Gh4 V-log and Green Screen

[Brian Siano]

If I were to shoot green screen footage with my GH4, would there be an advantage or disadvantage to shooting with V-log? It seems to me that shooting in Vlog reduces the color range, which'd make it more difficult to extract a good key. But, a logarithmic color gamut offers some flexibility in post. Anyone have any experience on this question?

 

[Carlos Morillo]

Generally when shooting green screen one can adjust/control the lighting so you can limit the amount of stops in your scene to what your camera can handle.
Unless you specifically need to match other footage shot in V-Log I don't see the benefit.

 

[Thomas Smet]

For the most part I agree that there is little point to use v-log to shoot green screen but it all depends on what you intend to do with the v-log material. To me v-log is like an alternative to shooting raw. We shoot raw to not have a baked in image and give us more control in post to make creative decisions with. This is why the whole concept of just slapping on a LUT seems a bit odd because then you basically start with a baked in image like you would with any other profile. The hole point of shooting v-log is to have that range to grade and not just about the dynamic range. To me I like v-log because I can push the lows and highs much harder than any other format which is similar to a raw workflow. You have an image that you can decide later whet to crush the blacks or the whites in the image or keep them evenly balanced. slapping on a LUT no longer gives you the most important benefit of shooting V-log which is the huge post range to work with.

So if you are into heavy grading in post then yes use V-log for green screen. In fact in some cases it is better when you need to match background plates with different types of lighting. Compositing is all about matching the look and feel of the foreground plates to the background plates. A difference in contrast can affect that look and make the shot look as fake as a bad key. By shooting V-log you basically have the range to dial in that contrast and exposure to match your background plates.

If you are not into heavy post grading then it is a lot more work to get to a decent quick key and could potentially make things worse for you.