GH2 PLEASE Talk me into getting a GH2 and hacking it

ripupthehwy

ripupthehwy

Well-known member
Okay, seems most everyone on here is enjoying shooting with a hacked GH2.
I have about 3 grand to spend for a camera/equip for a couple future projects. I REALLY want the Nikon D800 but price and the fact I'll have to wait weeks and weeks for delivery of it is a serious roadblock (I have an important docu shoot on death row at end of this month). So anyways I had almost decided to sacrifice the lush shallow DOF and awesome look of the D800 and get a GH2. After all, that will leave me with so much money left for a slider dolly, monitor, etc.

Here's my concern: After trying to educate myself on the hacking procedures (and no I won't shoot with it un-hacked. I need best quality possible) I fear this is too much trouble and risk. I watched this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPhrMmX4E3Y&feature=fvwrel WTF !!! Crashes?? Lose all your footage??
Hell no. I can't go shoot interviews on death row and risk the thing locking up and losing all the footage. This is a one time opportunity.

I was going to also use the camera for shooting a TV drama series. I'm talking long 10-12 hour shoot days. Lots of footage. I need this thing to PERFORM. Not just shoot USELESS 2 MIN. CLIPS to post on VIMEO to brag about myself. Is anyone shooting anything long form with this thing without it crashing, overheating, or losing footage? PLEASE TALK ME INTO OR OUT OF THIS BEFORE IT"S TOO LATE. i hope some people can end my worries and assure me of a painless encounter with getting this thing.
Thanks :-)
 
Well, you can get plenty of shallow depth of field on the GH2, depending on your lens/fstop.

As for hacking it... for interviews, you could seriously leave it unhacked and be fine, especially if they were locked down shots. But if you must hack it, use a good patch that doesn't push the camera to it's extreme. I use Cake or Flowmotion... neither of which has ever crashed or locked my camera using a Class 6 card.

Of course, that's not a guarantee... If you need to be 100% sure the camera will record as advertised... you can't hack it.
 
There's no 100% guarantee. Even a factory-direct camera can malfunction, though its not too likely.

If you love what you see from the GH2 get one and put FlowMotion 2.02 on it and use a Class 10 card and you're set. I've never had a crash or lockup with my Transcend 16G card.
 
For the TV drama, don't they have it in their budget for at the very least an AF100/FS100 and external recorder so that way you have the security of dual recording?

In terms of the hacked GH2, I recently used it as my B cam (F3 was A cam) for a feature and the only time I had problems was when I wasn't using Sandisk class 10 cards. But I was using one of the higher end hacks. But as others have said there is no guarantee. I've had the 5D (unhacked) malfunction on me and lose footage more than the GH2, so you never know.
 
For the TV drama, don't they have it in their budget for at the very least an AF100/FS100 and external recorder so that way you have the security of dual recording?
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No, not yet. this is local "Low budget, I fund it myself and make money on the back end" TV. lol :-) Also, I'm just not convinced the af100 gives as much of a filmic look compared to the Nikon D800 , Canon D5, or even the GH2. JMHO from what I've looked at.

There's no 100% guarantee. Even a factory-direct camera can malfunction, though its not too likely.
.. get one and put FlowMotion 2.02 on it and use a Class 10 card and you're set. I've never had a crash or lockup with my Transcend 16G card.
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If i go with the GH2 I'll try the flowmotion, which I've never heard of. BTW I don't need the highest bitrate possible, as I'm sure that increases the possibility of crashes right? I mean, isn't there a significant enough quality increase with going somewhere around 75mbps??
've had the 5D (unhacked) malfunction on me and lose footage more than the GH2, so you never know.
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Interesting.
 
ripupthehwy said:
No, not yet. this is local "Low budget, I fund it myself and make money on the back end" TV. lol :-) Also, I'm just not convinced the af100 gives as much of a filmic look compared to the Nikon D800 , Canon D5, or even the GH2. JMHO from what I've looked at.
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Yea, I definitely prefer the GH2 look over the AF100 (although I do really like the AF100 look for documentary work and used one for about a year on a documentary I was shooting). I think, but I'm not sure, you can use GH2's hdmi feed for an external recorder like the Ninja. I believe there is a debate on whether it provides any quality increase, but at least then you will have the dual recording.
 
Rip,

The FLOWMOTION patch is from user LPOWELL who created arguably the best and most stable hacks for the previous GH1 camera. He has A LOT of experience with this.
Flowmotion 2.02 is his 'flagship' hack for the GH2 and it has seen VERY wide adoption in the past couple of months since he released it. It hovers around that 75-100mbps data rate, renders what many feel to be the smoothest motion while still outputting a data rate that HUGELY reduces macro-blocking and color banding.
I use this patch as well.
Oh, and they play back in camera so you can confirm your shot.
Results from many users seem to show that it is about as stable as a NON-hacked GH2 when using the more affordable standard class-10 Sandisk cards. This has been my experience too. The Super high-rate Sandisk Extreme Pro 32G (or is it 64G?) cards are just out of my budget range still.

The hacked GH2 will give you plenty of sharpness and detail - your lenses will give you the 'character' you prefer.

~Cheers!
 
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Cory Braun said:
Yea, I definitely prefer the GH2 look over the AF100 (although I do really like the AF100 look for documentary work and used one for about a year on a documentary I was shooting). I think, but I'm not sure, you can use GH2's hdmi feed for an external recorder like the Ninja. I believe there is a debate on whether it provides any quality increase, but at least then you will have the dual recording.
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Nah! The HDMI stream ABSOLUTELY gives you a better image - but it's a huge amount of extra work and cost - and these fully evolved new hacks bring you SO close to the HDMI signal that there is little justification anymore for all that hassle.
A smart fella posted a series of non-hack and hack vs. HDMI frames for study over on the "Personal View" site. It was pretty crystal clear.
 
Flow Motion v2 uses the GH2's video mode options to provide two user-selectable bitrate ranges:

100Mbps peak - 1080p 24H, 1080p HBR, 1080i FSH, and 720p SH modes.
60Mbps peak - 1080p 24L, 1080i FH, and 720p H modes.

* 100Mbps: optimized for the finest motion picture quality, using manual exposure lenses.
* 60Mbps: optimized for absolute reliability and extended file-spanning on standard Class 10 SD cards.

In practice, Flow Motion's 60Mbps videos are visually indistinguishable from its 100Mbps videos in all but the busiest types of scenes. Dark areas in underexposed shots may also benefit from a 100Mbps bitrate. And if you need the highest image quality the camera can produce, 1080p 24H mode will automatically work at peak bitrates up to 140Mbps when needed.

Here's a download link to the current Flow Motion v2 patch:

[h=1]GH2 100Mbps Flow Motion v2 Patch - Banding & Blocking Be Gone![/h]
 
Thanks everyone for your responses. This is a huge help.
One final question: I shot a couple years ago with a Canon T2i. Aside from the shutter constantly closing while not shooting and the batteries lasting only long enough to fire off a few quick shots (literally) the camera also seemed to overheat.
What's battery life like with the GH2? Does it get hot/overheat? I assume since there's not shutter I need not worry about it closing all the time when sitting idle/not shooting.
 
ripupthehwy said:
Thanks everyone for your responses. This is a huge help.
One final question: I shot a couple years ago with a Canon T2i. Aside from the shutter constantly closing while not shooting and the batteries lasting only long enough to fire off a few quick shots (literally) the camera also seemed to overheat.
What's battery life like with the GH2? Does it get hot/overheat? I assume since there's not shutter I need not worry about it closing all the time when sitting idle/not shooting.
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These do not happen with the GH2.
I've done hour-long continuous shots without running the battery all the way down.
It is wise of course to buy at least 1 extra PANASONIC GH2 battery (3rd party are not recommended), but this is the case with any video camera.
 
I shot a feature this year on the GH2 (as well as a bunch of smaller projects ranging from corporate talking head stuff to events, shorts, docs, etc.) and never had any problems with overheating, camera lockups, corrupted cards or lost footage, etc. Always shot with a hacked camera and sandisk extreme 32gb and 16b cards, post through the adobe suite.

Battery life is decent, I can count on a hour + per battery (shooting time, 2+ if you turn the camera off between takes). If you're planning on using the camera for long production days I'd definitely recommend getting an external battery solution (either v-mount or anton bauer). It's definitely worth the expense, and will make your life easier regardless of the camera you're using.

I shot a feature last month on the C300, and while I enjoyed working the with C300 much more from an ergonomics and workflow standpoint, I don't think the GH2 loses anything in terms of the final, graded image. The only negatives to the GH2 are limited dynamic range, poor ergonomics and a lack of features, and much less room for error in-camera in regards to exposure and color.

In my opinion the GH2 is currently the best low-cost S16mm alternative.
 
$3000?

GH2 - ~$700
extra batteries, cards, etc - ~$300

That leaves you ~$2000 for lenses, which should be a pretty darned good start.

$3000 just gets you one full-frame, 30-minute-max camera body with no lenses
 
The price-to-play is sufficiently low and the actual hack procedure is virtually full proof at this point. FWIW I was able to shoot the hacked GH2 (flowmotion 2) simultaneously with a D800 recently and that $3K brick has absolutely nothing on the GH2 that I could see. I've seen some good stuff from the D800 using external recorders but I think the "filmic" look or advantages in DR are really going to depend on the subject. I've used the GH2 as a B camera in interview setups for more than a year now and its been a reliable and (very) cost effective tool.

To be honest, the only complaint I have about the GH2 is the tripod mount.
 
So far I've shot 4 short films a feature film, 3 commercials, and assorted B-cam footage for a Syfy movie with mine, and other than the rolling shutter (which isn't really bad just can't do any shaky cam FX with it) the Highlight rolloff (which is manageable) I wouldn't trade my hacked GH2 (Quantum 9B) for anything short of a Scarlet....anything.

 
mcbob said:
$3000?

GH2 - ~$700
extra batteries, cards, etc - ~$300

That leaves you ~$2000 for lenses, which should be a pretty darned good start.

$3000 just gets you one full-frame, 30-minute-max camera body with no lenses
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Couldn't have said it better myself, I LOVE my gh2!! No regrets!! Currently using Sanity 5 hack
 
If you know the limits: reduced color range, AVCHD codec, no space for exposure errors, then you can get great footage out of a hacked one.
Make sure to have the fastest cards if you want to go with high bitrates.
 
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