7D or GH1.... ?

twocik23

twocik23

Veteran
I wanted to hear from the real users, not some magazine review. So I'm looking into buying the Canon D7 new or used, but wasn't sure about not having the image stabilizer like my Nikon D90. How much of a difference does this make ? Curious because I've shot with it on and off and couldn't really tell the difference but again most of the time it was on a tripod.

The camera is mainly being used for video, but for pictures as well. Do you think the Gh1 would be the better buy or D7 ?
 
Wow great article Barry.

I went with the GH1 because:

1) Price $1150 with kit lens goodbye 7D I don't care what you can do. That is a lot of lens money!

2) Articulating LCD, I mainly want this for a run and gun super light weight camera. FF is all I am adding to it. If this wasn't my plan then the articulating LCD would not be a deciding factor.

3) lenses, so many so little time.

4) 14-140 and 20mm auto-focus in video. meh but it's cool at times.
 
I got my GH1 long before the 7D was announced. As I'm in PAL land the 5DmkII was out of the question for the lack of 25 fps. I thought I'd have a cool camera to make some private small projects with but was really surprise of how good the GH1 image looked, it has some aliasing but not with the colour artifacts that the 5DmkII showed. It looked good enough that I dared accept doing a commercial with it after the client had seen my small shorts and loved how they look. I explained that it's a small high-end consumer camera that's not really meant for pro jobs and the comment was "Well unlike those other guys we've worked with you can make a film-like look - their stuff looks like a news clip" (the 'guys' they refer to use traditional video cameras). Here's the result:

http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=186392

Then 7D was announced and I was happy to see that Canon had added proper frame rates and considered getting one but then the footage started to trickle in... I was disappointed to see that it has the same green-purple aliasing artifacts and even more pronounced than the 5D. Bleh, I guess a downside of having spent decades working with SD video has made me allergic to that kind of visual bugs. And after that comes 1DmkIV and same artifacts again is reported by beta testers. Now that one has at least a insane low light capacity going for it but still it's a bit embarrassing for Canon that Panasonic can do a better looking base video image in a $900 body than a $1700 one let alone $4000 or what the 1D will cost. We'll see if it remains in the production version. However the other day I stumbled across a review of the Canon Legria HF11, a dedicated camcorder and guess what - the test chart in the review reveal the same green-purple colour artifacts. It seems like Canon goes for a methodology in scaling from the sensor that's less than stellar.

http://provideocoalition.com/index.php/awilt/story/review_canon_vixia_hf11_avchd_camcorder/P1/

In my eyes the two current Canon HDSLRs produce a more 'electronic' looking moving image, the GH1 looks a whole lot more like 'film' and all these test charts confirm my gut feeling. And I'm not just talking about the obvious artifacts that pop up now and then in detailed fine patterns - I'm talking about seeing a colour shifting pixel crawl around sharp edges in portraits, in the hair, around nostrils, eye lashes and even between the white of an eye and the iris or even the reflected glint from the lighting. It's subtil but it's there - I notice it right away but a casual viewer might not see what it is, only that it feels 'electronic'. And then I'm a slo-mo junkie and as the 7Ds 720 60p really don't look good I'd have to keep the GH1 no matter what.

So I decided to stick with my GH1 for now and hopefully Panasonic doesn't wait to long with releasing a model with stronger encoding. Not that I've had any problems with encoding breaking up so far*. Hope this helps.

*Consider I have a PAL version that shoots 25 into 50i so I don't have to deal with the pulldown removal which seems to snag a lot of people. Many times I seen the 'mud scream' it has in fact been incorrect removal of the pulldown that's been the culprit. A frame consisting of two other frames with motion blur interlaced together ain't pretty.
 
Twocik-
I concur with most everything else that's already been said and give a thumbs up to the GH1 if video is the primary use. For stills, I don't think anyone would argue against the 7D.

0100-
Where did you find the GH1 for $1,150? Certainly that's not US dollars?
 
Ron Rodenmeyer said:
Twocik-
I concur with most everything else that's already been said and give a thumbs up to the GH1 if video is the primary use. For stills, I don't think anyone would argue against the 7D.

0100-
Where did you find the GH1 for $1,150? Certainly that's not US dollars?
Click to expand...


On ebay brand new. US dollars after BCB.
 
get both - then again I kind of have to for work :(

7D - you get better low light sensitivity, more than 2 worthy lenses to choose from that aren't f5.6 and $1000 (don't care what you say Panny's prices are exhorbant - you can get a similar canon lens for half the price of the kit lens msrp) and better photographs to boot. Canon charges you an arm and a leg for 2.8 and wider lenses. Panny charges you an arm and a leg for a a 4.0 lens.

Also 7D you don't get those nasty streaks and plaid patterns (mine are still on the sensor - how long do they take to fade?)
 
What is the issue with the 7Ds 50/60p's being worse than the GH1? A friend is doing a project and wanted to use the 7D for both 1080p and slow mo 720, but Barry Green's excellent review seems to think that the 50/60p on the 7D is seriously flawed.
 
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