GH2 HELP! Quick advice needed for taking stills to use as matte paintings

dvxhutch

dvxhutch

Well-known member
Hey guys,

I love my gh2s but I've never really used them for stills. However, after seeing the awesome tutorial below, you can add a lot of latitude and detail by overlaying a higher resolution still as a matte painting on the static parts of your shot.

Can someone please give me pointers for using the gh2 for stills? I want to take wides of buildings at night, and also of city buildings during the day.

Which settings do you use? etc.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

http://vimeo.com/20003389
 
hutch - thanks for the link to the tutorial. I'm going to have to see if I can do something similar in Vegas.

I do use the GH2 for stills as well as video, so I have a few thoughts that might be helpful:

1. read a basic tutorial on stills - there are a few inexpensive starter books like BetterPhoto Basics and Really (x3) Easy Step-by-step Digital Photography. There are also a few free online tutorials from places like National Geographic and Nikon.

2. sorry to suggest this, since it is so poorly written, but re-read the manual from the still perspective. There's a lot of stuff in there that you may have missed the first time if you read it with an exclusive eye towards shooting video (e.g., exposure bracketing). If the poor writing in the manual is too much of a challenge, I recommend GH2: The Unofficial Quintessential Guide.

3. for your specific purpose, make sure the GH2's still aspect ratio matches your video aspect ratio (e.g., 16:9). Your default still aspect ratio is probably set at 4:3.

4. RAW vs. JPEG: your GH2 is a world-class camera in RAW if you have the time and expertise to manipulate your stills in post. It looks like you're going to be busy enough in post with the matte process. I recommend that you use JPEG on the highest quality setting and "M" (medium) file size (so you don't lose ETC).

5. white balance - since you're shooting JPEG, you will have limited ability to deal with this in post. The GH2 requires attention in this area. Personally, I adjust the camera's AWB away from green and down toward magenta a little using the AWB adjust tool. I also move it a few clicks to the left. You'll have to experiment a little to see what works best for you.

6. For your daytime cityscapes, I strongly recommend a polarizing filter if you're not already using one for video. They eliminate that washed-out sky look and give you a dramatic deep blue sky instead.

7. at night, you'll be using long exposures and a tripod to gather the light you need for your matte still. Take lots of pictures with various exposure times (and a few different white balance settings). It won't take a lot of time, but may save your bacon in post.

8. experiment, experiment, experiment - again, this is easier with still photos, and your learning curve will be steep since you're already comfortable with the camera.

Good luck and I hope this was helpful. Look forward to seeing examples posted, when you have them!
Bill
 
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thats brilliant! Just expose as desired, set WB, shoot in RAW. Stills are more forgiving than video in my opinion.
 
I can recommend getting Olympus E-PL1 body for still images. The jpeg's are so fine that Lumix can not touch them even if one took the extra time to shoot and develop RAW.
 
Aki_Hartikainen said:
I can recommend getting Olympus E-PL1 body for still images. The jpeg's are so fine that Lumix can not touch them even if one took the extra time to shoot and develop RAW.
Click to expand...
I wish people who post like this would make it clear this your opinion rather than making such absolute walled statements. How about posting some samples that prove this statement... Al
 
Aki_Hartikainen said:
I can recommend getting Olympus E-PL1 body for still images. The jpeg's are so fine that Lumix can not touch them even if one took the extra time to shoot and develop RAW.
Click to expand...

I have heard this from other M4/3 shooters as well.

We all know the GH2's JPEG encoder is about the worst - well it seems the Oly's is about the best. Process of elimination has to point somewhere.
 
It makes no sense to use another camera body to shoot the stills. The whole idea is that, with the twist of the dial, you can shoot a high resolution still from the exact same position and the exact same lens as the video. Using another camera to shoot the stills wastes valuable time and introduces problems because of lens and position differences. Anyway, shooting RAW with the GH2 will be just fine, especially since that skips the JPEG encoder, and the still gets downsampled to 1920x1080 anyway. The examples in the tutorial posted by the OP are cool, and I think this is a valid way of getting more dynamic range out of the camera. Of course, these are only really good for locked down shots, but I'm going to try this on my next project. Interesting!
 
I have the same lenses for both Oly and Lumix. I lock down the tripod, and both cameras have the quick lock for the tripod. Changing the camera on the tripod on a whim has only marginal impact on the field of view, easily corrected later. Not saying that the GH2 still images could not work well, but they are not the best quality and the two camera approach is actually viable too.
 
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Like dvbrother says, it makes no difference if one camera has better quality than another... because to get the effect, you have to shoot the exact same framing/focal length/DOF/etc from the exact same position, so you use the exact same camera that you're shooting the video with. The point of the still image is to boost shadow detail, not catch every detail, so ultimate quality isn't worth the fuss to match switched cameras. You know, that whole adage about forests and trees....

I've actually been using something roughly akin to this for a while when shooting real estate interiors... I lock down a lovely interior shot with grand window views, and then switch exposures - one exposed for inside letting the windows blow out, and another exposed for outside letting the interior go dark... then in FCP, composite them together with "screen"... kind of a poor man's HDR video. With some tape, markers, stopwatch, and fiddling I can match slow pans or slides well enough, or just a digital slow-zoom if time is tight.
 
brunerww said:
hutch - thanks for the link to the tutorial. I'm going to have to see if I can do something similar in Vegas.

I do use the GH2 for stills as well as video, so I have a few thoughts that might be helpful:

1. read a basic tutorial on stills - there are a few inexpensive starter books like BetterPhoto Basics and Really (x3) Easy Step-by-step Digital Photography. There are also a few free online tutorials from places like National Geographic and Nikon.

2. sorry to suggest this, since it is so poorly written, but re-read the manual from the still perspective. There's a lot of stuff in there that you may have missed the first time if you read it with an exclusive eye towards shooting video (e.g., exposure bracketing). If the poor writing in the manual is too much of a challenge, I recommend GH2: The Unofficial Quintessential Guide.

3. for your specific purpose, make sure the GH2's still aspect ratio matches your video aspect ratio (e.g., 16:9). Your default still aspect ratio is probably set at 4:3.

4. RAW vs. JPEG: your GH2 is a world-class camera in RAW if you have the time and expertise to manipulate your stills in post. It looks like you're going to be busy enough in post with the matte process. I recommend that you use JPEG on the highest quality setting and "M" (medium) file size (so you don't lose ETC).

5. white balance - since you're shooting JPEG, you will have limited ability to deal with this in post. The GH2 requires attention in this area. Personally, I adjust the camera's AWB away from green and down toward magenta a little using the AWB adjust tool. I also move it a few clicks to the left. You'll have to experiment a little to see what works best for you.

6. For your daytime cityscapes, I strongly recommend a polarizing filter if you're not already using one for video. They eliminate that washed-out sky look and give you a dramatic deep blue sky instead.

7. at night, you'll be using long exposures and a tripod to gather the light you need for your matte still. Take lots of pictures with various exposure times (and a few different white balance settings). It won't take a lot of time, but may save your bacon in post.

8. experiment, experiment, experiment - again, this is easier with still photos, and your learning curve will be steep since you're already comfortable with the camera.

Good luck and I hope this was helpful. Look forward to seeing examples posted, when you have them!
Bill
Click to expand...

Thanks Bill! I didn't expect all my questions to be answered in the first post, but you have!
 
mcbob said:
I've actually been using something roughly akin to this for a while when shooting real estate interiors... I lock down a lovely interior shot with grand window views, and then switch exposures - one exposed for inside letting the windows blow out, and another exposed for outside letting the interior go dark... then in FCP, composite them together with "screen"... kind of a poor man's HDR video.
Click to expand...

Great info mcbob, will definitely try that as well, thanks!
 
Guys, thanks for all the feedback. On the tutorial's vimeo site, the maker of the video says that it's possible to use this technique for moving shots as well, but doesn't elaborate.


Any ideas how that would be possible?
 
dvxhutch said:
Guys, thanks for all the feedback. On the tutorial's vimeo site, the maker of the video says that it's possible to use this technique for moving shots as well, but doesn't elaborate.


Any ideas how that would be possible?
Click to expand...

Just take multiple photos to cover the area that you are shooting.
Use a stitching program to put them together.
Of course this can be difficult to do depending
on the camera movement and lens settings.
Also, knowing how to use After Effects and
tracking software would help.....
 
dvxhutch said:
Guys, thanks for all the feedback. On the tutorial's vimeo site, the maker of the video says that it's possible to use this technique for moving shots as well, but doesn't elaborate.


Any ideas how that would be possible?
Click to expand...


You would need to track the scene. The process would be similar to the tutorial below, except you would be tracking in your own stills from the scene instead of a castle.
http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/set_extensions/
 
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