GH4 GH4: The creative choice

Well the GH4, that I bought by accident, is what has really got me into the video thing. Now I'm awaiting delivery on a C100 mk ii. Basically, nearly everything I'm doing to the GH4 image is in an effort to get it looking similar to what the C100 comes up with out of the box.
 
astromann said:
I think Erik mainly uses Sony camers these days.
Anyway about this noise thing I just dont get this at all.
I have had the GH4 well over a year and shot in many different conditions, and no real problem with noise.
I take it the histogram is ETTR mainly? I mean I have done shots in the evening with a 12-35 2.8 ap, no major problems with noise, even a bit underexposed.
Shot close ups indoors at 1600 ISO, looks fine unless its dramatically underexposed, I am a 3d artist by trade and I often work with images where I have to reduce luminance noise and color noise for textures to UV wrap,
so I have a good eye for this
You must either be doing something wrong...or have a dud camera, obviously a M4/3 cam is not going to compete with a full frame when it comes to noise specs in really low light.
But as far as being overly noisy, I just dont see that...and I have shot tons of stuff with it.
YMMV
Click to expand...

Coming from a C300/100 and 5DMKiii i do find the GH4 noisy. I use a speed booster with a 24-105 f4 which effectively makes it f2.8. I also am reluctant to go over 800 ISO.

I use Neutral Profile with contrast dialled around -4 (i think this introduces noise in the shadows. I find Neutrals colour more accurate for skin tones than CineD. I have iDynamic set to OFF and iResolution to Standard I also do not raise Master Pedistal & 0-255 luminance & NR -5. I don't prefer the overly flat look because I always end up adding contrast back anyways.

Maybe ive just been spoiled with the C300/100's low noise.
 
BeeHop said:
Coming from a C300/100 and 5DMKiii i do find the GH4 noisy. I use a speed booster with a 24-105 f4 which effectively makes it f2.8. I also am reluctant to go over 800 ISO.

I use Neutral Profile with contrast dialled around -4 (i think this introduces noise in the shadows. I find Neutrals colour more accurate for skin tones than CineD. I have iDynamic set to OFF and iResolution to Standard I also do not raise Master Pedistal & 0-255 luminance & NR -5. I don't prefer the overly flat look because I always end up adding contrast back anyways.

Maybe ive just been spoiled with the C300/100's low noise.
Click to expand...

There is low noise and creative choice. The GH4 was absolutely the creative choice because it needed a mixture of elements which only the GH4 could provide. If you look at the vid, you can see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etT4rVrGyXc - it is a mixture of noise and sharpness. This is what the band was looking for.

Also, the parts which are sharp enough are, well, sharp enough because of the contrast.
 
A quick GH4 story...

Back in November, we shot a package of commercials for one of our clients. We had a healthy (but not huge) budget, and we chose to shoot on the Alexa. We had done two previous shoots for them, both on the RED Epic Dragon. All of these shoots are the usual bright, comedic, narrative spots, shot on location.

Last week, we had to shoot some spots for the same client, but with 1/10th the budget. We scaled down the crew a bit, simplified the concepts to fit our (non) budget, and shot it all on the GH4 with the Atomos Ninja Assassin. We used the Speedbooster XL with a set of Canon CN-E prime lenses, and we shot 4K in V-Log, and recorded ProRes 422 files for a good balance of file size and bitrate.

The footage looks fantastic, even when viewed side-by-side with the Alexa footage. Sure, the Alexa skin tones might be ever so slightly better, but we're through two rounds of rough cuts, and the client couldn't be happier with how the stuff looks.

Now, you could plug in any number of cameras in place of the GH4, but the GH4 just happens to be what I have. And when you have a great cast and crew to get the best out of it, the difference between it and any other camera gets much, much smaller.
 
Definitely having a big matte box helps. The GH4 is a small camera but it can still look impressive if you put a 300 mm lens, rails, a matte box and an external monitor on it. I have learned that when working with certain clients they need a big matte box and others don't.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top