TJB

Thanks for posting the interview Andrew....well done.

Whatever you do, don't ask him how he liked Michael Reichmann's review of the Panasonic L1 over at
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/Panasonic-L1.shtml
He said the L1 has "a viewfinder that verges on the unusable."

Moire and aliasing are top concerns with the GH3. I'm hoping it's not as bad as the Nikon D800 and the latest Sony offerings. Yoshiyuki Inoue probably thinks moire and aliasing are things we should live with considering it's a consumer camera. If that's true, then it may have been a case of dumb luck with the GH2.
No XLR. For me that would have been a slam dunk....shame.

"What shall I do with my GH2?"

If you've read the above and seen how good Mick Jones' BTS video looked up against "Genesis"

then......hold onto it!

Moire, aliasing, no XLR accessory, no focus peaking and viewing problems with EVF. Firmware can only fix so much.
Is it possible to adjust audio levels whilst recording?
Is noise and banding reduced in ETC mode?
Panasonic have admitted that the popularity of the GH2 surprised them. Maybe the GH2 was just a wonderful fluke of design?
Did the GH2 design team work on the GH3?

Haven't seen any pictures of the rumoured XLR accessory. Hope that materialises.
Hope they've fixed the awful noise in ETC mode at 160 ISO when underexposing.

[quote name='Axel' timestamp='1347903241' post='18376']
Before FW1.1 came out, the boss of the development department at Pana asked users to send their wishes. Mine was. among others, peaking. They answered, yes, we could color the sharpened outliness (looks like aliasing sometimes on moire-typical structures). But they didn't. However, if you know it's there, you see it the moment your motif turns sharp. Very useful.
[/quote]
This needs more explanation. Now that I know it's there I still can't see it.

[quote name='PatrickV' timestamp='1347008128' post='17505']
Thanks for your advice guys. The Tiffen is a bit too expensive for me.

Is this combination also an option for me?

Light Craft Fader ND Filter Mark II 62 mm
Visico Filter-Adapter 58mm - 62mm
[/quote]
I've never used the Light Craft Fader ND but I've heard good things about it. I use a Genus and it's good but if you pixel peep it does soften the shot a bit. Best variable nd filter for the price? Who really knows. You really do get what you pay for with filters.
http://philipbloom.net/2011/06/04/the-best-variable-nd-filter-i-have-used/

The visico filter adapter should be fine. Step up and down filter adapters are pretty simple and inexpensive items so I wouldn't worry.

One thing you might want to consider when purchasing is getting hold of a set of filter wrenches because sometimes it's almost impossible to remove the adapter to then use the vari nd on another lens. I know it sounds odd but grease from your face (side of your nose) - applied to the threads of the filters and adapter help them not to stick. Simply swipe your finger across the side of your nose and run it around the threads of the filter. Strange but true.
http://the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Lens-Filter-Wrench-Review.aspx

For many many reasons - my advice would be to avoid a DSLR as the main event camera. Stick with the tried and tested video cameras for the important stuff and use your 60D for the pretty bride getting ready shots and the reception B roll. You can lock the XF100 off on sticks shooting speeches and wonder around with the 60D getting the pick up shots.

I've heard horror stories from event videographers who sold up their EX-1's and bought into DSLR's.

I use Tiffen 0.6ND and 0.9ND filters. They're good quality at a reasonable price. I also use a variable ND filter. The better vari nd filters like Heliopan are very expensive. Cheaper ones are still expensive and may soften the image and may cause the 12mm to vingnette. Also most vari nd's won't let you fit a lens hood.
I find the tiffen 0.9ND to be great for outdoors on a bright but cloudy day. You'll need more nd for bright sunny days. I try and avoid step up -down filter adapters. I always loose them - instead I have a 52mm 0.9 ND for my 14-42mm and a 46mm 0.9 ND for my 20mm f1.7.

If you check amazon for the filters, they show you the step up- down adapters as accessories.

[b]"Has anyone ditched their DSLR for MFT?[/b]

I own an use the GH2, 5DMKII and sometimes a 60D daily. Basically I find that the Canon is an unbeatable camera for shooting video and stills of people and rural landscapes especially with the 24-105mm f4 IS lens or the 17-55mm f2.8 IS lens. The latter has a poor manual focus ring for video but otherwise an "L" class lens. The former is my favourite IS lens of all time for video. Fairly quiet and so steady. At 105mm it's very usable and manual zoom and focus are silky smooth.
To my eye the colours on the Canon are so much more pleasing. With the right picture profile, skin tones are very natural.
The GH2 is an extremely versitile camera. I've shot 50i and 25p broadcast documentary jobs on it. (Admittedly it was downscaled to SD for transmission.) The producers loved the footage.
The GH2 is also my home video camera because of it's size, weight and ability to shoot very clean video and sharp stills. I have a better keeper rate with face recognition on the GH2 than auto focus on my Canon cameras.
Many say that the Canon cameras shoot better stills. But I say - how good do you really need your stills to be?
You've probably already read-
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/panasonic_gh2_revisited.shtml

The only thing I don't like about the GH2 is that I sometimes get very noisy images when underexposing using the Extra Tele convert feature and I don't like the silkypix software.

I carry the GH2 everywhere I go because the Canon cameras are so much heavier, larger and conspicuous that the Panasonic.

So have I ditched my DSLR for the GH2? The answer is almost. I shoot the Canon for the full frame look. I can't get "that" look with the MFT sensor size. f4 on my 5D is f2 on my GH2. The DOF is the same but the look isn't. Go figure. Someone more famous than me once said, that full frame makes you want to lick the screen. I think it's true but not so for the GH2.

This looks like a fantastic camera. Congratulations to Grant Petty and his team. The reasoning behind the design makes sense and I hope this camera sells like hot cakes.

"What we didn’t want to do is a large sensor that drains power. Sensor size wasn’t the priority, the image was.”

For all of us who prefer more latitude with shallow depth of field - please Mr. Petty, can you one day design and produce a camera with a larger sensor?

I really go along with Vincent Laforet's analysis of this fantastic camera.
http://blog.vincentlaforet.com/

[quote name='EOSHD' timestamp='1346542509' post='17126']
There are certain lenses that look better on S35 and some that look better on a 2x crop sensor.

Nice to have a choice, I'd certainly prefer to use a 18mm T1.6 on S35 rather than Blackmagic. But then I'd rather use an 85mm F1.4 on the Blackmagic or GH2 as a super fast telephoto than on full frame where it is a standard boring portrait lens with uncontrollable DOF :)

All the comparisons to full frame and claims of 'small chip' are bunk.

S35 is large, Blackmagic is medium, consumer camcorder is small.
[/quote]

Hands up anyone who hypothetically would choose an s35mm sensor over a 2/3 inch sensor camaera if BMD offered them at the same price? IMHO, a sensor that suits the lens mount would have been more sensible even if more expensive.

On the topic of this blog. Of course raw is a fantastic option. Can't imagine anyone arguing that the option of raw and prores isn't a fantastic concept.

I really hope Blackmagic Design find success with this camera because if they do then maybe they'll produce a s35mm or full frame version. That's when I'll sit up.

This is a fascinating topic - one that could and does fill volumes. I will never stop learning about light.

I agree with KarimNassar. Controlling natural light for portrait/ interview/ dialogue setups with simple cut and fill methods is crucial for outstanding results. Background choice and talent placement are equally important.

Thanks Andrew, good read.

I've been using my GH2 for several months with and without various hacks and it's just now that my camera has started to produce bad horizontal flashing/banding. It wasn't there before. It's so bad that I would have noticed it right away because now the problem renders the shot unusable. The noisy banding shows up on my camera not in dark shaded areas of the shot but somewhere half way between 0.3 and 0.5 volts on a waveform monitor.
This problem occurs usually when I'm using ETC mode even at low ISO. It's more noticeable when one underexposes. Some say, well just don't underexpose - but for a camera prone to ugly blotchy blown highlights, underexposing a landscape to capture more detail in highlights is sometimes necessary.
This is a real deal breaker for me. ETC was such a unique and powerful feature but now rendered unusable.

There isn't much in it....not for the price difference and no headphone jack.

I'm not keen to see a GH3 smaller than the GH2. The size and weight are just fine. For many reasons there seems to be a never ending trend to miniturize, however my hands are staying the same size.
If they leave out EX Tele Conv then I won't even consider it. I find it one of the most unique and powerful tools that a small sensor camera offers.
Highlight clipping is a big deal for me. Time to fix that.
Most likely to see-
Improved LCD - but not essential.
Improved Viewfinder - although it's already pretty good.
25p - they learned that lesson already.
Better low light ability in both video and stills.
Better build quality.
Most likely we won't see-
Anything but the AVCHD codec

I didn't buy an FS100. I haven't bought a Canon 5DMK3 and I won't buy a Blackmagic Cinema Camera.
$4,500
$3,500
$3,000
=$11,000

NOW.....soon I can buy a Canon C300!

Providing the Canon 650D camera system with auto focus during video is aimed at soccer Moms. I think that's Canon's market. Serious videographers who pull focus manually on their own or paid shoots know what I mean. So "fixing" auto focus (which for serious shooters wasn't an issue) and then NOT addressing alaising and moire, well you know that Canon are only happy to take care of people who don't have a clue but pay the money. So on many points I can see where Andrew is grumpy, but then again, I don't find myself focussing on Canon marketing strategy.....I'd rather just go out and shoot something with an appropriate (budget) camera for the project at hand. Many of us should be simply thankful that the GH2 and the fullframe DSLR's together fill this roll fairly well. Maybe we should just get over it and agree that the perfect budget video camera for all film makers will never exist. Ripping the guts out of an expensive camera to make it look a little more like a GH2 was pretty entertaining though!

For the most part I agree with Andrew. The only difference is that I don't find myself an either or type. I choose my cameras for their strenghts both full frame or APS-C and choose the GH2 for landscapes and only when it's overcast to avoid horrible highlight clipping.
Australian Broadcasting just aired a documentary on the London Olympics. "U.K. London Swings"
I found a couple of Andrew's tripod marks around Westminster bridge.
abc.net.au/foreign
http://vimeo.com/43783066
I shot most of the colour footage and reverse two shots on a GH2. The rest I shot with a P2 broadcast camera. The program makers were very pleased with the GH2 footage and I found the GH2 perfect for this particular shoot.

Wow....many thanks "Yellow" for "The Basics." If you asked for a show of hands of who didn't quite follow along.....that would be me. I get the gist though so thanks!

This is a great heads up to those of us who were wondering like Andrew, why we didn't seem to be getting what we thought we shot.

Thanks Andrew, This is why I visit your site. Great blog.

Some observations not yet noted: When looking at footage converted to ProRes422 with Clipwrap and the same footage converted to ProRes422 with 5DtoRGB I find that the 5DtoRGB file size to be slightly smaller but the image size slightly larger. In other words, Clipwrap crops the shot slightly.

What's that about?

 

Okay, something that looks like a polaroid camera that shoots raw. Hmmm. I'm not a resolution nut although I'm liking the GH2 over the 5DMK2.....but with such a severe crop....sorry NEXT.

I think Andrew is right - the CD1 is a B camera to the C300 and C500 or Red etc.
It's role is pretty much the same as the 5DMK2 was on BIG hollywood productions. James Bond stunt cam but now with resolution to match the A cameras.

To see every offering as something that should be priced for the GH2 budget shooter is silly.
These are serious tools for big productions and are not necessarily designed as a one camera solution for low budget indie films.

4K - for whom? Anyone interested in checking out 5DMKII footage that's aired weekly by one of the world's largest public broadcasters -
http://zoom.zdf.de/ZDFde/inhalt/9/0,1872,8235273,00.html?dr=1
It's worth noting that not every broadcaster needs to meet BBC HD standards, especially if some broadcasters are still transmitting in standard definition. IMHO, these programs look fantastic. The question then is- who is 4K for? Cinema release?

I think eventually we'll see proper 1080p trickle down to the masses in the form of a Canon 70D over the next couple of years and at the right price- hopefully without the need for a AA filter teardown. In the meantime I'm enjoying shooting the GH2 and a 5DMKII. If your output is web based or even SD broadcast, then these are still the only cameras that remain true to the spirit of small, light and stealthy with a unique look - and for the right price.
I had read a lot about the GH2 before purchase, but it wasn't until I started shooting with it that I realised how good it really is - even without the hack.