Imaginate

Does anyone else think the color science in this camera is still complete crap? I haven't seen anything to make me think otherwise. 

I wish companies would start working on dynamic range, color science, rolling shutter, aliasing-moire free images, rather than on low-light. A 5D or GH4 or a Canon rebel is all I really need to shoot good images in extremely low-light.

I would guess this has to do with the influx of amateur filmmakers who don't know how to use lights(thank the canon DSLR revolution) and have been chirping in the ears of these camera manufacturers for better low light capabilities.

Lights can be scary, but they are a big factor in amateur vs pro shoots(amateurs seem to use window/available light exclusively and pros will prefer to light it the way they want).  Plus to my eye the low light high ISO stuff looks weird and very unnatural. 

If the Sony could record for 90 minutes straight, it would be my first choice for archiving lectures and concerts.  For now, the GH4 will do fine.

Exactly. I said the same thing and some idiots were ripping me and saying "plenty of docs" are still shot on a 7D.  It's easy to tell which posters shoot for a living and which ones just test cameras for fun. 

I guess I should mention that I don't like the Sony image at all. I had a sony PD-150 and I've hated the Sony image since. The Z1-U sucked and I have owned a Panny HVX-2000 since day one, so I'm probably not the most unbiased person on here.

If you're "run and gunning" you won't really be swapping lenses anyway. So just buy one 10-stop ND filter and maybe add a vari ND.

 

I don't know how bad the rolling shutter is compared to the 5D, but I've seen films with a lot of action, such as The Raid, where you can see things bending whenever the camera moved fast. However, the rolling shutter didn't really harm the fast paced movements at all.

Yes you can switch lenses if you have an assistant(PA budget is the best spent money on set) and yes there are times when you can take advantage of the RS, but mostly it's a very annoying workaround. Funny how most of the responses on here have been how to technically avoid RS, but none have offered an answer to shooting with it. 

The dynamic range with SLog will totally blow the crap out of GH4, as well as low light performance, probably 4 stop advantage in video mode. 

 

I would like to see 5D III raw vs A7s Slog

 

Even Alexa has rolling shutter. 

I get it. Some folks really need DR(although most are just shooting crap for vimeo). DR isn't king though. To me the images out of 99% of the footage that I've seen from the a7s are pretty flat, lack color depth and don't really excite me. The one small clip that I've seen of the 10 bit footage from the GH4 blows away even the the Den Lennie footage in 4k that is graded. Call me crazy, but again I've seen enough. To me the with a 10 bit(doesn't have to be 4k)recorder the gh4 is a poor mans RED. The a7s footage looks just like a beefed up 5d with more DR(even on Den's footage).

I have a 5D fully hacked RAW and while it's good it's DR isn't as good as you think(the 14bit footage is amazing to grade though).  You have to consider the fact that you're using a hacked camera, which has totally overheated on me shooting only 35mins of RAW at a concert. The bottom line is that it is still a hacked camera and really not one that should be used on hired gig.  Have you even used a 5D hacked? You can't review footage in real time, it doesn't always record the clip(95%rate, but still not good enough), and it's fucking nightmare in post to work with. I've run ML many times on shoots, but due to the fickle nature of RAW, I end up shooting h.264 most of the time to be safe. 

So yeah. I'm gladly switching to a GH4 that has an unlimited record time, 10 bit output and I really like the subtle softness of the m 4/3 look. Biased? Maybe, but consider that I was a dedicated Canon shooter(C100 and mkIII) until a few months ago... Full frame and DR aren't the end all be all.  

The dynamic range looks incredible, but the rolling shutter looked terrible.

I do a lot of 'jump in' handheld work, so I don't think this camera would be an ideal upgrade. Need to see more.

I've seen enough. Unless you're shooting House of Cards the rolling shutter looks to render this camera pretty much unusable in a majority of real world shooting situations.  The high base ISO on S-Log is going to cause all kinds of problems shooting ANYTHING with fast lenses too. A maxed out variable ND filter or heavy 1.8+ will be minimum for F1.2-4 in any kind of decent light.  I shot in a factory last week on my GH4 and I never went above ISO 400(shooting at F1.8-8). Would have been a major pain to have swap out an ND every single time I had to change lenses and having a big ole matte box is a pain for a Run N Gun operation. 

Seems like a great camera...on paper, but the real world hassles don't justify the cost and the workarounds to get a good image.  Typical Sony!

I also forgot to add that I'm not that worried about the full frame aesthetic either. It's very nice to be able to put some nice L lens on this, but I think with the upcoming EF to m 4/3 metabones will close the gap.  

From what I heard, it does have a 30min limit. 

Seems like this is case as per Matthew Allard's review on Newshooter.

This is a real deal breaker for me and one of the MANY reasons why I'm going to keep my GH4.  I shoot mostly doc stuff with lots of long interviews and live events.  Also the dynamic range doesn't look that impressive at all. The 8 bit footage out of cam looks very DSLRish and not much better than a 5D(granted this will probably change a bit with 4k and 4:2:2). I wasn't that impressed with the Den Lennie footage either and this review just confirms it. The 10-bit image out of the GH4 looks like it's going to kick the crap out of most images from this camera. It might be a little too early to make this judgement without seeing more 4k footage of both cameras, but right now the GH4 footy looks better straight out of camera and so far @ 4k downscaled into 1080 on a recorder(yes I think the TEST clip of the little girls looks better than the Den Lennie stuff). Don't get me wrong, the low light is nice, but personally I don't want to see everything when it's dark. Kinda defeats the purpose of light and dark to me. 

Just curious if any has used  a BlackMagic HyperDeck to get 4:2:2 out the camera? Might be a cheaper option as compared to the Blade, but not sure about the lack of ProRes.  The 10bit looks likes it's going to give the GH4 a massive advantage over the AS7 and will be the saving grace of this camera.