GH2 official discussion thread

etienne.jacquemart said:
Hi,
Against all odds, there's no possibility to focus using the touch screen; or only if you accept to automatically take the picture or begin recording at the same time...
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As described, it is possible.

The very nice feature of a short zoom in auto-review (present on GH1 !) has been removed. It was so useful to quickly check if the picture was correctly focus... what a dumb decision.
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What do you mean? Click the green arrow button and turn the wheel to the right. There you have your zoom. Just like int he GH1
Or touch the picture for a little while and it will enlarge.
Or what feature in the GH12 do you mean?

Generally, I preferred the GH1 rubbered finish, I find the new one very "cheap hard plastic".
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I agree.
 
In the GH1, you have in the menu auto-review (automatically review the picture just taken) two settings : normal (set the time en sec) AND zoom (set time). What I used was 1 sec full review, followed by 1 sec zoom. In GH2, you only have "normal" review of picture taken. So then you have to set to "fixed", and when the picture is reviewed, manually zoom with the wheel, that half press shutter to return to normal mode...
Not sure about the menu names, mine is in french... but just check, you'll see that the same menu is different on GH1 and GH2.
 
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AKED said:
As described, it is possible.


Yes, but I'd like the possibility to just focus, and AFTER decide if t's OK and take the picture or begin video recording. I don't necessary want both to be simultaneous ! For example, I want to make first a focus on somebody, and wait something interesting happens to begin recording. Same when you half press the shutter !
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kainekainekaine said:
Wow thanks alot for that Rigs, very quick repsonse. Had to do some pixel peeping but ive downloaded the mts clip and can see the line very slighty towards the end of the clip at the top when your at highest underexposed and at fast shutters. I can see it spring up when I hear the shutter change towards the end of the clip. I cant see it at begining as I suspect it doesent show at 1/50th -100th if the scene is correctly exposed and theres no movement of the camera or of the subject. You can use iso 3200, 6400 and sometimes it wont show other times it will. So I have a feeling you might have it but maybe its not as bad. If you could point your camera at 3200 in a dark area, with plenty of noise showing and switch between 1/50th and 1/60th you could probably just see it flick up and down on your lcd, look about 3/4 of the way down form the top of your evf or lcd. People remember this is just an early sketchy technical test to see if the line actually exists on all cameras so far, whether its acceptable that it exists in certain real world conditions is upto you. By the way Rigs I seen you GH1 hacked vs GH2 test on vimdeo, what do you think of the differences between them so far.
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yes you can see the line on the mts file at the end at 320.. so i think all cams still have it in some way or another
 
etienne.jacquemart said:
In the GH1, you have in the menu auto-review (automatically review the picture just taken) two settings : normal (set the time en sec) AND zoom (set time). What I used was 1 sec full review, followed by 1 sec zoom. In GH2, you only have "normal" review of picture taken. So then you have to set to "fixed", and when the picture is reviewed, manually zoom with the wheel, that half press shutter to return to normal mode...
Not sure about the menu names, mine is in french... but just check, you'll see that the same menu is different on GH1 and GH2.
Click to expand...
I found it in the GH1. Thanks, I did not know that feature.
Very helpful indeed.
 
etienne.jacquemart said:
AKED said:
As described, it is possible.

Yes, but I'd like the possibility to just focus, and AFTER decide if t's OK and take the picture or begin video recording. I don't necessary want both to be simultaneous ! For example, I want to make first a focus on somebody, and wait something interesting happens to begin recording. Same when you half press the shutter !
Click to expand...

You can press the lcd (touch to focus) to let the GH2 focus.
After that has happened, you can either take a picture or start filming.
Is that what you mean?
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roei z said:
yes you can see the line on the mts file at the end at 320.. so i think all cams still have it in some way or another
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I don’t see it at full 1920x1080p resolution on my desktop screen. All I see is a really unusable grainy image at best. I think you are searching to hard.

I know others have had problems and I sure wouldn't want to have anything similar to what I have seen posted on this and other sites.
As with any camera I'm trying to find the best performance and limitations it offers. In my short time with the GH2 I have noted that I will not be filming anything above 800. Our GH13's work well up to 500 iso and we never push them beyond their limit.
Our "real world" filming for broadcast over the last year (GH13, Red One MX, 7d, T2i, EX3, F9000r, 35mm Arriflex cameras and even an s100 via Nanoflash), does not include shooting underexposed scenes. I do have the luxury of a good crew that keep us properly lit. We have had some problems or issues with all of the above cameras and have learned to work around them. We even had a similar horizontal rolling bar - almost sync like problem pop up a few weeks back on a production using a Red One Mx camera, it kept popping up over the 5 days of filming and we somehow worked around it.

I know Its been said a million times before - proper lighting, fstop and iso selection, plus white balance and lens choice and some luck are always key to get getting good quality shots. Push these or any camera to its limits and you will have problems. I hope that perhaps an extremelly underexposed strain is the root of the problem that the other GH2’s are experiencing and people won't be so hard to find faults within their limitation . This is an amazing under one thousand dollar camera.

I look forward to adding the GH2 to our next production, it seems like it will provide us with certain options we may not have with the other cameras we use.

 
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etienne.jacquemart said:
Hi,
I'm new on this forum. Already owner of a GH1(3), I received my GH2 yesterday in Belgium and just wanted to share some disappointments regarding the new ergonomics :

Against all odds, there's no possibility to focus using the touch screen; or only if you accept to automatically take the picture or begin recording at the same time...

The very nice feature of a short zoom in auto-review (present on GH1 !) has been removed. It was so useful to quickly check if the picture was correctly focus... what a dumb decision.

I undersand why the clic wheel was put at the back rather that the front; but there's a kind of protruding protection that reduces to much the portion of the wheel you actually can touch. I mean on GH1, I can turn the wheel 5 to 6 clics on one finger move, on GH2 only 2-3 clics. And you have to press a lot harder to clic. And use both hands !

There is still no push auto focus button (instantly auto focus while you're in manual mode). Very usefull in movie recording.

The crop mode cannot be directly assigned to a function button : instead you assign the dedicated menu (less convenient).

The assignation of function buttons cannot be different in camera / movie mode.

When you change speed/aperture, now there's a new kind of sliding menu that I find redundant with the indications in the bottom. It's probably a matter of taste, but I don't like not to be able to remove it as it reduces the framing area.

You cannot change speed/aperture for movies unless you're in custom movie mode (worse : the speed/aperture indications that are displayed are incorrect (no effect), so are misleading).

Generally, I preferred the GH1 rubbered finish, I find the new one very "cheap hard plastic".

But of course I feel overall positive about GH2, the most important is image quality, and this has indeed improved. Just wanted to share these first thoughts...

And sorry for my bad english !
Click to expand...

Please send your GH2 to me and I will find it a proper home as it is obvious you haven’t read the manual. It actually does basically everything you said it doesn’t. You just have to read the manual to find out how to do it.
 
AKED said:
etienne.jacquemart said:
You can press the lcd (touch to focus) to let the GH2 focus.
After that has happened, you can either take a picture or start filming.
Is that what you mean?
Click to expand...

Yes... Maybe it's possible, but I wasn't able to figure how to do it ! If you use continuous focus, sometimes it works (not all times) when you move the focus target on the screen. But this is very slow. I would like to use it in instant single focus mode. You would touch a certain spot, it focuses, and that's it. Like on my Sony camcorder !
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mpgxsvcd said:
Please send your GH2 to me and I will find it a proper home as it is obvious you haven’t read the manual. It actually does basically everything you said it doesn’t. You just have to read the manual to find out how to do it.
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Then your help is welcome ! ;)
Though I admit I spent only a few hours with the camera, I can tell you I have carefully read et read again the manual (downloaded long before I got the GH2) and I used intensely the GH1(3) for about 2 years... I'm almost sure I'm not that wrong. Maybe also I'm not describing clearly what I mean. Can you correct me for at least one or two point of my list ?
 
etienne.jacquemart said:
Then your help is welcome ! ;)
Though I admit I spent only a few hours with the camera, I can tell you I have carefully read et read again the manual (downloaded long before I got the GH2) and I used intensely the GH1(3) for about 2 years... I'm almost sure I'm not that wrong. Maybe also I'm not describing clearly what I mean. Can you correct me for at least one or two point of my list ?
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There are too many things on your list for me to write about. However, if I ever get my GH2 then I am going to do a comprehensive video that answers every question that has been asked. I have been keeping a list of all of the questions and I think I know how to answer all of them. It is just easier to do it in a video format when I finally get the camera. It is crazy that it is so hard to spend our money on these cameras in the US.
 
kainekainekaine said:
Had to do some pixel peeping but ive downloaded the mts clip and can see the line very slighty towards the end of the clip at the top when your at highest underexposed and at fast shutters. I can see it spring up when I hear the shutter change towards the end of the clip.
Click to expand...
Since this post I have been looking at his downloaded clip for at least for the last twenty minutes and for the life of me I can not see anything resembling the issue we are discussing. It's just a lot of ....noise. There was an instance where i thought I saw something...but it turned out to be nothing. I've even paused the video at several locations and couldn't find a thing.
 
GrahamH said:
A very small number are shipping already, I think only in the west. It seems like anyone's guess when and where they will become widespread.
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Thanks! I have tried to call Panasonic for answers, but they just repeat what's on the website: Approx. December...

Harumph! And, I live in the west: California. Oh well, Patience is an attribute...

Thanks again.
 
AKED said:
etienne.jacquemart said:
Yes, that works on the GH2.
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Yesssss !!! After spending hours in vain trying to make touch focus work, I just switched my 14-140 lens (on which I just installed the latest FW) to the 20mm pancake... And it works ! I put back the 14-140, and now it's working also. It must have been some kind of bug, as if the lens needed to be "rebooted" after update. I was getting upset of being a complete dumb, as the principle is simple as touching the screen !
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Ian-T said:
Since this post I have been looking at his downloaded clip for at least for the last twenty minutes and for the life of me I can not see anything resembling the issue we are discussing. It's just a lot of ....noise. There was an instance where i thought I saw something...but it turned out to be nothing. I've even paused the video at several locations and couldn't find a thing.
Click to expand...

Maybe we need better underexposed eye glasses to show the flaws :). I'm moving onto to filming some real stuff. hopefully the others can do the same and we can get onto seeing what this GH2 can really do.
 
AKED said:
Yesssss !!! After spending hours in vain trying to make touch focus work, I just switched my 14-140 lens (on which I just installed the latest FW) to the 20mm pancake... And it works ! I put back the 14-140, and now it's working also. It must have been some kind of bug, as if the lens needed to be "rebooted" after update. I was getting upset of being a complete dumb, as the principle is simple as touching the screen !
Click to expand...
Ok, so it IS possible to touch in 1 spot and have it focus and then simply touch in another spot if you want to focus on something else (WHILE RECORDING)?

To take that a step further....is it possible to touch focus (simply just touch the screen where you want to focus) and have it continuously focus in that 1 spot?

I want to use the GH2 for some club work and I that would be a really useful feature.
 
Hi all,

Just for info.

1) New firmware lens for 14/140 Ver. 1.4 released yesterday Dec 7 2010.
For Video use : best AF and best OIS.

2) I found some bugs on the GH-2 rel. 1.0 PAL version. Some compatibility problem with HDMI out to LCD TV different brand from Panasonic ( LG etc.).

Last test : Seems that the problem is only in play mode > HDMI out during REC seems good.
 
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