GH2 official discussion thread

Matthew P said:
If there was an option to select the framerate in 40fps continuous shooting mode (like 25fps etc), it would be a dream camera.... no more problems with codecs, aliasing, low resolution (as far as the Canon DSLRs, anyway) etc etc. It would be EXTREMELY high quality. :laugh: It clearly has the potential, seeing as it can do 40fps alraedy...

The camera records in 1080i60 (also sometimes called 30i). The GH1 recorded in 24pf/25pf (basically, progressive frames stored in 60i, and 50i respectively). There's NO WAY to get true 60p from 60i, and there seems to be quite a lot of confusion about the matter (probably stemming from 43rumours), and to get 30p from 60i means loosing HALF the vertical resolution, making HD not actually HD at all.
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It isn't that hard to extract decent looking 24p from 40fps photos, little frame skipping but not tooo bad, you'd drop a frame here, wait two frames, drop a frame, wait one frame, drop a frame. Should look something like 60p converted with simple frame dropping which again, isn't that bad on shots that aren't all horizontal movement. The question would be how long can it record for in this mode, and is the quality actually that great or is it downscaling in a weird way.

As for losing vertical resolution with 60i I do not believe this is correct. The interlaced fields exist on alternating lines and then you are meshing them together. You're losing temporal resolution but not vertical. It's not deinterlacing by shoving lines together, that wouldn't work.
 
himynameisnathan said:
Cheers Ben andThat's what I thought, just wanted some clarification about it. Can FCP or AE de-interlace the footage or are other programs needed. Last thing, sorry. Apparently the sensor is actually capturing 50/60 progressive frames but interlacing them due to AVCHD, is this true, and would a hack be able to remedy this?
Once again, thanks
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AE and FCP should be able to do it. I would use Compressor in the Final Cut Studio though. Fast and allows batch functionality.
 
If the tele crop is 2.6 times and not variable it will not benefit 16mm lenses. It will leave a chip area at 1/2" or smaller. 2x crop gets 2/3" which is actually slightly smaller than a 16mm image circle. I'm hoping for a variable push in that will allow to just eliminate vignette while maintaining full video resolution
 
Anyone know yet if the variable frame rate (300% etc) will allow for slow motion in 24p mode? They showed fast motion with 300% so I assume it's a low-frame rate undercrank option for timelapses, etc. Lower framerates use much less space on the card due to compression even if stored as 24p, etc, because there are fewer changes between frames that need to be saved, less data to be compressed. You can get hours and hours on a card with the 1/2 sec shutter option in 720/60p on the GH1.

But anyway, it looks on their website like the 300% option is for under cranking in whatever framerate you're recording in...anyone know if there's an overcrank option as the sensor may be outputting 60p?
 
dop16mm said:
If the tele crop is 2.6 times and not variable it will not benefit 16mm lenses. It will leave a chip area at 1/2" or smaller. 2x crop gets 2/3" which is actually slightly smaller than a 16mm image circle. I'm hoping for a variable push in that will allow to just eliminate vignette while maintaining full video resolution
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You still will be maintaining full video resolution, just not field of view.
 
tcglog said:
Is this the same as taking a 14MP photo and then cutting out the center part and enlarging it?
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Yes, it is. The "traditional" digital zoom uses the data combined from several pixels, but this now zoom uses every pixel in the center of the sensor.
 
bighatcowboy said:
http://panasonic.net/avc/lumix/systemcamera/gms/gh2/high_speed.html#fps5

If I'm reading the chart right, no live view in 40fps burst mode. Also says 40fps max recordable.

So it's one second of 4:3 4k blind shooting video at 40fps. While I can definitely think of uses for it, not as cool as I had hoped.
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You get 2k 16:9, if it has better downscaling and compression than the video (hopefully a normal intraframe JPEG situation) then that could be useful...I don't see where you got the idea that it could only do it for one second from...still, only works for one second which is a terrible bummer...wonder how fast you can fire it off after that one second is up though. CUT ACTION CUT ACTION CUT ACTION ;)

Actually might work for some action scenes where the shot is going to last less than a second anyway...especially given that these scenes would be the most likely to mess up the codec. So like, fast punch, or a closeup gun shot, or a bullet hit, or something like that....clearly not for slow happy shots.
 
Ben_B said:
Aren't 50i and 50p both very easily converted to 25p? Just deinterlace the 1080/50i or drop the 720/50p into a 25p timeline in your NLE.
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...in case 50i store 25p from the sensor. But that's unlikely the case here : 1080p50 sensor->1080i50 container->540p25. You can't get back 1080p25 unless sensor provides 1080p25, which you don't have here. If you deinterlace from a 1080p50 signal converted to 1080i50, you won't get true 1080p25 but a mix of 2 pictures at 2 different times.

Ben_B said:
Anyone know yet if the variable frame rate (300% etc) will allow for slow motion in 24p mode?
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No, the best "slow motion" you can get is @80% : 30fps is played back at 24fps. Not much slow motion...
 
Re. the 50i vs 25p debate - it's largely an aesthetic choice. 50i looks like video - it's what tv news, soap operas and gameshows are shot with. The motion is smoother but therefore has that video look. 25p is what higher end dramas and documentaries are shot on (probably because they used to shoot of film, and kept that same frame rate when they transfered to video.)

Can you make 50i look like 25p? Yes, but it does require a lot of processing and a little loss of quality. I know because we used to do it all the time - it's called filmifying. It used to be the case that video cameras all shot 50i, so if you wanted 25p you had to filmify. This isn't a simple process. It's completely different to when you have 25p in 50i (like the GH1) because then you can just combine the fields. With true 50i you are missing some information (unless there's no movement in the frame) which has to be recreated. If you spend a lot of money and put it through custom hardware you can get very little quality loss. If you do it cheaply in software you do get significant loss.

That's my understanding anyway. So for me the GH2 sounds like a problem.
 
From the Press Release said:
The Extra Tele Conversion function virtually extends the zoom range up to 2.6x, thus the max.728mm in AVCHD Cinema/FSH mode, max. 1092mm in AVCHD SH mode and Motion JPEG HD / WVGA mode and max.1344mm in Motion JPEG VGA/QVGA mode is available with the LUMIX G VARIO HD 14-140mm / F4.0-5.8 ASPH. / MEGA O.I.S. which is developed to be exclusively compatible with movie recording.
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The press release uses the term "up to" for the tele crop function, so I'm hoping that it's variable.
 
timo.vaino said:
Yes, it is. The "traditional" digital zoom uses the data combined from several pixels, but this now zoom uses every pixel in the center of the sensor.
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So what resolution would the photos be with the tele function? How would the video still be with full resolution??

Thanks!

edit: so it basically makes the GH2 a smaller sensor camera and thus increases in reach?
 
tcglog said:
So what resolution would the photos be with the tele function? How would the video still be with full resolution??

Thanks!

edit: so it basically makes the GH2 a smaller sensor camera and thus increases in reach?
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Yeah seems like. Lowlight will probably be awful too.


As for photos, I believe somewhere I read that this mode was designed specifically for use with video...prob normal extended optical zoom feature in photos.
 
Ben_B said:
Yeah seems like. Lowlight will probably be awful too.


As for photos, I believe somewhere I read that this mode was designed specifically for use with video...prob normal extended optical zoom feature in photos.
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Thanks Ben!

I understand the only difference in video will thus be worse high ISO performance?
 
More than a little disappointed. The only positives for me seem to be the touch screen focusing, HDMI monitoring and perhaps a better codec.

Since the latter GH1s are not easily hackable, you can assume they did the same with the GH2.

The apparent lack (unless I missed something) of true 25p kills things for me. I'm shooting for UK broadcast so 25p is where I need to be, not 24p or 30p, I need 1080/25p or real 720/50p when I need slo-mo. 1080/50p would have been the deal 'maker' for me, but then the codec would need to be much faster too.
 
Exact said:
More than a little disappointed. The only positives for me seem to be the touch screen focusing, HDMI monitoring and perhaps a better codec.

Since the latter GH1s are not easily hackable, you can assume they did the same with the GH2.

The apparent lack (unless I missed something) of true 25p kills things for me. I'm shooting for UK broadcast so 25p is where I need to be, not 24p or 30p, I need 1080/25p or real 720/50p when I need slo-mo. 1080/50p would have been the deal 'maker' for me, but then the codec would need to be much faster too.
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Thats what you get when you get for not being in America! Seriously though, that sucks man. Can you shoot 24p and convert to 25p? They do that for broadcast all the time in PAL land for US movies, etc.

Looks like the codec will be better, the questions is: by how much? Looks like it will have a good GOP and B-frames but we will see.

HDMI monitoring is a big deal for me as I have an HDMI monitor (got for free, thank you 2009 Ikan contest :)) and a lot of the other features (programmable buttons!) are exciting to me. Will probably pick one up (ha! I make launch sound so easy!)

Although...if GH13 is working/would work for you I highly recommend it.
 
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