Grass Valley Put CMOS Into Their Infinity Camera

Last year Grass Valley hinted that they were looking to use CMOS chips only when they thought the quality was good enough for their cameras.

Well December 5 last year was the date that they decided that they were. The Xensium CMOS sensor is to be put in to their new Infinity Broadcast camera for shipping sometime this summer after field trials.

The sensor is their own design and offers 2.4 million pixels and control which will allow pixels to be read in any order meaning you can capture in interlace or progressive. The sensor also has a 12-bit A/D on the chip which GV say will lower noise even more.

Spec is 2/3in 1920x1080 and they claim will record 1080/30p at the top end. There were no decisions as to what other cameras will get the CMOS sensor but it seems likely that this development is open ended.

The Infinity itself is as IT as you can get and even has a GB Ethernet port out of the side. At the moment it will take compact flash and REVPro 32. The REVPro 70 is hoped to be supported sometime this year.

The 'media' camera records to JPEG 2000 as present but the concept is to carry different codecs to suit what you are shooting. JPEG2k as its known is an unknown as far as how it will work in post and the workflows are being designed as we speak.

Since the introduction the model has undergone improvements in cooling and now has Bluetooth connectivity to up to five remotes for Metadata checking and writing.

Prices will be around £17k for the body and on the shoulder should be under £30 depending on lens. REVPro disks are around £60.

Podcast Infinity camera demo

Grass Valleys CMOS Explanation, Jan 2006 HD Magazine (use password definition)