5d or GH3

ade4all said:
This is just silly fan boy talk now - there is no comparison between 5d mk3 720 50p and gh3 1080 50 - I have seen the 2 together and there is a big difference
Click to expand...

How about vs the Nex-5n? 1080 50p vs 1080 50p. Which one comes out on top? Have you done scientific studies or just going with "I feel it."?
 
I was a die hard 7D shooter. I don't need the super shallow DOF of Full Frame and believe that S35 (or APS-C) is a good happy medium and in cinema terms S35 is 'Full Frame'. The 7D was nice when shooting close ups but anywhere else and the resolution and moire killed it for me. Now switched to the GH3. Wow! Really nice, sharp images and I get full res 1080p50. I got the Panasonic 12-35 2.8 as a do it all lens but as soon as the speed booster is released I will add that and use either the Rokinon primes or old Nikkor primes for their aperture rings. I then get a camera with a very detailed sensor, with the speed booster my lenses get back their S35 look (DOF) and they become a stop faster. GH3 + speedbooster + Nikkor or Rokinon primes will be a great combination IMO and extremely flexible.
 
I've never used the Nex, wasnt talking about that - all i'm saying is that for 50p the gh3 has much more detail, its there in front of your face you dont have to "feel" anything.....whichever is most pleasing is completely a matter of taste and most of this thread has had a fairly reasonable discussion on the different merits to each camera - pick what works for you - but I would have thought even a die hard 5d fan like yourself would accept the gh3 has a slight edge when it comes to resolution, particulary in 50p
 
I have to agree with ade4all here, there is nothing subjective about which camera resolves better. The GH3 beats all the Canon DSLRs in 1080p25. When shooting 50p, the GH3 at 1080p kills the Canons at 720p. No comparison.
i was testing out the GH3 on my jib in the back yard. I had it above my daughters sand pit looking down over her and could literally see every grain of sand. The GH3 is really impressing me.
 
Back to the original poster.... Rather than judge which camera you should purchase based on 7 pages of internet posts by various camera fanboys, my advice would be to find a location/camera shop which has both cameras, bring your own SDHC card, and demo each camera, bring the footage home, make your own choice!!!

Bottom line.... Just remember these 2 things!

1: No camera is perfect.

2: No matter what some camera fanboy says, almost any modern camera is capable of delivering good results when used by knowledgeable and talented filmmakers.

Good Luck!

Dave
 
David W. Jones said:
Bottom line.... Just remember these 2 things!

1: No camera is perfect.

2: No matter what some camera fanboy says, almost any modern camera is capable of delivering good results when used by knowledgeable and talented filmmakers.


Dave
Click to expand...

+1. And, most importantly, no audience in the history of cinema has ever watched a film and said, "boy that could have used a bit more resolution." Or, "gee, those skin tones really would have looked better with a Canon."

Filmmakers are the only ones that obsess over these ultimately trivial details in their equipment.
 
David W. Jones said:
Back to the original poster.... Rather than judge which camera you should purchase based on 7 pages of internet posts by various camera fanboys, my advice would be to find a location/camera shop which has both cameras, bring your own SDHC card, and demo each camera, bring the footage home, make your own choice!!!

Bottom line.... Just remember these 2 things!

1: No camera is perfect.

2: No matter what some camera fanboy says, almost any modern camera is capable of delivering good results when used by knowledgeable and talented filmmakers.

Good Luck!

Dave
Click to expand...


5D Mark II, 60d, 7D are not able to resolve the detail I need on wide shots. There is No question regarding that, it's simply not there. I have not used the Mark III extensively to make a final judgement, but I do know the same scene with the GH3 I was able to get the detail I needed. The main advantage for the Mark III is low light / High Iso / less noise. Being on a set with the GH3 and having even a couple of lights I've never had a problem.

Now at the end of the day it's all about the image you like and what you have to pay for it. For $3000 you can buy the Mark III or for half the cost you can buy a GH3.

It's all about what you need your camera for, if you're doing events maybe a Dslr is the wrong choice all together and a standard video camera would be better. IMHO no one tool is perfect, but the main reason for me even having a discussion in this thread was to tell people that the GH3 is an excellent camera.
 
ras815 said:
+1. And, most importantly, no audience in the history of cinema has ever watched a film and said, "boy that could have used a bit more resolution." Or, "gee, those skin tones really would have looked better with a Canon."

Filmmakers are the only ones that obsess over these ultimately trivial details in their equipment.
Click to expand...

I shoot TVCs, docs, corporates, sports features, interviews etc. I do it for a living. I have had clients say, what is all that stuff shimmering? It was all over the guys patterned tie in that interview and it was in the trees on that wide shot. Moire.

In this day and age with most people having 50" + 1080p screens in their home, I think there is a demand for better quality images. 80% of people won't notice but does that mean we should lower our standards to the lowest common denominator?

It's true that shooting a badly written and directed feature on an Alexa wont make it any better but if the camera doesn't matter, why don't accountants win the argument and have everything shot on the cheapest camera available. If your analogy is true though, why don't artists just use Crayons on butcher paper like my daughter uses at school and let the art speak for itself instead of expensive canvases and rich paints?

If the Fanboy comment was directed at me at all, I'll give you my reply. I think that people who will only consider shooting anything on a 5D or 'Full Frame' are the true fanboys. I have just switched from the 7D to GH3, does the fact that I think the GH3 is doing a better job than my 7D make me a fanboy or are YOU the fanboy of shallow DOF who doesn't know how to shoot nice images and tell a story without a Full frame camera at f1.4? They are the true fanboys!

Reading forums can make you more confused about choosing a camera than when you started. It's true that you should test the cameras yourself. Where I found forums useful is pinpointing each cameras weak points. With that knowledge, you can test the cameras in those conditions and decide for yourself if their shortcoming will affect you. The 5D will look nice shooting a talking head so if all you do to test it out is point it at the sales assistants face in the shop to test it out, you wont get a true feel for its all round performance.

A camera is just a tool. My farther in law is a carpenter, when he comes over to my house he laughs at my hammer saying it's terrible to use. His costs 4x as much and does feel better in the hand and well weighted. Now if you look at anything that he has built around my house with my hammer you wouldn't say "that looks terrible what was that nailed in with?". You can't tell. For him though, he had to concentrate a little harder when working to make up for it's shortcomings.

i feel that in certain situations with my 7D I had to think about how to get rid of the terrible moire showing up on my EVF rather than just concentrate and telling the story, shot composition etc. The fact that I don't worry about these things any more with my GH3 leaves me to concentrate on the important things while working. It's not only how the final image looks on the screen but how the tool worked to get it.

I started shooting 16 years ago. If you were starting out then, you will know that the difference between entry level 1/3" chip cameras compared to what the pro's where shooting on was huge. Now, a $1200 camera is a competitive tool that you can get great images out of.
 
All valid points.

I originally created this message because I was looking for feedback regarding these two major systems. I love the "look" of the Canons, but love the clarity/IQ of the GH3. I despise the "softness" of the Canons and the low light/high ISO performance of the GH3. at the end of the day i'll have to choose one and make the most of it.

Right now it seems like it would be easier to have a FF Canon and sharpen in most than to have a GH3 and try to reduce the noise as well as get proper color out of it.

Also the looming G6 from Panasonic looks like it could be better than the GH3 at a cheaper price....
 
ANother couple of things I dont think were mentioned..

- Cost IMO the canons are overpriced (unless you are using them for stills)

to me cost of cameras is important in the current era of a better camera every six months and big deflation on last years model

- rotating screen

I have the D600. 5d2 and Nex5n, - I love the ability with the latter, which has a rotating screen to shoot, low high and waist level ..
 
Just to throw a hammer into the works, the MK3 might not look so soft for much longer.


RAW video is in the very early testing stages but it looks like stable RAW 24p recording will be a reality very soon. @ 3Mb per frame it eats a lot of hard disk space and there's more work in post but it looks fantastic and leaves the GH3 for dead.
 
Last edited:
Nice when you want to shoot raw, but I don't need RAW at 3MB per frame most of the time. That 11 second clip would have been round 820MB!

for narrative film the RAW 5D looks great. For everything else, it's just not necessary and cumbersome in terms of workflow.
 
Last edited:
Also, I understand the 5D is outputting RAW but the sensor is still line skipping isn't it? It's not so much the codec that lets the Canon DSLR's down but how the sensor bins information to get it down to 1080p25 or 720p50 isn't it?
 
I haven't checked with the devs whether the RAW is lineskipped but the resolution is MUCH higher than the H.264 and we know for sure that the compression isn't causing the big resolution hit so lineskipping must be the culprit. The RAW lv_rec resolution looks comparable to RAW stills to me.

Shooting RAW certainly requires a bigger investment in time and money in post but to get that kind of IQ out of a camera that's the size of a v-mount battery is amazing. Keep in mind too there are no other RAW full frame cameras period.
 
Last edited:
vtwiz said:
I shoot TVCs, docs, corporates, sports features, interviews etc. I do it for a living. I have had clients say, what is all that stuff shimmering? It was all over the guys patterned tie in that interview and it was in the trees on that wide shot. Moire.
Click to expand...

Which the 5d III doesn't have. No moire. No aliasing. That's huge. People don't get it until they get that one shot where it's horrible. You can get those horrible shots with a BMC.
 
@ Maarek : The 5D still only does 720@50p though.

I just watched that 5D RAW YouTube clip full screen and am not impressed by it. I know it's only a YouTube clip but it doesn't look good to me at all.
 
I've personally shot RAW on the MK3 and like I said the video looks like RAW stills, just downscaled to 1080p. If there's a resolution hit I'm not seeing it, it's way more detailed than H.264.
 
So a Wobbling medium shot of an old shoe and a small dog and now we have amazing footage......
Must be all of the BMCC footage I've been working with lately, but color me unimpressed.....
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top