Wonderdog Media, in Tacoma, WA, has recently added Panasonic’s AG-HPX170 solid-state P2 HD handheld camcorder to its complement of P2 HD acquisition tools. The facility, which specializes in corporate and commercial video, has deployed Panasonic’s AG-HVX200 as its mainstay camera since early 2006.
Wonderdog co-founder/producer/director of photography Scott Gribble is currently teaming the HPX170 and HVX200 P2 HD camcorders on a large-scale project to establish the Northwest Living and Wellness Network, a commercial-free service slated to screen in more than 150 markets throughout the Tacoma and Olympia areas by summer 2009. With a mandate to entertain, educate and inform viewers, the network focuses on “living the Pacific Northwest Lifestyle” and covers topics such as healthy families, homes and self.
Wonderdog deploys three reporters equipped with HPX170 and HVX200 camcorders on location shoots for Northwest Living and Wellness. The company shoots 30-minute episodes that are already screening on LCD displays in close to 40 venues ranging from doctors’ offices to automotive repair facilities. The content is played back from a CompactFlash media hardware player to the LCD displays.
Earlier this year, Wonderdog spearheaded a similar network, specializing in medical news, for more than 200 local physicians’ offices. Northwest Physicians Medical News, which premiered in October 2008, is in ongoing production with the HPX170 and HVX200 camcorders. Gribble is also using the HPX170/HVX200 combo to shoot a video for Habitat for Humanity, a disaster preparedness video for the city of Lakewood Fire Department, a recruitment video for the Mason County Fire Department and a safety video for a large automotive repair facility.
Gribble has 10 P2 cards of varying capacities, an AJ-PCS060G P2 Store Drive and a new Dell Precision M6400 mobile workstation equipped with an ExpressCard/54 slot, so he can check playback and manage cards while on the road.
Wonderdog has loaded Adobe Premiere Pro CS4 and Avid Media Composer onto the computer so Gribble can edit on the fly and build edit decision lists in the field. Using 32GB P2 cards, Gribble can shoot all day and begin editing. Some projects are edited from P2 cards in Avid using a P2 Store and encoded without “consolidating the media,” he said.
Gribble edits exclusively on Avid Media Composers with Mojo SDI and is currently evaluating Premiere Pro CS4’s speech-to-text function to support transcribing in the field.
