Mmmbeats

As explained, our access is contingent on not doing any rigging in the actual room.  We're being granted quite a favour with the location and can't push any more.  We just need to make the setup work within the parameters we have. 

Actually just had an idea - I don't use MFT lenses an awful lot (usually EF lenses with adapter), but looking at the couple of panny lenses I have, they have quite small front elements.

I'm thinking perhaps I could press them up against the grill and crop out the grill elements at the side.  I'm delivering 1080p, so could shoot 4K for this and even possibly stay with the GH5S!  It seems like I would probably cover a clean 1080 frame like this.

Only issue - not sure I'd get a wide enough angle of view.

37 minutes ago, BTM_Pix said:

One option as you are using an mft camera are the Olympus body cap lenses as you should be able to get pretty flat, although the grip will limit just how flat.

The 15mm would be the one for the FOV that you are after but I would definitely try and have a go with one to make sure you are OK with the performance.

Another option would be the Osmo Pocket as you can get that butted up right to the grille and the big advantage is that you can remote monitor it with a phone so it makes it easier to set up. The FOV is wide but closer to what you are after than that of a GoPro.

The other one would be a 1" compact like the Panasonic LX10/15 which you could mount slightly above and use the optical zoom to get through the grille. As with the Osmo, the advantage there is that you can use the phone app to monitor as well as control the lens. The LX10/15 can take the Cinelike D hack as well so you could match it better to the GH5 if you are using Cinelike D on that too.

These are a very interesting set of options, which I am off to research further...

33 minutes ago, Anaconda_ said:

Could you forget about the grill altogether, hang a mirror at 45 degreed from the ceiling and then put your camera up close the the ceiling - shooting into the mirror and down into the room? Then you can use whatever lens you want to. Flip/flop the footage in post and nobody will ever know  

No access for that sort of thing unfortunately.  Nice idea though.

Our access to the location is conditional on not removing the grill or rigging a platform in the room itself, but we have great access from the room above looking down.

I need a reasonably wide shot (essentially something like a 35mm - 50mm FF equivalent).  The room is around 14 feet high.  It's a geometric birds eye shot - straight down.

None of that is negotiable unfortunately.

Stylistically I need to end up with something adhering to 'realistic' - well controlled distortion, neutral colours, etc.

I've been looking at the Laowa 24mm f/14 probe lens, but it looks incredibly soft from what I've seen so far, and f/14 might be a problem too.

Any advice for lens or other technology options for shooting through a narrow gap?

I have a situation where I need to film top-down through a fairly narrow grill (haven't been able to measure the exact dimensions yet, but around 2cm (1 inch) width.
I only have access from above and need to film the scene below without seeing the grill mechanism itself. 

I'll be filming the majority of the piece on a GH5S.  I'm looking for options of how to get this additional footage.  Lightweight and simple to rig are important considerations.

So far 3 things come to mind - 

- A probe lens, but these don't seem to work very well as regular (non macro) lenses.

- A go pro pressed up against the grill, though I really don't like the loss of technical control they offer

- A high-end phone camera with a thin lens attached - totally new territory for me

Anyone have any thoughts or experiences?  Bearing in mind this will be for a professional (non broadcast) production.

C200 is very much set up for RAW / Proxy workflow, right?

3 hours ago, omega1978 said:

Thanks Mattias, for explain it.

For me film weedings are the base of my work and i like to capture emotions and all what happens ( sometimes i have to gather up to not cry in some situations )

But i understand completely, that is not for everyone 

In case you didn't quite catch it, my comment was just a little joke around a misspelling in your post, meant as fun ? .

2 hours ago, omega1978 said:

i don`t know if the upgrade brings a lot shooting weeding ?!?

 

The market for weeding videos hasn't really matured yet.  Hedge trimming might work, but weeding get's a bit repetitive watching after even just a few minutes ?. 

Did you just say fam? ? ?

eta: Just seen your location, which makes it less likely you meant to say fam.  Pity.

On 6/20/2019 at 3:45 PM, Video Hummus said:

The small color tweaks they gave the GH5S allows great colors SOOC. I usually shoot HLG but if you nail white balance and exposure the 10Bit Cine-D looks really good with some small profile adjustments.

What's your cine-d tweak recipe, if you don't mind sharing? 

Having chosen the virtues of the GH5S over the IBIS of the GH5, I did use IBIS (on my GX80) for a run-around shoot the other day.  It was an absolute delight. 

I used a Zacuto loupe off the screen, and added a small video head for weight.  There was some sensor panning going on, but it was smooth and appropriate for the subject (a fast-moving cultural event).  The footage was more stable than had I used a monopod.

In short I'd be excited to have IBIS as an option on a camera like this.  I wonder if the killer combo would be a fully grown cinema camera (for built in everything) + a little mobile number like the SH1?

That's awesome.  I'd love a cross-company version of this (but I guess that would defeat the point for smallrig).  Great stuff.

On 6/13/2019 at 2:19 PM, webrunner5 said:

It is Not amazing if it is too dark whether you like it or not. In this day and age nearly Any camera, even Phones can take great stuff if you can grade and edit. If I was the African actor in it I would be pissed. He is Black alright, so Black half the time he just sort of blends into the woodwork. Piss poor grade.

This is suppose to be what a Person of Color is Suppose to look like in a dark environment. Not just a freaking shadow!

 

This is a pretty ludicrous response.  First off, grading is, beyond anything else, a subjective matter.  So you didn't like the way they used shadows and concealment to draw the viewer in.  I happened to love it.  In no universe is there a definitive 'too dark' in these matters.  Not to your taste?  Fine.  Simply wrong?  That I don't accept.

That character's first scene, which is the one I imagine you have most objection too, uses concealment to draw the viewer in, and does a pretty good job of it imo.  There are highlights that flash up here and there that give glimpses of the pressure the character is under, and then they use motivated light for a great reveal (when the headlight splashes through the window and you finally get a full glimpse of his fear).   It's not the most devastatingly amazing cinematography I've even seen, but it does a very good job.

Secondly, the image you've posted up as a comparison is so different in tone and feel it's more or less irrelevant.  It's not going for anywhere near the same kind of atmospheric sense of dread.  It's shot in a completely different set of lighting conditions, so of course the exposure looks different.  Added to that, it's not even technically that accomplished of an image (though it may work perfectly well in the context it was intended). 

I genuinely wonder if the gamma is a bit off on whatever screen you're viewing on, cos that can make moody stuff look impenetrable.  

Person posts amazing looking film shot on sub-£1k camera.  Posts that follow mostly highlighting criticisms.  Nothing wrong with the observations btw, but do you think we might be a bit in danger of losing our 'wow' factor?

A matter of taste I guess.  No part of any frame was too dark for me.  Lovely looking and well worked.  One of the better showcase films I've seen.
I know you need a fair bit of production budget to get results like these, but what times we live in for entry level cameras, eh?

53 minutes ago, Chrad said:

It's really documentary where the crazy high DR becomes a major feature, no? In the early days of cinema feature filmmakers were lighting to film that held significantly less DR than any recent hybrid.

Well I think it depends how much control you're able to exert.  Often on a low budget shoot, access, time, personel or resources will prevent you from being able to apply the solution you'd like to have.  That's when windows start to blow, skies start to pop, and other undesirable things start to happen.  At the sharpest end of low-budget you just can't always fight all the fires.
Of course there are ways around this with meticulous planning and imaginative framing, but having a camera with superb colours and high DR sure would be a helping hand.  

The released footage with it's seemingly vintage styling does make it a little hard to evaluate the camera at this stage.  I get that it looks good, but it strikes me as odd to promote a camera whose headline spec is 6K with footage, some of which looks like it resolved at around 720p.  

I am aware that features have been made with all sorts of cameras, including phones.   But huge compromises have to be made.  I shot on a GH4 for years - absolutely love the camera.  But the DR alone would have me pulling out my teeth if I had to shoot a feature with it. 

There are intangibles that set aside the image from proper cinema cameras over prosumer cameras that go way beyond the spec sheet. 
If Panasonic really are putting all of their highly-regarded Varicam / EVA science into a $4K tool, then that is a remarkable facility to have available.

Perhaps looking at the incremental steps up from GH5 and S1 is the wrong way to look at this camera, and it is better to measure the incremental step down from the existing cinema lines.

As an example, if it lives up to the way Panasonic are selling it, this could be an option for micro-budget feature films, could it not?  £4K for an image you could potentially put up on a movie screen? 

The footage is well shot, lit, and graded, but am I the only one surprised at how soft it looks generally?  I know clinically sharp is not an ideal to chase anyway, but the majority of the footage on that compilation looks soft and mushy to my taste.

11 hours ago, Skip77 said:

You absolutely come off as the girl in your comments about "2 S1 bodies, 2 firmware upgrades, 1 24-105 f/4, 1 extra camera battery, 1 S1 battery grip. Retail total $7123. My total $5044!" or you come off as a braggart.  

I never mentioned the EOS R in a positive light ever. I also never said one negative thing about the S1 or S1H, ever.  I'm all for progressing technology that helps everyone. 

I've never understood braggers that have to post about how much they spent on gear, good for you but no one cares about braggers. What's the crow I'm suppose to be eating? 

And again, how long have you worked for Panasonic ?

Using 'girl' or femaleness as an insult in this day and age really is quite pathetic.  Learn to 2019.

I think this is going to be priced out of reach for most indie filmmakers and jobbing one-man-bands.  Where I can see this being really popular is as a b-cam, tricky-corner cam, backup body, etc. on professional crewed shoots.  If I was DPing on something critical with a top end cinema camera, I'd really love to have something like this sitting in a bag on standby.  It looks like it's capable of being tuned to deliver footage that could live alongside top level stuff quite convincingly (based on how the S1 is shaping up).

I can't think of a better combo for that particular usage (which is big money if it really catches on).

Also, small productions (web series', multi-cam doc, etc.) might be interested.  There's a lot of money to be saved over full-blown cinema cameras, especially if you're buying several units.

I just can't see solo operator / owners coming in in large numbers.  So far, there's not enough to suggest value over the other fantastic cameras in the sector.  Plus, if you really need to step up in quality the fully-featured cinema cameras start to come into range for just a bit more.  Also, the inbetweeny market is starting to come to life a bit (Z Cam), so there's that temptation too.

I'm not so fixated on either FF or 6K as selling points.  Of course, I'm happy to take them if on offer, but give me a really super-functioning S35 camera at 4K and my money's yours.  The market as a whole may feel differently!

So far Panansonic's L-Mount offerings all seem perfectly interesting, but from a selling POV, a bit niche.  I hope they know what they're doing.

Do Panasonic's R, H, and S suffixes have a clear identity now?  I'm getting a bit baffled.

Leaning towards being a FF GH6-type camera (and a bit of an S1 killer!!!) perhaps.

If the H really is for 'hybrid' then that's a bit confusing.  Isn't the existing S1 marketed as a killer hybrid system?