Can somebody point me to some sharp 1080p AF100 footage?

A

Adamsenoj

Well-known member
Can somebody point me to some sharp 1080p AF100 footage? I've been looking through Vimeo but most footage can only be seen on Vimeo and if you make it full screen it seems to be just blowing 720p up to fill the screen. It would be great to find some real 1080p footage with download links so it can be watched in 1080p. But I look through many and they're either not 1080p or just mundane footage not well shot or good looking.
What are your favorite sharp AF100 1080p footage? Mainly interested in wider shots rather than close ups.
 
This looks really nice lpowell. So you have and use both cams?

This is the closest I have seen AF100 and GH2. In my opinion you have to look quite hard to spot the sharper image of the GH2 and the extra sharpening in the AF100 doesn't look sharpened at all, at least not more than the GH2. Great job!
I went through your vimeo page and this looks much closer than the 2 tests with the girl in black moving around. There the AF100 is clearly softer. I just didn't understand why you recorded the AF100 in 30p and the GH2 in 24p for that?
Your vimeo channel is nice. I wish you had more AF100 videos though. It would be great to see AF100 wide shots with these settings.

I read the linked thread where you said this: I eventually boosted Detail Level up to -2 and found that the key to matching the GH2 was to adjust the AF100's Master Pedestal down to -9. That also crushes most of the low-level sensor noise from the CINE-LIKE D gamma curve, and allowed me to reduce Detail Coring to the minimum at -7.

If you are crushing blacks are you you loosing DR? Or that's not what you meant when you said:That also crushes most of the low-level sensor noise from the CINE-LIKE D?
I always have the impression the GH2 has less DN than the AF100 as the AF100 is capable of flatter images. So does the AF100 grade better?
By the way, do you use an external recording?
 
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It's funny this topic got started as I was looking for the same myself.


I wanted to know how many people sharpen in post using the AF100, and what methods you use. I'd love to see some AVCHD examples and examples recorded externally.
 
In my opinion lpowel results show that in camera sharpening may be better than post sharpening if you compare it to what Nate Haustein posted.
 
Adamsenoj said:
I read the linked thread where you said this: I eventually boosted Detail Level up to -2 and found that the key to matching the GH2 was to adjust the AF100's Master Pedestal down to -9. That also crushes most of the low-level sensor noise from the CINE-LIKE D gamma curve, and allowed me to reduce Detail Coring to the minimum at -7.

If you are crushing blacks are you you loosing DR? Or that's not what you meant when you said:That also crushes most of the low-level sensor noise from the CINE-LIKE D.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the props! I started with the GH2 in Smooth Film Mode, which I favor for daylight shooting. One of the major limitations of the GH2's consumer settings is that lacks the AF100's Master Pedestal control. In order to match the GH2's shadow detail to the AF100's Cine-like D gamma curve, I found that I needed to lower the AF100's pedestal setting to -9. While this does reduce the AF100's dynamic range a bit, it cleaned up the shadow noise and gave me a bit more headroom in the highlights. That also allowed me to raise Detail Level to -2 and take Detail Coring down to -7. While this may not be what you'd prefer for shooting with the AF100 on its own, it does match the GH2 quite well, making it ideal for my purposes.

With its 100Mbps bitrate, the hacked GH2 is able to record fine details free of digitization artifacts. This can make GH2 footage easier to grade when sharpening or high contrast is needed. However, the AF100 has less banding, making its smooth gradients easier to work with than the GH2. If I had an external recorder for the AF100, it would no doubt produce motion picture quality as good or better than the GH2.
 
The props are well deserved.

So the GH2 has less DR than the AF100? How many stops is the GH2 rated at? I think the AF100 is 10 stops right?

How limiting is the lack of pedestal adjustment when shooting high contrast day scenes with the GH2?

So you are saying that without lowering the AF100 pedestal to -9 you wouldn't have been able to make the AF100 sharper by raising it to -2? Just trying to understand the process.

When you say: This can make GH2 footage easier to grade when sharpening or high contrast is needed. Do you mean you would only shoot with the GH2 over the AF100 if a sharper image was needed, meaning wider shots and the like?

Recording the AF100 to an external recorder would produce motion picture quality as good or better than the GH2 you say, but still not as sharp right?

It seems you not surprisingly think the AF100 recorded to external recorder is much better to grade than the GH2 images even with hack?

Have you tested the GH2 with external recorder?

Do you have AF100 1080p wide shots footage shot with these GH2 matching settings or your favorite AF100 settings uploaded anywhere? I would love to see that. Problem with many footages online is that you never know if the guy knew what he was doing to judge the camera based on that. But in your case it's clear that you absolutely know what you are doing. Not a knock on anybody else though.

By the way, the AF100 does shutter speed 50 in 24p or only 48?

I'm seriously thinking about buying both these cameras.
 
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Did you shoot that? Most of the shots with the girl looked extremely sharp. In one of the medium close ups of her lying on the bed the hair was super sharp. Was that the Zeiss?
Were the wide shots in the room shot with a higher F-stop? It looked almost all in focus.
The bedroom shots are so saturated and brightly lit that it's hard to tell if you are looking at resolution or just color contrast. But it definitely looks sharp! Thanks for the link.
 
By the way, these are my favorite AF100 footage I could find so far. Where available, download the full 1080p version and watch full screen:



Very short and not so sharp but very cinematic. I know it has nothing to do with the camera but still:




Very nice:



Fantastic Anamorphic footage and very sharp too considering how old the lenses are. The night shots towards the end and the car close up are very nice too:



Sharp!:



Well, you know you like it and I'm speaking of how nicely shot it is and how nice the image looks ;) :


This reminds me of GH2 footage a lot. I think because of the crunchy look, which is a lot of what helps GH2 footage look sharper than AF100:



Erik just posted that and I had to add it here. Just gorgeous:



And now my absolute favorite! Many say AF100 looks like video and you do find many AF100 videos that do look like video. But this looks not only cinematic but has that golden era hollywood flavor in my opinion. Looks very filmic and also very sharp but not in an electronic way. The wide shots looks sharp but nice. Close ups are visibly softened on purpose. My over all favorite AF100 footage so far. Very nice cinematography.
Download the full 1080p version and watch full screen:



Most of you probably already knew all these footage, but let me know what you think anyway. ;)
 
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I know (and love) all of those, with the exception of Stations which I hadn't seen before.

It's gorgeous and yes, sharp, but if sharpness is your #1 criterion, there are other sharper cameras out there.

Snow is beautiful, and like you said, not so sharp.

Are you making note of the glass used for each?

Here's what I think is one of the best AF examples (though I'm not sure where it falls on your sharp scale), Zeiss Superspeeds.

 
I find the AF is sharp enough for me. I shot a showreel scene for a couple of actresses the other week and found myself adding a soft focus filter to everything because it was too sharp for my liking, and that's with the sharpness dialled right down.
 
groveChuck said:
I know (and love) all of those, with the exception of Stations which I hadn't seen before.

It's gorgeous and yes, sharp, but if sharpness is your #1 criterion, there are other sharper cameras out there.

Snow is beautiful, and like you said, not so sharp.

Are you making note of the glass used for each?

Here's what I think is one of the best AF examples (though I'm not sure where it falls on your sharp scale), Zeiss Superspeeds.

Click to expand...

Yes, I had seen this video already. I'm on the fence about it. It's hard to judge sharpness because it's not available as a 1080p download, or is it somewhere?
If you blow it up to full screen in a 1080p monitor it doesn't look so sharp, but it's not fair to judge it that way. On the other hand it's also not fair to judge downrezed footage if it was shot in 1080p. It will look artificially sharper.
I think what impresses more is that it clearly had some sort of budget. But I'm not sure the camera was used to its full potential. The highlights on the horse is hideous for example. It could have been exposed differently in my opinion. Not a knock on the filmmakers, but I'm more impressed by Stations or the anamorphic footages, although this also looks really nice. The other interesting point is that it seems they had the budget to use a more expensive camera but chose the AF100.

Sharpness is not really my #1 criterion. It's just one of them and an important one. But I already realized the AF100 is definitely sharp enough.

The thing that impress me about Station is how filmic it looks while being almost totally shot during the day and outside. It's much easier to make video look filmic in scenes with lots of shadows and darkness and low key lighting such as night shots and inside shots. Also impressed with the sharpness and this was the footage that sold me on the AF100. The opening shot with her and the red building look super sharp but not like video. I don't think that was sharpened in post at least it doesn't look sharpened to me. All the wide shots look sharp and nice. The high lights also look very good, specially after you read all the complaining of the AF100 highlights. Look at the shots of the pick up truck in the sun. Shows what correctly exposing can do for you.
 
Matthew B said:
I find the AF is sharp enough for me. I shot a showreel scene for a couple of actresses the other week and found myself adding a soft focus filter to everything because it was too sharp for my liking, and that's with the sharpness dialled right down.
Click to expand...

Yes it can be a subjective thing. Definitely less important in a actress demoreel or wedding videos than for example in landscape shots which is what I do a lot.
 
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