Short DOF on a DV camera?

Just a quick question, semi-related to photography: Is there a DV

camera that has a short depth of field view? As far as I know you need

a large sensor for that. How large are DV-camera sensors? 20D-like or

compact-like?

if you mean a video camera, the range is from 2/3 to 1/4

Sensors are very small.

 

Canon's Obtura Xi has a 1/3.4" sensor (smaller than just about any digicam, roughly a 10x cropping factor compared to 35mm), and their top-of-the-line XL2 has 1/3" sensors (roughly a 6x cropping factor compared to 35mm) (yes, the numbers don't seem consistent, that's because they don't use all the pixels in the sensors when shooting video).

 

Let's assume 0.003mm CoC for the Xi, 0.005mm for the XL2.

 

Looking at long portrait distances (angle of view about 140mm in 35mm equiv, 6 ft away), let's assume that the Optura Xi is still f/1.6 at such a focal length - you'll have about 7 inches of DoF with the Optura Xi. Mounting a 24/1.4L on the XL2 (using the EF adapter), you'll have about 3 inches in the same conditions.

 

In 35mm equivalents, those approximately match the depth-of-field you'd get with 35mm film at f/8 (for the XL2) or f/16 (for the Optura Xi).

You want a DV camera with at least one or three 1/3" CCDs. However, if you zoom in from 8 to 10X on a subject, the background is usually out of focus. Some of the 1 CCD Sonys have a 1" CCD. The new Optura 50 and 60 seem like nice cams with OIS but I'm not sure about the CCD size. Trouble with the Xi is that it's not so great indoors (in lower light). I've kept my 2 old JVC DVL9500u for indoor shooting.

For sunny days you may want to use a ND4 to try and force the iris open when zooming in as I described above.