GH3 Why cant i get shallow depth of field like a cheaper canon dslr?

PegLeg Media

PegLeg Media

Well-known member
I film a lot of video interviews and the clients always ask me if I can get a shallower depth of field, but my GH3 just cant.

I use a GH3 and have a canon 50mm 1.4, a panasonic 25mm 1.4 and an olympus 45mm 1.8. None of them get that shallow depth of field, even opened all the way with tons of light in the room. I found this guy who uses a Canon 60d which is a MUCH cheaper option, with a canon 1.8 50mm lens which doesnt even open up as wide as my lenses yet his depth of field is on another level. he could probably spend $700 to my $1500+

here is his video:
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBr82ewZgB8&hd=1

anyone know if my GH3 could get this look? and how?
 
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PegLeg Media said:
I film a lot of video interviews and the clients always ask me if I can get a shallower depth of field, but my GH3 just cant.

I use a GH3 and have a canon 50mm 1.4, a panasonic 25mm 1.4 and an olympus 45mm 1.8. None of them get that shallow depth of field, even opened all the way with tons of light in the room. I found this guy who uses a Canon 60d which is a MUCH cheaper option, with a canon 1.8 50mm lens which doesnt even open up as wide as my lenses yet his depth of field is on another level. he could probably spend $700 to my $1500+

here is his video:
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBr82ewZgB8&hd=1

anyone know if my GH3 could get this look? and how?
Click to expand...

Well the GH3 sensor is much smaller then the canon dslr's. So you will need much faster lenses to get the same shallow depth of field. Have a look into the Voightlander 25mm 0.95 and 17,5mm 0.95 and also the slr magic hyperprimes. That will do the trick.

You also might want to look into the Metabones speedbooster. That will also help to some degree.

You probably have checked this before buying the GH3 if shallow depth of field was your main goal, you would have gotton cheaper off with the canon dslrs for sure.

Cheers
 
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Technically your GH3 is a MUCH better camera than any of Canons APS-C cameras for video. All you need is a Speedbooster and some Full Frame or APS-C lenses and you can have the same DOF as your mates 60D.
 
Your Canon 50mm f/1.4 will give you exactly the same depth of field at the same distance, focus, and aperture setting on both cameras. You get a bit tighter field of view on the GH3.
 
If your number one priority is shallow depth of field, you should have the biggest sensor you can get. And that's not in the GH3. You'll want a "full frame" sensor DSLR.

But... there's a heck of a lot more to video than just depth of field. And the GH3 excels at most of them.

As to getting the shallowest depth of field that you can from the GH3, shoot long lenses, up close to the subject, at wide open aperture, and with as much spacing as you can get between your subject and the background that you want to be out of focus. Don't be afraid to pull your subject to a doorway so that the background is all the way across a room -- put the camera on the other side and shoot through the doorway if you have to. Else, put your back right right into a corner and pull your subject close to you so the background is diagonally across the room.
 
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Why would having tons of light in the room help with your aperture wide open? Perhaps your closing your aperture down instead of opening it?
 
PegLeg Media said:
I film a lot of video interviews and the clients always ask me if I can get a shallower depth of field, but my GH3 just cant.
Click to expand...

I've been shooting corporate interviews for the past 2+ years with GH2 and GH3 cameras, and have no trouble at all achieving a shallow DOF look.

All I can assume is that there is something wrong with your camera technique, as the difference in DOF between a GH3 and a 60D is less than 1 F-Stop. ( I owned a 60D for about 4 months, then sold ALL my Canon gear after using the GH2 camera for about one month, because the GH2 produced significantly better video images than the 60D ever did )

If you want to match the FOV ( field of view ) and DOF ( depth of field ) that you get with a 50mm f/1.8 lens on a 60D body, you will need to use a 35mm lens at f/1.4. Or you can buy a SpeedBooster adapter and use the same 50mm f/1.8 lens at f/1.8. With correct positioning the look in terms of DOF will be identical.

If absolute shallow DOF is a big thing for you, then you should buy a Full Frame sensor camera like the Canon 5D Mk3 or the Nikon D800.

Personally I find shallow DOF a problem with Full Frame cameras because most of the time the DOF is TOO shallow, where you can shoot a tight head'n'shoulders shot where the person's eyes are in focus but the their nose is out of focus, which looks terrible. Even the cable network show "Wilfred" which is shot with Nikon D800 Full Frame cameras sometimes has way too shallow DOF in their shots, where I feel like something is wrong with my eyes while watching the show because almost nothing is in focus.

For my corporate shoots the DOF of the GH3 is perfect, and most of the time I'm shooting between f/2.0 - f/2.8 for most of my shots.
 
?? You're doing something wrong/not doing something right if you can't get shallow DOF with the Oly 45mm on the GH3.

I've shot tons of film projects using the Canon and Nikon 85mms as well as the Canon 85mm 1.8 (which has beautiful bokeh as well.)
The Oly 45mm is right there with them in terms of getting a completely, soft, perfectly OF background, and the it handles specular light really beautifully as well.
On the GH3, it's right there with the best combinations - to the point where I don't even think of it as a crop sensor vs my FF cameras.

Hell, the Oly 12mm can get decent DOF if you shoot it right.
But the 45mm...it ain't the lens that's holding you back that's for sure.
 
TheDingo said:
I've been shooting corporate interviews for the past 2+ years with GH2 and GH3 cameras, and have no trouble at all achieving a shallow DOF look.

All I can assume is that there is something wrong with your camera technique, as the difference in DOF between a GH3 and a 60D is less than 1 F-Stop. ( I owned a 60D for about 4 months, then sold ALL my Canon gear after using the GH2 camera for about one month, because the GH2 produced significantly better video images than the 60D ever did )
.
Click to expand...

Thanks for all the help guys. I love the gh3, I just spent an hour with a client shooting a simple blog video asking me how to get shallower depth of field and if we should use his t2i instead of my gh3. But his reference was only looking at my 7inch monitor.

i had another client asking the same thing a couple months ago and looked dumb not being able to give him an answer or solution.

and TheDingo, do you have some examples up I can watch for reference?
 
PegLeg,

You can find examples yourself. Your problem is a lack of understanding of basic photography, all of the principles of which apply to motion picture. You appear to have "jumped into" this video/motion picture thing somewhat unprepared.

Here is a link to a youtube video that kind of covers some of depth of field management:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wjSfsDkzyAI

I personally don't use the depth of field calculators he describes, I've always used the depth of field prevue function of the camera to see what my setup is doing (photography and motion picture are visual things, where there is a way to "see" I don't "work by the numbers"). You should have CONSTANT PREVUE set to ON and have EXPOSURE MODE set to "M" (for manual) and your LCD/viewfinder image on the GH3 will lighten and darken as you adjust exposure. You will also be able to SEE the depth of field your whole setup is giving you. I recommend looking at this through a loupe with 3x magnification although I can often see it well enough in the EVF.

There is NO MAGIC one lens or one setting that will solve this problem for you. You must MANAGE it through working distance, lens selection, aperture selection, and subject to background elements distance.

Do your research, the web is a great resource and some of the articles are even well illustrated.
 
I know all of those factors. I have been doing video for 10 years. Working with dslr's for 4. I can get a shallow depth of field just not like in that video I posted. Here is one if the videos the client wanted better depth to:

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Any suggestions for this shoot? We were back as far as possible so couldn't get him farther from the wall


Sent from my iPhone
 
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PegLeg Media said:
... I found this guy who uses a Canon 60d which is a MUCH cheaper option, with a canon 1.8 50mm lens which doesnt even open up as wide as my lenses yet his depth of field is on another level....

anyone know if my GH3 could get this look? and how?
Click to expand...

APS-C crop is x1.6, m43 x2. Rough approximation for DOF calculations is a 1-stop difference.

To get the same approximate DOF and FOV on a m43 sensor as a APS-C sensor utilizing a 50/1.8 lens, you will need a ~40/1.2 lens (assuming both are opened all the way).

Dead-simplest way to get S35-style DOF/FOV with cheap lenses is the MetaBones Speedbooster (plus any compatible nifty-fifty) [EDIT: ok, yeah, the CV 42.5/0.95 or forthcoming Leica DG 42.5/1.2 would be THE dead-simplest way if you can afford it.]

The PL25, O45, and FD50 are good glass, the m43-native options yielding a beautiful, sharp image. Their FOV/DOF characteristics would be matched by a D60 utilizing a 30/2, 55/2.4, 62/2 respectively - but not necessarily their color/clarity/contrast.
 
PegLeg Media said:
...We were back as far as possible so couldn't get him farther from the wall....
Click to expand...
I can't get your youtube link to work, so I can't see exactly what you have going for a setup, but that statement right there is the red flag to me. Depth of field is a function of aperture and particularly distance to the subject. The closer the subject is to the lens, the shallower the depth of field. Anything past halfway to infinity focus is hard to get shallow depth of field with these 2x crop factor sensors.
 
PegLeg Media said:
I film a lot of video interviews and the clients always ask me if I can get a shallower depth of field, but my GH3 just cant.

I use a GH3 and have a canon 50mm 1.4, a panasonic 25mm 1.4 and an olympus 45mm 1.8. None of them get that shallow depth of field, even opened all the way with tons of light in the room. I found this guy who uses a Canon 60d which is a MUCH cheaper option, with a canon 1.8 50mm lens which doesnt even open up as wide as my lenses yet his depth of field is on another level.
Click to expand...

My calculator for DoF for a f/1.4 aperture, and 50mm lens, for GH-1, gives about 6 inches of DoF at a subject to camera distance of 10 feet.

That also gives a Field of View of approximately 4'x2' which would be good for a 'head+shoulder' close up shot.

How much shallower DoF do you need.

At 15' subject distance, the DoF is 1 foot and FoV is 5'x3', for a waist up medium shot.
 
PegLeg Media said:
Any suggestions for this shoot? We were back as far as possible so couldn't get him farther from the wall


Sent from my iPhone
Click to expand...

In order to effectively evaluate your DoF requirement, you need to indicate the subject camera distance, and if a 'wall' is in back, what that distance is from the subject.

I posted calculations for 10 and 15 feet, which yield a DoF for your 'wide open' f/1.4 55mm lens of 6" and 12" respectively.

How much 'less' DoF do you need.

The alternative is to find another venue that has sufficient room for you to use the length of lens you desire to use, to get the camera-subject-background distances such that you get the DoF effect you desire.

That's usually cheaper than buying a new lens...

That or convince the client that shallow DoF is sort of a passe effect, and everyone in Hollywood and the world are going for deep sharp focus...
 
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