GH2 official discussion thread

Mmmm.... I hope it locks too. Roei - looks like that one's in your camp!
I bet it won't, but the rename is encouraging.

Looks to me like the film modes interact with the video encoder like this:
If midtones are made bright so that they are continuous with highlights, you can expose lower and have both midtones and highlights place in the midrange of the color science - which is a good thing for keeping highlights richly saturated.
If there is a strong contrast between midtones and highlights in the mode, then the highlights get pushed out of the color space and a higher exposure is encouraged.
 
Roei,

Thanks for trying the HDMI, I hope you'll succed soon ;-)
I'm waiting for an HDMI tryout to decide if I get the camera.
Anyone has a sample?

thanks
 
Sage said:
Mmmm.... I hope it locks too. Roei - looks like that one's in your camp!
I bet it won't, but the rename is encouraging.

Looks to me like the film modes interact with the video encoder like this:
If midtones are made bright so that they are continuous with highlights, you can expose lower and have both midtones and highlights place in the midrange of the color science - which is a good thing for keeping highlights richly saturated.
If there is a strong contrast between midtones and highlights in the mode, then the highlights get pushed out of the color space and a higher exposure is encouraged.
Click to expand...

from what i saw on all those preferred modes (smooth, nostalgic, cinema), i feel that even after tweaking it's still too contrasty. how can i get closer to a flatter image?

+
after starting REC, the LCD turns darker and contrasty so if that's the "real" image i'm getting, it's not what i've wanted..

*forgive my horrible english
 
marceljuan said:
Roei,

Thanks for trying the HDMI, I hope you'll succed soon ;-)
I'm waiting for an HDMI tryout to decide if I get the camera.
Anyone has a sample?

thanks
Click to expand...

i'm at the mercy of the tech guy at work, he's taking his time upgrading the drivers on the Blackmagic.. so another day wasted
 
roei z said:
from what i saw on all those preferred modes (smooth, nostalgic, cinema), i feel that even after tweaking it's still too contrasty. how can i get closer to a flatter image?

+
after starting REC, the LCD turns darker and contrasty so if that's the "real" image i'm getting, it's not what i've wanted..
Click to expand...

Looks like the only things in the arsenal are -2 contrast, 'Intelligent DR" (test to see if that can lock down in the gh2, or if it still changes exposure when a shot moves), and the choice of mode. The intelligent dr feature could be exactly what we need if it does lock down.
If it gets hacked, I hope Vitaly adds -10 contrast. Also the hdmi to ninja may allow for retention of some dr.

Do you mean that the Intelligent dr goes dark when you hit record? I wonder if the implementation this time applies it after a shot is finished? Perhaps it is one evaluative exposure alteration thats takes into account the whole of the clip? Wishful thinking I suppose :}
 
It would be nice if you shoot some footage in the different mode for us all to see. Human faces in direct sunlight would be nice also. No at noon, but more so in a realistic time in the afternoon.
 
i'm not sure it's about the I DR...i disabled the Ie thing-
i think it's just changing when i start recording.. maybe it show me the real image while capturng to the card..

and BTW- Tele option is crap. looks like digital zoom.

* sorry- my mistake. works great.
 
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Dazza said:
Check out the shot into the sun, that's great, far better than on the GH1.

Intelligent D-range is just a ramped gamma curve isn't it? It would be nice if it was doing something with the sensor but I'm doubtful
Click to expand...

It is a ramped gamma curve - but - the sensor is already good. 11 stops is plenty. The biggest limitation of all these vdslrs is the software - the color science and implementations of appropriate gamma curves to fit in the video space. Red has figured this out, and with their new color spaces, they made sure that no dynamic rage is placed out of range. Consumer manufacturers could put cinema cameras in our palms with a simple bit of code - but they don't care. The way most are, its 6 stops at standard, 8 stops if lucky. If only we were given more ability to lower contrast!
 
roei z said:
Hope so... There's a setting option which says x2, x4...
Tell me what to do.
Click to expand...
OK. I just went through the Japanese-language manual, & I think I've got it.

Go into the Movie shooting menu, as shown below:
Movie Menu.jpg

Scroll through this menu until you see this text. (It says "EX Telecon" in Japanese.):
EX Telecon.jpg

Turn it [ON].

When it's on, you should see its icon on the screen (#33 below.)
Screen.jpg

Please keep in mind that I don't have a GH2. I just went through the downloaded Japanese-language manual. So I could have missed something.
 
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Sage said:
As far as evidence for that, I've seen excellent examples of standard as well.
Though shadows are crushed (I don't know if that is the grading), check this out:
http://vimeo.com/15480369
-standard
Click to expand...

Sage,

I went and looked at that and as the author Gunther Machu points out he only used Standard mode and some lite color grading in post. That brings me to my thoughts on this. It would seem to make sense that if you have access to good grading software such as Magic Bullet that you would shoot with the GH2 so that it has little or no in camera processing going on so that later, in post, you would have a cleaner slate to then apply your grading. Is Standard Mode as stripped down as it goes? What is your opinion? The GH2 will be my first DSLR. I own the Panasonic GS-400 and would shoot with all features turned off and then color correct later, thinking that was perhaps the way to do it.

Ragnar
 
ragnar said:
Sage,

I went and looked at that and as the author Gunther Machu points out he only used Standard mode and some lite color grading in post. That brings me to my thoughts on this. It would seem to make sense that if you have access to good grading software such as Magic Bullet that you would shoot with the GH2 so that it has little or no in camera processing going on so that later, in post, you would have a cleaner slate to then apply your grading. Is Standard Mode as stripped down as it goes? What is your opinion? The GH2 will be my first DSLR. I own the Panasonic GS-400 and would shoot with all features turned off and then color correct later, thinking that was perhaps the way to do it.

Ragnar
Click to expand...

That really is the way to do it. All big movies are done this way, and look flat before the colorist gets to them.
The immediate importance with the dslrs is to save the DR (highlights/shadows) from clipping and colors from bleeding with a low contrast mode, and then add the grade later to get a more expensive look.
Standard mode isn't considered the most stripped down in that sense, but a lot of factors play into the ultimate image. (when I get the cam, I'll start to develop more advanced strategies w/ the modes)
With vdslrs, the compression (8bit, 4:2:0) is the mediator, so there is a very fine point of balance when going for image flexibility. On my Canon, I started getting the best image out of a compromise picture style. (but the ultimate key is to keep as much dr as possible)
Standard stands to win some points because of this idea of trying to get the image right in cam so as to avoid codec flexibility issues in grading.

Usually the DR award goes to Nostalgic and Smooth, with nostalgic being considered to keep the most dr (because of how it pushes all the values close together at the bright end of things, so you can underexpose and keep highlights).
But it does add a yellow hue, taking away from the blue of the sky.
A great example of nostalgic:
http://vimeo.com/12906857
 
Sage said:
Standard stands to win some points because of this idea of trying to get the image right in cam so as to avoid codec flexibility issues in grading.
Usually the DR award goes to Nostalgic and Smooth, with nostalgic being considered to keep the most dr (because of how it pushes all the values close together at the bright end of things, so you can underexpose and keep highlights).
But it does add a yellow hue, taking away from the blue of the sky.
A great example of nostalgic:
http://vimeo.com/12906857
Click to expand...

Well, tweeking certainly makes sense to me. Perhaps I'll focus on Standard, Nostalgic and Smooth at first when I get my GH2(next week?). Let's hope that the C-Mount f1.2 and f1.4 1/2 and 1/3 lenses that I bought on ebay end up working with the TeleCrop feature I've been reading about.

Ragnar
 
roei z said:
that's what i did.. x4- right now it's just looks as an upscaled image of the original. maybe this feature isn't optimal with vintage lens usage? (i only have canon fd's)
Click to expand...

x4 is digital zoom.
People try to tell you how to turn on teleconverter, not digital zoom.
And it'll be fine with FD lenses, just stop them down.
 
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