Grass Valley Viper

Adrian Hilton
Professor (BSc, DPhil, CEng, MIEE), University of Surrey, England
Favorite gear: Thomson Grass Valley Viper FilmStream Camera
List: $110,000 (including break-out box)
Why I love it: When we evaluated the Viper alongside
other HD cameras we considered for our research, we found it to be a
superior performer in both picture quality and flexibility of use. The
FilmStream 4:4:4 HD format, in particular, lets us capture video
without intermediate processing, which means we can manipulate the true
image directly in post.
"Our research uses multiple camera systems to capture a 3D
representation of a scene, from which the producer or viewer could
freely control a virtual camera. In essence, a very high-resolution
capture of the scene should allow us to create a video-realistic
synthesis of real objects, people and environments. The aim is,
eventually, to put the camera angle, lighting and even movements of the
actor into the hands of the viewer- whether that’s an end-user or a
creative involved in production and post. We also think our research
will help game developers and broadcast graphics artists create highly
realistic character models using direct 3D content production. The goal
is to achieve the same visual quality of conventional 2D HD/SD video.
Our previous work using standard-definition video, in collaboration
with BBC R&D, had been limited by camera resolution in critical
areas for reconstruction like the actor’s face. The Viper will give us
a much-improved reconstruction quality, which could be used directly in
broadcast for both studio production and outdoor events, such as sports.
We’ve been truly surprised at how big a difference HD makes in picture
quality for downstream processing, especially when compared to the
output from our previous standard-resolution system."
If you can’t live without a particular camera, software suite,
monitor or any other piece of gear, write and tell us why at:

studio@accessintel.com