Low Light Streaks - Is my camera faulty?

Barry_Green said:
a few days later, you just don't notice it anymore, whether it's HVX "noise"
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I still notice this one. Drives me a little nuts. I think it gets aggravated when using a 35mm adapter. Anyway I've never had a banding problem with my GH1...and yes I can make it show up at will...just shoot properly exposed like barry says and I'd say never go over ISO 400 in underexposed shots and you should be fine.
 
Thanks for the test Barry. I got similar results (or lack of) from burning in.

Could you be a bit more specific about how to shoot to avoid the banding? I'm certainly learning to "expose to the right" more. But even when the scene as a whole is nicely exposed I'm still getting visible banding in the darker areas - shadows, shaded skin areas etc

I can't see how to avoid having some underexposed areas in a scene - you don't want everything equally lit. So any tips much appreciated.
 
Well, it can't be avoided in all circumstances. It happens. What you have to do is know when and where it happens, and try to avoid those scenarios. It happens primarily in flat surfaces that are 2.5+ stops underexposed. If there's detail in those areas you won't really see the banding, even though it's probably there. Shooting a white sheet of paper 3 stops under, you'll clearly see streaks of blue and red in it. Shooting a rippling pool or some blowing trees or something like that, you'll probably never notice or see the FPN.

If you absolutely cannot avoid the banding and it looks unacceptable to you, my advice would be to see if you can overexpose some and then bring it down in post. That's not always possible, of course, but where it is possible it will save you from visible banding.

And, frankly, there are lots of shots with banding in them that nobody will ever see, because through composition and lighting the viewer's eye is directed towards what the cinematographer wants them to see. So yes, there might be banding in the background, but if people don't notice it, it's much less of an issue. It's like 24p strobing on a pan; if you're following a subject and the viewer's eye is trained onto the subject, the viewer won't see or notice how horribly strobing the background is.
 
Thanks - good advice.
I still feel that some cameras (including mine) have it worse than others.
For instance patricks bar video looks great even though its shot at iso 1000+.
Watching that I'm sure if I shot the same thing I'd get banding. There are darker areas that look clean.

Here's a wild theory (without much evidence). Somepeople seem to have had success with burn in or have noticed the banding decrease markedly in the first few days of use. So perhaps when you first start using the camera, there's some coating which evaporates with intensive use. But if you use the camera only intermittently to start with, that coating dries on and is fixed. Then the burning in process will be ineffective.

When I first got my camera I was very busy, so although I shot a little bit with it, I wasn't using flat out (like I would have done had I had the time). And of course the whole burn-in idea didn't come until later.

In other words this change with use might be something only seen in the early days with a camera. Or it could be that cameras vary.
 
Some pretty sage advice floating out there. I'll accept it was a psychological problem on my part and it's familiarity with the camera that is making things seem less drastic. I've just now cancelled my trip to Haiti(see earlier voodoo reference) to solve the 'mud' issue.

Seriously, thanks for hearing me out on this one because, as someone pointed out earlier, I've learned a ton from this conversation. I'm going to miss the ole 'Low Light Streaks' thread however as it had become almost a second home to me.
 
Whilst we're in mythbusting mode - can we get to the bottom of whether cameras vary in their banding?

What we need is either someone who owns two cameras (and believes they're different) or we need to get together two people, one of whom thinks their camera is bad, and one who thinks their camera is good (or has improved).

Then we just need to take to pictures of the same thing with exactly the same setting. Instant result.

Somewhere in the world there must be two GH1 owners near eachother who could do the test.

I think my camera is quite bad and I'm in the UK: London, NW6. Willing to travel a bit if there's another londoner with a "low-banding" camera we could get together.
 
I have two gh1s but one is being used right now, get them both back together tomorrow. Wouldn't mind doing a quick test if ya'll can agree to the 'best' tests to do.
 
Panasonic RP-SDW32G 32GB Class 10 SDHC Memory Cards on ebay

Panasonic RP-SDW32G 32GB Class 10 SDHC Memory Cards on ebay

Hi guys,

As I sent mine GH1 back to B&H due to a lot of FPN and as I already ordered a Canon 5D Mark 2, I'm selling two Panasonic RP-SDW32G 32GB Class 10 SDHC Memory Cards on ebay. In case anyone want, just let me know. I also have the Panasonic MC Protector DMW-LMCH62 Filter for sale.

The links:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260463983073&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260463983084&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

Thanks,

Ricardo
 
meimaluco said:
Hi Mike,

As I'm almost sending my GH1 back to B&H because of the FPN, I would like to know if you still see it with the Zeiss 50 1.4 at night? Because I can't record anything at night without FPN using the stock lens.

Best,

Ricardo
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Mike@AF said:
I haven't shot anything low-light again since then. I'll try another test and let you know. I did show what I had shot at that low-light to a director that wanted to see what the camera could do and he didn't seem to notice or be bothered by it. That's a good sign. Actually he was extremely impressed. We're using it for one his projects tomorrow in fact.
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Okay I've been busy shooting several different very short projects with the GH1 over the past couple weeks, but I finally got around to doing this ISO 1600 test again. There's still banding, streaks, and noise. If I was in the same place and same lighting as the first time I shot real low light at ISO 1600 I would expect the same amount of banding, streaks, and noise. Just as Barry said, there's no burn-in.

Three of the projects I shot had very low light. I kept the camera at ISO100, ISO 200, and ISO400. One project at ISO100 is pretty much finished and the low light shots look fantastic. Another project with low-light shots at ISO100 and one with low-light shots at ISO200 and ISO400 haven't begun post quite yet, but my view of the dailies seem to show that they are very clean. No streaks or noise.

The key (as stated by many before) is to light well and expose well. If you find yourself in a low light situation try to add light. If you can't, then you need to expect the streaks and noise when you shoot at higher ISO's. In that case you may want to consider a lower aperture lens or even changing locations if that's an option.

One thing to note... if you do shoot something in low-light at ISO1600, try to add brightly lit objects somewhere. With my low-light ISO1600 tests there is considerably less streaks and noise when there are bright objects in the frame. For my initial test a few weeks ago there were a lot of lights on behind the bar. Everything away from the bar was dark. When I was shooting subjects in the low light, but had the lights behind the bar in the background (even only partially), there was much less noise and streaks overall.
 
delaney said:
I have two gh1s but one is being used right now, get them both back together tomorrow. Wouldn't mind doing a quick test if ya'll can agree to the 'best' tests to do.
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I find the best way to get banding is to shoot indoors at night with normal household lighting. At least in my house, that'll push the camera in terms of exposure. Using the kit lens point at a flat surface like a wall. Set the Iso to 400 or higher. Adjust shutter and aperture so that it's 2 or 3 stops underexposed. If your camera is anything like mine you'll get very clear banding. It particularly evidence if you move the camera as the pattern stays put.

If you could take the same shot with all the same settings on your two cameras that would be great. Of course, if the banding is the same it might just be that your two cameras happen to be equal. But if they're different we've proved that it can vary between cameras.
 
nathankw said:
Whilst we're in mythbusting mode - can we get to the bottom of whether cameras vary in their banding?

What we need is either someone who owns two cameras
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hey,
i already owned two gh1s and the first one i got had a little banding at the beginning. This thread wasnt that big as it is now but i noticed that it did go aeay after use over several days (or maybe even the day after i got it) it was clearly gone and i could shoot low light video with exactly NO banding!
I breought that cam bacl because the rubber coating wore of (as discussed in another thread) and got a new one.
This one also got bandong of course and i thought it would go away but it stayed even after shooting a few nights of video.
So the thing is:
i can clearly say banding is a device-specific issue. In quantity and quality! If that helps you... Good luck
 
I think I'm repeating myself (again) but the initial short supply of the GH1 might relate to difficulties in producing enough sensors that will pass quality control - and maybe they tightened up QC after the first were produced? OK, guesswork...
 
New batch of GH1

New batch of GH1

Ozpeter said:
I think I'm repeating myself (again) but the initial short supply of the GH1 might relate to difficulties in producing enough sensors that will pass quality control - and maybe they tightened up QC after the first were produced? OK, guesswork...
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Does anybody knows if the new GH1's that are coming out now still have the FPN issue?
 
I don't think there really was an issue, it was mainly what happens when people don't know how to shoot with these things. I can generate banding on my camera in 2 seconds...all I have to do is put on the slow-ass stock lens, turn on my one 60-watt light bulb in this room at 12:30 am, and crank the ISO to 1600. Yup that'll do it. Would I ever dream of shooting like this? Not unless something really good was happening (yes I went there) and I couldn't reach my faster glass from the bed (and because I sleep with it, as I am sure you all do, I don't see that being an issue :D)
 
Ben_B said:
I don't think there really was an issue, it was mainly what happens when people don't know how to shoot with these things. I can generate banding on my camera in 2 seconds...all I have to do is put on the slow-ass stock lens, turn on my one 60-watt light bulb in this room at 12:30 am, and crank the ISO to 1600. Yup that'll do it. Would I ever dream of shooting like this? Not unless something really good was happening (yes I went there) and I couldn't reach my faster glass from the bed (and because I sleep with it, as I am sure you all do, I don't see that being an issue :D)
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I was getting FPN with my first GH1 (with stock lens) using ISO 100, 200, 400, ... even outside on a bright day.

I already bought a second one, it will take 20 days to arrive in Brasil, so I'm wondering if it will still have it.

Did you notice that the stock lens gets a little loose on the mount of the GH1?
 
Yes, a little loose. Why dont people use iso1000/1250? if the light is so low, banding, even at that iso should not be an issue.
 
Ben_B said:
I don't think there really was an issue, it was mainly what happens when people don't know how to shoot with these things. I can generate banding on my camera in 2 seconds...all I have to do is put on the slow-ass stock lens, turn on my one 60-watt light bulb in this room at 12:30 am, and crank the ISO to 1600. Yup that'll do it. Would I ever dream of shooting like this? Not unless something really good was happening (yes I went there) and I couldn't reach my faster glass from the bed (and because I sleep with it, as I am sure you all do, I don't see that being an issue :D)
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It's definitely an issue here. Proper exposure and banding still occurs on flatter solid color surfaces.... like FACES. It's happening on a colleague's camera as well. Can't work around it. It's there all the time - Nikon prime at f1.4 shooting at 100ISO outdoors. Banding.

Fixed pattern all the way and pumping up the ISO only accentuates it.

Really hoping that it's fixable in a firmware update.
 
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