GH3 iDynamic - what do you think?

[stevedocmaker]

I just got my camera 2 days ago, and I have not done any testing of this feature yet, but a quick try looks promising at increasing dynamic range (and noise). Has anyone experimented with this?

 

[Kindredmachine]

I've been experimenting with iDynamic quite a bit and on LOW it actually appears to do a great job of increasing exposure in the shadows, giving the illusion of increased dynamic range while having very little increase to the highlights. I think this feature is actualy worth using in certain situations but we need to do more testing to see how easily the added shadow noise can be cleaned up with a denoiser and if the effect can just as easily be achieved by raising the shadows in post instead of using iDynamic feature. I'm going to do a side by side test (iDynamic vs doing it in post) to see which gives better results next week.

 

[Kindredmachine]

... I just so happened to have a gh3 and a laptop outside with me while having some coffee so I figured, what the hey, and I shot a quick comparison. Without posting screens, I can say the use of idynamic in a high contrast setting (outside) actually provides better appearance of dynamic range that just simply raising the shadows in post if you keep it on Low-Standard. Actually does a very good job. Just be careful to keep an eye on your mids and highs to ensure the featyre isn't increasing those as well. My opinion is that to keep the feature the most usable, be sure to have your scene exposed properly first. It's not something I would keep on all the time, but defintely effective and useful.

 

[stevedocmaker]

After another quick test this afternoon, I think it will be useful on the low setting, but definitely not something to leave "on". It does increase noise, but the shadow lift is decent, it will help when the darks are so crushed that lifting them in post doesn't help much. It doesn't increase the overall dynamic range, but it does help increase the useable range under high contrast lighting.