GH1 First Impressions (PAL)

[EdMcLeodJones]

Hi there,

I got my GH1 on Saturday, and spent Sunday shooting some footage down at Canary Wharf in London.

http://vimeo.com/5076887

The early stuff I took was a bit chunky and showing some of the 'mud' that everyone's talking about (shots of the boats/water etc), but got a bit better once I switched to full manual mode (fountain, pigeon, etc). I'll upload the MTS files somewhere so everyone can take a look at some PAL source material.

720p MJPEG comparison version coming soon...

Let me know what you think.

Cheers,

Ed.
http://vimeo.com/edmcleodjones

[akaloith]

most of them are very usable
i think that the camera could use 24mbit/sec and have very good results

1) please do us a favour and shoot 1080 25p and 720 50p with all the settings turned to their lowest (-2) sharpness contrast etc

2) also do us a favour and shoot the exact same scene at 1080 and 720
a static one and a non static one

3) also do some autofocus checks at avchd 1080 and 720 and motionjpeg 720 to see if there is a difference

Thanx a lot

[editman]

I don't have a GH1 yet but I did get a Panasonic DMC-FT1 yesterday and had time to test the AVCHD lite mode. It's a 1280x720/50 rez at 17mbps. Sounds just like the GH1 right? Well there's one advantage with the FT1, it uses a CCD-chip so rolling shutter is non existing.

It's by no way as good as the GH1. Smaller sensor, no manual control and fixed lesser optics. But it was interesting to finally judge the AVCHD stream by myself. Did some quick tests in mixed lowlight/highlight environment.

I must say that for having the limitations of the camera the final image was very good. Very little noise, sharp and even thou I shaked the camera as hell it didn't break up, atleast not to any extent. I can see this to be one complement to GH1 when you just have to avoid rolling shutter or when you have to shoot under water or rain. It's waterproof! The two will cut together easy in 720/50 mode.

This camera also has 1280x720/30 mode in M-JPEG compression. This in lowlight was much noiseier. I guess it will hold up better in daylight thou.

Used Procoder to make watchable files. Tried VLC but it looked awful.

[DrBlaz]

please, is 1/30 the slowest shutter speed in PAL?

I read a PAL manual and it seems to be 1/30, but in PAL should be 1/25, thanks!

[Martti Ekstrand]

It's read out as 1/30 on the display.

[DrBlaz]

thanks Martti

[Jackson Miller]

The available shutter speeds (for the us model as well) are clearly oriented towards photographers. Thats how all DSLRs are.

[Martti Ekstrand]

I don't have equipment around to verify that 1/30 is really 30 in PAL video mode - ironically the one guy I know who could help me with that left for Tokyo on Friday. But 1/50 is there and is really what one should use for PAL, there's also a 1/40 step in-between that could be used for tweaking exposure if in lack of a little more light. Haven't tried shooting 1/40 yet.

[tommetass]

Nice images:)

But I'm a little concerned. I see in most of the GH1 videos that there are a lot of lagging. Like every 3 seconds there's a small lag that sort of make movements really jagged.

Is there a way to fix it?

[Noel Evans]

Nice images:)

But I'm a little concerned. I see in most of the GH1 videos that there are a lot of lagging. Like every 3 seconds there's a small lag that sort of make movements really jagged.

Is there a way to fix it?

I get that on Vimeo a lot. Id suspect its that.

[EdMcLeodJones]

I think it might be the Neo Scene conversion in my case, I've detected that it's duplicating some frames. I've logged it as a bug, so hopefully they fix it soon, as other than that it's an excellent workflow.

UPDATE:
Turns out it wasn't an issue with Neo Scene, it was a weird problem with my machine with both Neo Scene and Neo Player installed.

[B. Wayne]

Good Stuff, man! Great work. Seriously!

[Tameside]

I think it might be the Neo Scene conversion in my case, I've detected that it's duplicating some frames. I've logged it as a bug, so hopefully they fix it soon, as other than that it's an excellent workflow.
Hi, just got a gh1 pal, is neoscene the best workflow in your opinion? I will only be using prem elements after neoscene conversion. Can you batch eveything over into neoscene and how big do the files become and are they of any higher quality?

Many thanks

[EdMcLeodJones]

Hi, just got a gh1 pal, is neoscene the best workflow in your opinion? I will only be using prem elements after neoscene conversion. Can you batch eveything over into neoscene and how big do the files become and are they of any higher quality?

I haven't tried any other workflows, but Neo Scene is a good fit for me. Yes, you batch convert the AVCHD files and they are converted into Cineform AVI files. They are larger files, but still manageable compared to uncompressed. You can choose a quality setting which can make a difference in the file size.

Obviously the Cineform files can't magically add detail that isn't there, although the supposedly do something to increase the color sampling from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2. Personally I can't see much of a difference toggling between the original and the Cineform file in After Effects, but it's better than losing sampling I guess.

The Cineform files themselves are very fast to edit with (especially compared with the AVCHD files, and I'm on a 4 core i7 machine!), and being AVIs should work with any compatible programs. I haven't used Premiere Elements so you'd be best off downloading the trial version of Neo Scene and testing it out first.

Have a look in the Workflow section of the GH1 board for other workflows and try them out to see which one works for you.

Hope that helps.

[Noel Evans]

Anyone using the PAL GH1 in FCP? Would be interesting to see the workflow.

Im thinking it would be easiest to just go to prores. Thoughts?

Or would be great if someone could upload the original AVCHD files so I could take a look myself? Anyone feeling generous? Only need 10-15 seconds.

[timbook2]

if you have FCP under file : log&transfer, lead the import window to the root of the PRIVATE folder and your set.

[Tameside]

I haven't tried any other workflows, but Neo Scene is a good fit for me. Yes, you batch convert the AVCHD files and they are converted into Cineform AVI files. They are larger files, but still manageable compared to uncompressed. You can choose a quality setting which can make a difference in the file size.

Obviously the Cineform files can't magically add detail that isn't there, although the supposedly do something to increase the color sampling from 4:2:0 to 4:2:2. Personally I can't see much of a difference toggling between the original and the Cineform file in After Effects, but it's better than losing sampling I guess.

The Cineform files themselves are very fast to edit with (especially compared with the AVCHD files, and I'm on a 4 core i7 machine!), and being AVIs should work with any compatible programs. I haven't used Premiere Elements so you'd be best off downloading the trial version of Neo Scene and testing it out first.

Have a look in the Workflow section of the GH1 board for other workflows and try them out to see which one works for you.

Hope that helps.


Many thanks, will try it and see.