Andrew Reid

I've just had some information from a source that may be of interest to those awaiting Sony's NAB announcement. Read the full article here

In theory 4K over HDMI works and GH4 has it.   If this had 10bit 4K over HDMI as well then great.   If not and the internal Sony codec sucks then I will be sticking with GH4, full frame or no full frame :)

I think the rumoured 12MP is a genius decision by Sony. A real gap in the market for low light and lower resolution camera with amazing video.   Just tweeted this but bears repeating...   Nikon D3S is 12MP like rumoured A7S. Horizontal pixel count on that was 4256. Not gonna be a big crop to 4096 4K video on A7S

I must say, Sony should be commended for their approach to adapters. They even display them on cameras in some stores and sell Novoflex adapters in their Berlin flagship store at the Sony Centre.   Perhaps Metabones have found problems with Canon or Panasonic which have delayed it.   I am sure they are trying their upmost to get them done and shipped.

From my week long experience with shooting GH4, dynamic range is at least a match for the 5D Mark III raw.

I still think the 600mm will be sharper obviously, but putting the 600mm in front of a Canon video mode will lose you a lot of sharpness and full frame will lose you a lot of reach, so if you are shooting 1080p at 600mm on full frame, the sharpness and reach of such an expensive lens can get a little wasted.   4K will gain whatever you lose in terms of sharpness with the much cheaper 100-300mm OIS.

5D Mark III is in raw... that is the optimal setting :)

Well a $12k lens is going to be clear isn't it? If it wasn't I'd be very upset ;)   I think you should try the 100-300 in 1080p crop mode (or 4K mode and crop in post) and that 1680mm maximum reach whilst maintaining full HD should satisfy. Last time I used the 100-300mm I remember sharpness was pretty good.   If it doesn't, then fair enough. No amount of consumer gear is going to be good enough.   You might want to consider Sony A7R + the $12k Canon 600mm for stills though... 36MP would help.... and for video wait for the Smart EF adapter for Micro Four Thirds & shoot 4K with the Canon on the GH4.

Well the 5D Mark III here is raw. No compression.   There's zero macro blocking in raw due to no compression.   The GH4 gives you 8x smaller 4K files than the Blackmagic Production Camera, something has to give. It does have macro blocking in areas of the image where space is being saved such on plain skies, very dark shadows, etc.   It does have banding too but this is reduced when you go 4K > 1080p.   Banding isn't a problem with the GH4 like the GH3. It only really appears when you push the ISO to silly levels like here, or do a really extreme grade and you have a blue sky taking up almost all the frame. With a variable bitrate, the GH4 will allocate less bitrate to the sky frames, so the less detail in the shot, the more compressed it ends up being.   When the scene is well lit and detailed the codec does a great job, almost as good as a JPEG.   If the GH4 lacks a fine grain and that's what you want, you can do noise reduction but then add back the film texture afterwards with Film Convert.

Canon 600mm F4 IS is $12,000.   How can anybody complain about consumer stuff topping out at 300mm with a straight face.   With 4K you have extra cropping ability. A 1920x1080 box from the GH4's 16MP sensor gives you same detail as 5D Mark III but has something like a 5.6x multiplication factor on the focal length. So actually 300mm = 1680mm in crop mode on the GH4. Much longer reach than a 5D Mark III video mode with that $12k lens.

  +1

Nowhere am I saying it is in the same league as the Alexa or matching it on how far you can push the grade.   I know it isn't THAT good.   But it's great and Panasonic's consumer 4K codec is clearly a step forward for grading compared the usual DSLR codec.

300mm on a 2x crop sensor not long enough for you ajay?  :wacko:   The 100-300 has stabilisation... equivalent on full frame would be 200-600, go and price that up at Amazon :)

I may upload again with a slightly more evenly matched grade. But I love the Kodak look.

NAB 2014 thread... Fire away. Hopes, expectations, news anything goes!

  It's just the grade. Settings were correct, including ISO.

So just to confirm this is 1.5x sensor on the GH4 with Speed Booster, so you are looking at Super 35mm (the cinema standard) holding up to 5D Mark III full frame, at ISO 6400. Pretty amazing really.   A7S going to have to be a complete package to beat it, but it has a good chance of being even better at high ISOs thanks to the rumoured 12MP full frame sensor.

  Most likely. Suddenly I feel very interested in finding out how well XAVC on the AX100 holds up.   Only thing that could cripple the A7S is rolling shutter, but the 12MP count and "S" for Speed is a good sign that won't be a big problem.

  Time spent on this forum has robbed me of my patience man... Obsession? How about being more thankful for the info and less insulting.

  It's really important you download the original clip on this one :) Vimeo's compression hides all the noise.

12MP is a superb choice if true.

Grade original 4K MOV files from the pre-production Panasonic GH4 here - https://www.copy.com/browse/copy/GH4 Is the GH4 a match for full frame in low light? The answer, surprisingly, is yes... Read the full article here

Something to bear in mind...   I highly doubt the A7S will use the full frame sensor area to record 4K from. If they use their 36MP A7R and take a 4096 x 2160 box from it, you will have a smaller sensor than Super 35mm. If they use their 24MP A7 sensor it will still be a big crop.   Best case senario is if they use the 16MP sensor they supplied Nikon in the D4 and D4S, which already could window out areas of the sensor at 1:1 for video. Quadrants of the same 1920x1080p area Nikon uses on the D4S would be an option for the A7S but it still wouldn't give you a full frame field of view, it would be like the 1D C with a 1.3x crop.   GH4 is 1.5x crop with Speed Booster and you gain in optical sharpness and brightness.   So let's try to avoid the hyperbole stuff and get the facts right. This thing hasn't even been announced yet!   That said I am mega excited!

  Let's get a few things straightened out regarding Joe and dafranking's thoughts here, because they don't make sense at all to me.   1D C is different price bracket and an MJPEG codec. It isn't comparable to the GH4 on features and won't be comparable to the A7S on price most likely.   It is old technology now.   The GH4 is the most obvious candidate to compare upcoming 4K cameras to, it is the current benchmark. No other camera comes in at the same price point with this many features. The Blackmagic 4K has 8x larger file sizes which are impossible to archive over a years worth of shooting unless you are Donald Trump, yet it lacks even the most basic of features like histogram. Nice image under ISO 400 and I like the concept but sorry, it is not feature complete enough or ergonomic enough to compete with Sony or Panasonic, ditto the 1D C.

Dafranking - Can we up the quality of posts please.