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Maybe not most underrated but the Panasonic S1 is definately underrated outside of this forum. It's giving an FX9 quality image for peanuts. I would say it could compete with the C500 MK2 and C300 MK3 as well. The C500 can see into the shadows better by 2 stops or so, but it doesn't have dual native ISO. The Panasonic S1 can do 4000 iso with 4 stops of headroom in the highlights and a couple in the shadows. That punches the C500 dynamic range in the gut at the same ISO.

Yeah, the client wrote it, recorded it. I edited to her script. This video work is indicative, I think, of my "90% rule." Meaning, I score shots from 1 (shit) to 100 (perfection), and often try to hit a sweet spot of 90. Yes, you could do a bunch of other crafting to squeak out the final 10% to make the shots technically perfect, but the last 10% requires an ridiculously exponential amount of expense and effort. So, one tries to find a balance. I'd give myself an 80-85 on this stuff. It's all relative to what the client demands, what you demand of yourself, and what the budget allows. That all being said, the era of dudes like me delivering "90" is going away. Clients are okay with 30 these days. On the high end clients will expect 100. Seems like people in my range of stuff are not in demand so much anymore. p.s. I add a lot of grain in post. My ISO never went over 800 on this gig.

I think of all the video-capable cameras I've owned, the Pana G6 (which Andrew dubbed the 'GH2 Redux' when he reviewed it) was almost perfect for me - small, light, fits nicely in the hand, mic input, FHD 50p/60p to MP4 files, a lever to control power zoom lenses (the last G series camera to have that), 'creative video' mode etc. and a simple uncluttered control layout. For stills (not video), it also had variable telephoto sensor crop controlled by the zoom lever. It's successors gained 4k video and then IBIS, but I think they lost some of the 'only what you really need' control simplicity along the way.

Dito. I found a GH2 a few months back for dirt cheap and ran across this comparison: I find it absolutely amazing that the hacked GH2 still holds up in some areas against the GX80, which is a great value proposition in itself. I'd go as far as saying the hacked GH2 still holds up in many ways to current offering by Panasonic (G100). This not a knock on Panasonic but rather congratulating the people who've hacked the GH2. Now, actually prefer working with a GH2 to working with a GX80.

I know it's an impossible thing to really quantify to other people, especially pros, but it's been true in my experience as well. I've just ended up preferring using Oly cams for some reason. Ergonomics I think. And it doesn't make sense because Oly's menu system is a bit of a jumble, but I guess once I learned it, it's been productive. I don't do a lot of high end stuff, and what I do (still) do is almost always hand-held run-n-gun. I get by easily with 8-bit. My cheap EM10iii with a variable ND does the job. Here's a recent thing I was hired for; half day shoot and half day editing with a script they recorded. Basic basic basic, but got the product delivered to the client as they requested. I'm not sure if I even used a high end camera for a gig like this it would've turned out much different. So, you know, for me, the rather simple tool is appropriate.

The Panasonic EVA1 was a great camera, giving the power of an FS7 (and arguably a prettier picture too) in the smaller form factor of a FS5, but..... it had a few problems, a few examples: 1) came out too late, the FS7 had already got a firm grip on the low/mid end market (same problem the C300mk2/C300mk3 suffered from) 2) lacked a MFT Mount, thus couldn't build upon the huge huge success Panasonic had created with the GH series (and the rest of their MFT range) 3) Panasonic lacked a history in the S35 market to build upon, unlike Sony or Canon (which had their older F3/FS100/FS700 or C100/C300 etc). Not even on the high end did Panasonic have much of a track recorder having not long ago (relative to the EVA1 launch) brought out their Panasonic Varicam S35.

Your video is easily better than 95% of the work that is out there -- great eye and a nicely coordinated edit. The narrator did a great job, as well. Did someone give her line readings? I noticed that the interior shot had slight noise, but I was pixel peeping. I would guess that you had to stop down due to the high scene contrast. It certainly was not enough noise to warrant using an unwieldy cinema camera, although it might have been interesting to try a minor adjustment to the E-M10's "Highlights & Shadows" setting. Your video is a superb and inspiring piece that brings life to a mundane subject.

The red line didn't help, but a black Sharpie could quickly fix that.

But Alexa doesn't have the: extreme low light, P48 audio, slow motion, or 4K!

I think most people went Canon for EF lenses due to autofocus and others went Sony FS7/FS5 and so on for the larger range of camcorders and mirrorless mount. If Panasonic ever do an L-mount EVA2 with dual pixel AF then it's sure to do better.

About 12 years ago I did a lot of home movies of family using a Canon Camcorder with a DV tape. I bought a Firewire card, IEEE 1394, and fitted into my PC. With suitable cable from Camcorder to PC I transferred the recordings to the Hard Drive on my PC. This resulted in .avi file 720 x 576 , 25.00 fps , Data rate 28887kbps. Interlaced. In some cases I had 'wide screen PAL' ie 16 by 9 and in other cases I had 4 by 3 ( widescreen not selected when recording ). Back then I decided to transcode the .avi to mpg files suitable to burn onto DVD . The bit rate drops to around 6Mbps and I kept the frame rate at 25 fps interlaced. This gave good results for a family movie. A year or so ago, I decided that DVDs are not future proof and I need to make the footage be 16 by 9 with black bars either side if original was 4 by 3 and use progressive scan - ie de-interlace and use a resolution of 1920 x 1080. I felt the biggest problem was the de-interlacing of fast moving image - ie children running about. There is also another problem I find today and that there is difficulty to find an Editor which will accepting the original .avi files. Resolve 16 does not accept it. Anyway I have managed one way or another to make the format to what I want, but I may have not choose the best way to do it. When I show the footage to my grandchildren they just see the content and couldn't care about the finer details of the quality.

Follow up to my post about upscaling and de-interlacing with QTGMC and then playing with Midtone detail in negative values. Picked this frame since it's pretty classic DV and bad lighting. First frame is the original DV (in 720p timeline), then the upscaled frame and #3 the upscaled frame with -50 mid/detail, slightly lowered gain and lift and lowest possible glow. Screencap of Resolve at the end. Not really something magic, still not great, but definitely better.

Yes I'm just stuck in this odd middle ground where nothing is perfect or terrible. I would love CAF but having my entire collection of EF glass available to all of my cameras (5DIV, C200, S5) is worth more to me than CAF. The EF adapter is such a pain to remove due to my S5 cage setup that it has never come off after putting it on. Hybrid AF works pretty good most of the time with the adapter (half press to achieve focus then flip the MF button on the lens to lock focus). I will probably hang on like this until I see what disappointments the R5c manages to bring next year. If they somehow get it right, I'll finally move to a more native EF system (even though the R5c is RF mount). If Canon manages to colosally disappoint yet again then I'll just stick with what I have for a couple more years. If the R5c is even 80% what the S1H is, then Canon will have a winner but I don't see that happening since they already have the C70. In my perfect world I would have two identical bodies that can use all of my existing EF glass; both as good at photography as the R5 and as good at video as the S5 but with the R5's AF and the S5's XLR module, dual slot video recording, and dual ISO. One rigged for video (cage, XLR module), and one rigged for photography (no cage, dual battery grip, hotshoe free for flash triggers). Then on a shoot I can mix and match where the areas overlap when I need a quick video clip during a photo shoot, or a few images throughout a video shoot and where in a pinch I can use both bodies for the same purpose such as multi-angle interviews or both cameras rigged for photography for a wedding. So far its an unachievable dream but who knows what the future holds. My bank account thanks Canon every day for not making this dream possible.

Bumping this, because I'm not sure it needs a whole new post. The second trailer is now finished, but I'd love some opinions before it goes 'live'. All comments and feedback welcome and encouraged!

Thanks! Appreciate it! Yes, sound isn't my strong point at all. This film is entirely one man bad. I've done camera, sound, interviews, editing, colouring, lighting where necessary. The only thing I didn't do is the music, which I palmed off to my brother. I'm planning to finish the edit in the next 2 or 3 weeks, and then will try to send it off to be mixed correctly... but budget is a concern. So far, it's cost me nothing as I had all the gear used before I even thought about making it. As for contrast and highlights. I'm sure they are linked. The garden has such a dense canopy, I can shoot at f1.8 without an ND. The problem is then, that when some sunlight can come through, it's totally blown out. You can see the difference when he walks through the gate. At one point he's exposed correctly, and the next he's in total darkness, and the difference is only 1 or 2 steps. I don't really like the trendy washed out look, and wanted deep blacks, but perhaps I've gone a bit too far? I can reign it in no problem 🙂 Thanks again for the feedback!!