GH4 HDMI lag and the GH5 / Will it be fixed?

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danielisaiah

Active member
I know the official firmware for the GH5 wont be out until the camera ship date... but... for those of us who use external monitors this an important subject and I don't think I'm alone in hoping it is addressed.

This problem of HDMI lag has plagued focusing and sound syncing through the life cycle of the GH4 (specifically in filming in 24p) and I believe there was a massive assumption that this would be addressed in the GH5.

There are no comprehensive videos out there (that I can find) from the Panasonic ambassadors with pre-production GH5's that are focusing on this. I invite any of those lucky souls to do a test....or...for a Panasonic representative to speak officially on what were seeing in unrelated video reviews (example - some of the CES shots attached an Atomos external monitor - you can clearly see the lag happening)

While there have been wholesale improvements in the flip out LCD, its still relatively small for critical focusing during productions...

I guess my question is: What are the technical issue or limitations...especially at 24p? Why is the lag so much better at higher frame rates (like 60p).

It "seems" like something like this would be relatively simple to solve. Other, more inexpensive cameras don't seem to have this lag issue through their HDMI ports.

I'm sure GH5 is well underway with physical production, so how much more time is there to tweak the release firmware to possibly correct or at least improve the lag?


thanks for any responses in advance!


@moderator: We need a GH5 prefix
 
I posted a couple videos in the GH5 thread showing the lag has not been fixed. Someone asked a Panasonic insider who said newer firmware has improved it a bit, but they were still working on it.
 
I guess the frustration is that one would think the folks at Panasonic would have addressed this issue in the firmware or even hardware development of the GH5. It “seems” like a low level issue to fix, considering the new technology we know is being implemented in the camera.

The GH series, going all the way back to the GH1, has been primarily used by video enthusiasts as well as professionals….the later models skewed towards the professional side. I don't one fellow GH user who uses it for (primarily) photography. I have seen more GH3’s and GH4’s rigged up with cages and rails with external monitors in our community than not…and I know this a problem that they are well aware of. Now…I realize that THIS particular issue wasn’t the first thing they thought when there were designing the GH5 platform. But I also imagine that they are getting close to the cutoff for the production firmware to make late march production schedules. So….I REALLY hope that they consider this problem. I dream of smooth dolly shots that are dead on without 10 practice runs on the FF to compensate for the delay.

And again….what is the actual technical limitation (at least in the current GH4 and pre –release firmware of the GH5)? Decoding 24p down from 4k sources? HDMI bandwidth? Heat? If 60p can be shown with little or no delay, why not lower frame rates?
 
danielisaiah said:
I guess the frustration is that one would think the folks at Panasonic would have addressed this issue in the firmware or even hardware development of the GH5.
Click to expand...
No one outside of Panasonic engineering has much visibility into the GH-line's image processing pipeline. It has been confirmed, though, that certain hardware/firmware interdependencies were "locked" from the GH4 into the design of the GH5. This is to say that even with increased processing power, certain design limitations can preclude a seemingly simple fix from being implemented. HDMI lag may well fit that category. It doesn't mean that Panasonic isn't aware or doesn't care, only that an architectural change is required to address.
 
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