Dean

@ Dean: looks nice.

 

I couldn't help but notice some grey ('hot' I believe you call them) pixels here and there though.

I've had that once before myself with a Kodak Playsport Zx3 (which had a more interesting problem since those pixels were dancing around).

Back then I ended up needing to send it back for a replacement...

Thanks, Cinegain. Not sure about the hot pixels. I see some blue flare in there which I always seem to get for some reason. 

This is incredible - outrageously cinematic:

Dean - so long as you shoot in manual mode, you can shoot at ISO 6400. Not sure on how it works on shutter priority (I have my 2x2 lever set up to control ISO on the front dial in position 2, and I use that to control ISO in shutter priority all the time. I assume it works the same in video? Don't know for sure, though.)

Wonderful find, Jurgen. Looks fantastic. Great to see what can be done. Not a tripod in sight either it seems :)

I have my camera set up as you do with the levers but shoot manual in movie mode. Shooting like this the camera won't shoot beyond ISO 3200. I will try just shooting in manual on "M" (on the dial) next time. Shooting as you do also means you can use peaking to set up the shot's focus as well. Can't use peaking at all in Movie mode I'm pretty sure.

Here a clip of some ISO 3200 footage on the E-M1 from last weekend. For me ISO 3200 is totally acceptable on this cam. In the first part I shot at ISO 3200 because ... well ... it was dark !! The second part, I set the ISO on 3200 on purpose and flicked the aperture until it was exposed properly. I think it landed at around f/8 on the PL 25/1.4. Lots of my street stuff is ISO 3200, but I am certain these two little scenes are for sure. All noise reduction off in cam and none in post. As a bonus for y'all, there's "Footloose" playing in the background at the tacky bar we stopped in at for a beer  :D

More useless info ... the second part is in shot in a little arcade in Lock Road, Tsim Sha Tsui ... one of the many, many, many cluster of shops you can wander around in checking out second hand cameras and old lenses. I was looking for an M3 and there were around 10 available just in the 5-6 shops in this arcade. Great fun. I love Hong Kong !!! 

Also, in the second part, the shutter speed is set to 1/50 instead of 1/60 to compensate for the voltage here which is at 50Hz. I found this knocks the flickering issue on it's head nicely. The setting in "Custom Menu --> D --> Flicker Reduction" doesn't seem to do anything when set to 50Hz ... the flickering is still there if the shutter is set to 1/60.

Why Olympus doesn't implement 24/25p is crazy, but I have a theory. The sceptic in me really believes there's some secret behind-closed-doors agreement between Olympus and Panasonic regarding IBIS and video technology ... each company implementing one or the other to help drive sales. All at the detriment of us consumers. Why doesn't Oly do 24/25p? Why doesn't Panasonic implement IBIS in video ... the arrangement between these two companies seems a little too cosy. I refuse to believe Olympus doesn't ramp up the video side of things because they don't realise what they have as far as IBIS goes for video or because they are concentrating on stills ... there's some sort of collusion going on here I reckon  :angry:

Dean, how do you find the high ISO image quality?  What's the highest ISO the camera can shoot in video mode?

 

One thing I wish the GH3 had was auto ISO in Manual exposure mode.  i.e. fix the exposure at 1/50s and F2.0, but let the camera choose the ISO

I find ISO 1600 excellent and only a bit of grain at 3200. Pretty good at high ISO I would say ... not FF sensor good, but definitely acceptable. I have some ISO 3200 footage from last weekend I'll dig up later on.

I know I'm no Dean, but I drove around tonight and shot some video at 6400. I'll put it up tomorrow for you.

Can you shoot video at 6400 on the E-M1? In video mode it seems to top out at 3200, but if I just press the record button in "M" mode (normal "M" mode not "M" in video mode) it allows you to to record video at any ISO. It's a bit confusing.

Nice, Jurgen. I'm really not sure why the phrase "it's a dog's life" was invented. Most dog's I see like yours and the crazy little mut we have at home live a fantastic life !!! :)

The IBIS does make a massive difference to the usability of the camera. The E-M1 just takes care of the stability side of things for you which is  so liberating.

After testing the live crop mode at work yesterday, I decided to test it out walking home from work last night. I think it's a great feature and a lot of fun to use but I need to use it more to see what type of situation it's best suited to. Sometimes the effect looks pretty seamless but sometimes it doesn't.

Also tried out the 12-40/2.8 last night for video. I prefer the small primes, but the zoom range is handy.

The live crop mode Andrew mentions in the article is quite nifty !! 

Ah yeah, I forgot to add that after checking out the filter and lens surfaces, use a lens hood if possible. Good point.

 

Anyway, I'd say it's still possible that shooting without the filter (or with another filter) may indeed decrease the amount of that lens flare. The two (or four) surfaces of the filter are the first glass surfaces that catch the light coming into the lens, and those surfaces are the most likely to cause additional glare and reflections. Especially the cheapest (and smudgy) ones. Sometimes it can be something as simple as a subtle layer of dust on a filter that haven't been used (and cleaned) in a while, and screwed on the lens in a hurry.

 

I had somewhat similar looking reflections in my shots a while ago, and it was fixed simply by changing the cheapo (and not entirely clean) filter screwed on the top of the lens. I used that particular filter mainly to protect the lens from possible sea water splashes.

I can't use the hood for most lenses as I need to keep the variable ND filter on. Unless you like shooting at f/56, in Hong Kong you need to have one on all the time.

I checked the variable nd filter i was using and the front element of the lens and they were all very clean. The sensor seemed fine as well. I will see if this happens again in the next couple of days.

deang001,

 

I decided to have some fun and try converting your chicken choppers from 30p video to 24p using the workflow below:

 

If you're interested here are the results:

 

You will want to download it to watch it.  not watch it in the browser which looks heavily compressed.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/8xjns3jan6vbkc0/cc24p.mp4

 

In After Effects CC

1. create new composite with original video and set Time -> Time Stretch -> Stretch Factor (250%)

2. Composition Settings -> Increase "Duration" by 2.5x (so 40.02 seconds became 1:40:07)

3. Enabled Frame Blending

4. Frame Blending -> Pixel Motion

5. Then export keeping framerate 29.97  What you end up with is a stretched clip by a factor of 2.5x at 29.97fps.  The frames are filled in with computer-generated frames.

 

After that the the stretched file into Premiere Pro

6. Create new sequence with video and set Speed/Duration -> Speed (250%)

7. Set opacity to 50%

8. Then underneath the 24p video layer, I put the original 29.97fps video.

9. Then export sequence to 23.97fps with the Frame Blending enabled

 

Added note: You can change the opacity from anywhere from 0 - 100% in step 7.  Sometimes the original footage doesn't have much movement so no conversion is necessary.  Sometimes the interpolated footage is perfect, so 100% is fine.  But 50% seems fine across the board most of the times.

It turns out After Effects has built in feature to interpolate frames just like Twixtor.  They licensed The Foundry's Kronos and called it Pixel motion.  You can probably do all this within After Effects although I like this workflow because frame blending seems to work better this way for me.

Wow !! Great stuff, Michael.

30p doesn't really offend me that much, but it would be a nice update on the E-M1 at some point.

Your workflow seems fantastic … hopefully one day I will understand it  :)  Thanks for sharing.

That's lens flare.  You can only solve that "problem" by flagging the lens so lights aren't directly shining on the glass.  Or, just not shooting into lights.

 

Also, the next time you direct a movie in the Star Trek franchise you can do that on purpose with Zeiss lenses and everyone will think it's awesome and want to emulate it.

Ok, great … thanks.

Will file that tip away for when I'm directing Star Trek 17.

My wife and I love Star Trek btw. Currently watching S4 of TNG BD …. Engage !!! 

Nope. That looks like an ordinary lens/dirt glare.

 

Wipe off all the fingerprint smudges and other gunk off your filter(s) and the front element of the lens with a microfiber cloth, but be careful when doing it. If your filter is clean try another one, or shoot without the filter.

Thanks, Quirky. Excellent news !!

At the time I was using a "Lightcraft Fader ND MK II" on the 25/1.4. It's possible that the incense smoke from the Temple may have clouded the lens causing this but I'm not sure. In any case, I have cleaned the filter and checked the front element. I'll shoot again this weekend and hopefully not see this again.

For what it's worth, if you're shooting a f2 on m43, you have an effective DOF of f4 in regards to full frame cameras.  Considering that feature film cinematographers like to shoot around f5.6, I'd say that m43 sensors work well getting that shallow/skinny DOF look.

 

Something like a f1.4 on a full frame is useful for specialty shots, but shooting motion pictures that way all the time would be a bit much.

 

Anyway, I'm just saying m43 does good motion picture DOF.

Good to know, Fuzzy ... thanks. I have a lot to learn but it's so much fun being at base level again. Not saying I'm a great photographer or anything but I've got to the point where I'm OK with stills. Being absolutely new at something again like video is so exciting !!

When I have time to set everything up I usually shoot the 25/1.4 @ around 2~2.8.

No trouble at all with isolation and blowing out a background with M43 ... you just need the right lenses  :)  I have the 45/1.8 and 75/1.8 which are lovely and get the job done when needed. I just bought a Metabones Speedbooster on the weekend as I have around 10 Nikon MF lenses. I'm really interested to see how the 28/2 Ai-S and 50/1.2 Ai-S handle but they are a bit large on the E-M1. I'm thinking an M adapter and a couple of ZM lenses would be nice too.

I've shot FF for years and still shoot with a D800E, but it stays on the shelf most of the time now. I went through such a shallow DOF phase that hardly anything was in focus in any shot for months ... everything always wide open with lenses like the 135DC and 50/1.2 ... I'm a bit more judicious in my approach to using DOF now  :D

I don't have too many gripes about the E-M1, and the outstanding IBIS in this camera more than makes up for any shortfall it may have, but there are a few things I wish it did or did better. Obviously the whole 24p 25p thing is an issue but some other things are...

• It would be nice if the sprit level was available during video capture. As soon as you press record it disappears.
• Peaking during video would be nice as well.
• The camera should also let you assign what ever you want to the two dials when flicking between lever 1 and lever 2. At the moment it decides the pairs for you. In my ideal set up, I would have the camera always in lever position 1 and assign ISO to one dial and aperture to the other dial.

This cam is just perfect for street video where there's no time to set up a shot and skinny DOF isn't really needed. I just leave the camera in shutter priority in movie mode with S-AF & auto ISO when using the 25/1.4. If you see something about to happen you can quickly move the focus dot in position, tap once on the shutter release to gain focus, press record and your off ... and very stable  :)  I find it's easy to react quickly with the E-M1. It acquires focus so instantly and it's dead on 99% of the time in any type of light. I prefer the type of LCD that's in this cam over the GH3 as well for street. I just have it on a 75 degree angle facing me and shoot with the cam at about navel height. I find shooting like this as opposed to looking through the EVF does not attract anyone's attention.

Awesome.  Thanks for this.  I shot at this temple 5 years ago in HD and it doesn't look half as good as your footage.  Very encouraging.

Thanks, Fuzzy. That's great that you have been there before. It's an amazing Temple ... so colourful and exciting ... especially at this time of year. This weekend  is Chinese New Year and apparently on Sunday the place is absolutely packed. That would make for some pretty interesting footage.

Love the temples. How was the audio recorded? If that was onboard then well done :)

Thanks, Andrew. The audio is straight out of the cam. I've been very pleased with the audio. Even when street shooting it nicely captures the sounds of the city without anything sounding muffled. Less gear the better. With one small camera and one small lens your practically invisible  :)

Dean, this is kind of an off-the-rails question as it pertains to the topic, but:

Shooting stills with your E-M1, if you take a jpg (super fine) at ISO 6400, is some of your noise "black," like dark pixels?

http://imgur.com/oll7sU3 (this is what I mean).

It does not show up in RAW, which is great, and of course that's a 300% crop of my dog, so it's heavy pixel peeping on a Micro Four Thirds camera at 6400 ISO in a poorly lit room. I am curious if it's "normal" behavior, though.

Show up that way for you?

Hi Jurgen, sorry, but I'm really not sure. I haven't really taken many high ISO images. You would probably be better off asking the question on http://www.mu-43.com … they have a lot of super knowledgable people there.

Another couple of clips I put together over the weekend. All hand held ... of course  :)

I enjoy shooting stills on the E-M1 but I'm totally addicted to shooting video with it. Ergonomically, when set up to your liking, it's so easy to use and the controls, settings and dials just get out of your way.

In the second clip, I resisted throwing all sorts of colour effects over the top and left it as is out of the cam on vivid setting with contrast at -2 as Andrew suggested in a post ... all else at default. No PP at all.

Both shot with the Pana 25/1.4. In the scene at the 24sec mark of the 1st clip I used the inbuilt 2x convertor. There is a drop in resolution but the feature is handy.

I hope it is OK posting videos here but I did not see another thread that has E-M1 videos.

I noticed all of this weird green stuff going on in some footage I shot over the weekend with my E-M1. Is this the same issue? Shot with the Panasonic 25/1.4.

Happened when shooting inside and outside. 

http://youtu.be/VlfhZSRqRxI

30p is an issue here in a PAL country like Hong Kong when shooting at night under lights. I shot this random stuff while walking home from work last night. Most of it is in 1/60 where you can see the flickering is pretty crazy. I then remembered to set the shutter to 1/50 which seems to get rid of it.

I can get steady and pleasing shots handheld with GH3 and OIS. Obviously best in wide end of lens. Difference is that those are tack sharp and with 50/60P motion and feel is much more lifelike than at 30P. I can use higher shutter and there is no blur in motion. I can see details all the time, not only when camera stops moving.

 

Did you try to use GH3 with unstabilized primes or why couldnt you get steady shots?

I had a 12-35/2.8 and could get reasonably steady footage, but nothing in comparison to the E-M1. The GH3 always looked it's best when mounted on a tripod. Like I said, I think the GH3 is wonderful but it just wasn't for me. I really really hate tripods. I love just wondering around and taking shots ... and now some video... it';s a hobby and a tripod just ruins it for me. Everyone is different I guess.

Using unstabilised primes is a huge plus for the E-M1. With photography I mainly shoot with Nikon Ai-S primes and have a bit of a collection. These will work very nicely on E-M1 

To tell you the truth, I t=really don't notice a big difference in resolution ... maybe because I never really look for it anyway. Most of the time with my stills I'm looking for mood and feel over and above anything and add grain and do all sorts of things in post so I doubt it will be a factor for me if I persist with video. Video will be the same I guess. It's the feel and the mood of it that gets the message across not the super resolution. IMO anyway.

Sorry but this video is soft. Nothing like GH3 or RX10 level.

A new camera owner is shooting video on the default settings.  So it's a bit soft to start with.  Big deal.  If you know what you're doing you can make images from this camera look fine.  

 

Besides, all this worry about what sensor tech is best is ridiculous.   These days it's all pretty dang impressive.  If you want to shoot motion pictures to tell a story I doubt having a sensor with 5% less resolution than a competitor's camera is going to matter all that much.

 

Either you can shoot and edit or you can't.  Extra pixels are nice, but they're not going to give someone film making skills.

… and it was filmed on a 14-42 PZ at about f/22 and then had a film effect put over the top as well as other effects :)

Hello Andrew. Can I ask what picture profile you are using on the E-M1? Are you still using Vivid with the contrast down to -2?

I tried Muted with everything down to -2 which seems to be very flat. Natural with -1 contrast seems to be a nice happy medium for everyday shooting.

I'm a complete newb as far as video goes, but I am absolutely loving the E-M1 for video. The IBIS is incredible !! Just having a cam and a lens on the street with no other gear and filming away is so much fun.

This was the first clip I made. I'm usually into street photography but want to start doing some street clips :)

Trying to teach myself FCPX.

Hi Andrew.

Any news on when this is being released?

Cheers.

Looking forward to the gh3 manual. I have so many questions about the camera. Like how to deal with aliasing, best picture styles to shoot in settings. So glad I finally found this site and forum

Really looking forward to the book as well.

Be nice to have a lot of info on this camera centralised especially for people like myself who are pretty new to video.