m still playing with the different video upload providers…if you have any favorites, that support HD, drop them in the comments. The Vimeo uploads look a bit washed out upon conversion for the web….the Flickr upload looks great (and was alot faster to upload compared to Vimeo) but isn’t in HD.
I’ll reserve judgement on the video mode until I’ve had more time with the camera and with better conditions to shoot under…but so far, this is pretty damn cool…but lots to learn/figure out still.
Wow. That stuff looks great, especially the 50mm lens shallow depth of field hotness.
But to be honest, as more a video guy than a photography guy, I’m going to wait this out until a card-based video solution comes out using these lenses (or a micro four thirds solution which Panasonic is rumoured to have in the works.) It looks to me like video and photography are going to come together into something a lot closer to one another…but it’ll take some time for that to happen.
The colours are very vibrant in the video. Nikon quality is so great. I look forward to your photos and video in the near future.
For a first-gen video SLR, that’s pretty remarkable. The water in the Lonsdale movies looks particularly awesome.
The Canon 5D Mark II obviously has a few legs up (stereo sound with inputs, full 1080p HD, MPEG-4 instead of Motion JPEG, autofocus during video recording), but it’s also three times the price. This is certainly very nice as a bonus to a fine $1000 still DSLR.
The HD palmcorder I have here is looking a bit weak now, especially with its weirdo AVCHD codec.
@Warren: I agree….for me right now, it’s just a fun thing I can make my DSLR do….it’s most likely too limited to use for anything serious….but hey, people use shitty cameraphones to shoot video too.
@Carol: thanks! I look forward to shooting a ton with it.
@Derek: the price point and fun factor are what sold me. Most of the features of the D300, with HD video at a lower cost. I have a mini-dv camera that I’ve rarely used and it’s in a drawer….unlike my DSLR. But like I said above, it’s still pretty much a novelty….the mic is way too close to the lens so if you have a noisy (clicky) zoom or focus ring, it’ll be picked up.
@Derek the dealbreaker for a lot of people with the 5D is that it only shoots in 30p, not 24p. here’s been quite a hulabaloo about that, and there’s rumours Canon may rectify the situation in firmware at some point.
@John: yep, it’s great to play around with. Honestly, it’s not the tools, it’s what you do with them…and if you’re making compelling content on a Flip, people will watch it. Hell, “Fred”, which is shot with at best a crappy video camera and likely edited in Movie Maker, gets millions of views on Youtube, and I couldn’t explain why..but it does.
Can you plug in an external mic? I can’t say I’d ever use the default…
No apparent external mic input although that could possibly come via the USB, A/V or GPS connections via a firmware update.
Using an external audio source and software to sync them isn’t too difficult though.
I can’t believe nobody has hijacked your comments, so here is my equivalent to a Facebook wall happy birthday.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOHN!