Andrew Reid

Stay constructive Fuzzynormal. That's clear flame bate and adds nothing to the topic at all.

Here's some of my grades with Cinema profile from the guide. Let me know if you want a complimentary copy JG.   Click for the full 4K.   As long as you expose to the right the shadows are silky smooth on the GH4.      

Also depends on the exposure. James Miller has had some nice shadows out of it  

  Yes.

I believe it refers to AFF mode. That has the spatial awareness to detect the direction an object is travelling in and whether the focus point should move forwards or backwards.   Of course if the train is coming towards the camera at 200kph I wouldn't like to be the one to find out if it tracks or not :)

  Try Master Pedestal + 15. That seems to allocate more bitrate to the shadows and stops them from crushing so much.   Then I lift the bottom of my s-curve in Premiere like Kendy Ty does with his T2i.   That gives me rich tonality and colour but with more detail in the blacks.

  Exactly, you're no expert and that's OK... But polluting my forum with misinformation is not.   10bit data from 8bit 4K... just ask Rarevision and CineForm. http://www.eoshd.com/content/12140/discovery-4k-8bit-420-panasonic-gh4-converts-1080p-10bit-444   This is something which applies equally to both the A7S and GH4 but the GH4 does it internally, and steps up to 10bit externally... that's 10bit colour and not just 10bit luma.   It isn't about pixel peeping it's about getting the facts straight!

I did find The Dark Knight incoherent. It seems the editing took too many liberties. Didn't stop it from being Oscar nominated for Best Film Editing though.   Personally I think the OP video has a lot of good points in it... There are times when you need that spatial awareness in the edit, and good action sequences is one such time. There actually doesn't seem to be many great action directors & editors around at the moment. All the films which should be really entertaining, enthralling action films seem to have turned into expensive stage plays with the emphasis on po-faced photo-realism and characters so deep you can't understand them.

A good idea Greg. Custom scores would be a lot of work and it takes a long time to come up with good material (most bands take 3 years to record a 10 track LP) but to get an idea of what people want could be useful and indeed they may have something which already matches it or can be slightly re-worked to match the request.

The official EOSHD sticky topic for GH4 users.

The mysterious 5D Mark III hardware hack is a load of bullshit.   In the the last decade just about the only hardware hack which was viable was to tap uncompressed video off the DVX100.   Completely replacing the main board in a DSLR with a non-Canon part isn't feasible. Just to get everything working as a stills camera would require so much inside knowledge of Canon's proprietary systems and Canon would definitely sue them out of existence if they tried.   Chalk that one up to bored Canon users dreaming of meaningful upgrades!

Contrast is important to the image in many ways, colour especially. My flat profile is also in the book though. So you have the choice... especially in post.

I find Sony boost the red channel in all their cameras at the expense of blue, possibly accuracy in greens can be lacking too.   My Sony RX1 stills camera for instance is extremely harsh for portrait shots, it really does make people look ill, with red bags under their eyes, magnifies any imperfection, gives blotchy redness and spottiness to faces... You have to desaturate the red channel massively afterwards. Not good.   This is where Canon are much stronger. Panasonic takes a bit more work but it gets there.

The problem is Canon are not a video company at their core, they don't have the codec expertise or the number of video technicians as Panasonic have. Canon are happy to sell mass market stills cameras, but I worry they don't have the future insights due to their elderly top-brass management to stay with it long term, because the market is already shifting under them and they don't have an answer in a number of different areas. Compacts, consumer DSLR video, APS-C sensor performance and mirrorless being the main areas they have dropped the ball in recent years.

Yes that's correct SMG. Removed the details about the special sauce from your post...I want to keep them for the people who bought the book.

- "GH4 has a quad core image processor"   - "GH4 has sold better than expected and reviews have been overwhelmingly positive"   - "AFF mode auto-focus has spatial awareness - knows the direction of travel of objects in a scene and can track a train at 200kmph" EOSHD notes: In the future, I can see this replacing manual focus in filmmaking. The degree of programmability will be high enough to be user assisted but it will take the tracking away from the focus wheel and do it perfectly.   - "25% more usable dynamic range over GH3". EOSHD notes: The new sensor has 1/3 stop more in the highlights and cleaner lows, so the net result is that 25% more of the total 12 stops from the sensor is usable in the image   - "30% increase in colour accuracy". EOSHD notes: red channel is important for skin tones but if you boost saturation in the red channel like Sony do, you get blotchy unflattering skin. Skin needs reds that are treated differently, with less saturation. The GH4 image processor knows how to improve skin tones with 3D colour control.   - "Sensor samples AF at 240fps". EOSHD notes: stills and AF on the GH4 do not get enough praise. AF locks on far faster in low light than my 5D Mark III. In fact AF performance overall in low light beats the Nikon D4.   - "4K was natural step based on user feedback".   EOSHD notes...   What next for Panasonic?   Clearly the GH4 is a unique camera, the product planners are very clever with the Hybrid emphasis. Live view implementation, video and AF are now way ahead of Canon on many different levels.   However to compete in the stills market, Panasonic need a premium FX Lumix. Full frame. Nikon has it, Sony has it, Canon has it and all have it alongside existing crop sensor product lines. Micro Four Thirds will never be 'replaced' by a full frame Panasonic system, it will be complimentary like EF-S is to EF, like DX is to FX.   Panasonic sensors will likely have a boost now their joint venture with TowerJazz is up and running. TowerJazz I believe manufacture RED's and Arri's sensors.   But I love what Sony have done with the 12MP full frame chip in the A7S. Panasonic have already made use of Sony manufactured sensors (like in the GH3). Imagine the A7S sensor in a Panasonic GH body. Dream come true. Over to you Panasonic :)   https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=ja&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdc.watch.impress.co.jp%2Fdocs%2Fnews%2Finterview%2F20140530_649605.html&edit-text=   Via 43 rumors: http://www.43rumors.com/panasonic-gh4-engineers-interviewed-at-dc-watch/

Just resize to 50% on the 1080p timeline and you're done.

Wow such hostile responses. Amazing.   Anyway... Yes I bought mine from B&H in the US. Delivery took just 3 days and they pay the import duties up-front at the time you order it, which expedites the path through customs, pretty much guaranteeing you that 3 day delivery.   Price is competitive as the Pound is quite strong vs the Dollar at the moment. Mine did not end up any more expensive than the £1299 UK price.   All models are PAL / NTSC world cams even the Euro ones which are crippled for 29min.   So yes B&H are absolutely the way to go if you want to avoid the crippled maximum run times.

This is a really nice update. Silent shutter is great to see (GH4 has it). Shipping end of July in Europe, too bad still quite a way to go. I thought it was supposed to come out end of June? Nice of Sony to confirm the dynamic range too, but let's see video mode and some independent tests in due course!

There would likely be an option for custom scores at a higher price. Uniqueness doesn't become a problem until the track has been sold 2000 times or so, and by that point, we'll have more material... and be able to invest back into the material... upping the quantity AND quality at the same time.

That's unfortunate that eleison wimped out at the last second... I had a witty reply waiting.   Maybe he does not in fact work, but sits around all day downloading music for free.   But maybe he has a day job in an office working long shifts and expecting to get paid at the end...   My suggestion is that he tries working unpaid and see if he likes it! As that is what he seems to think some musicians should put up with!

  I'm sure this will be very nice, but there's a difference between 15 stops in 14bit raw and squishing that into 8bit.

RX100 is nice but consider the Panasonic GM1 as well... More flexibility with the interchangeable lenses. The tiny pancake 12-30mm has OIS stabilisation and it's sharp, whilst keeping the weight down to RX100 levels.   RX100 has stabilisation that is very effective but but video quality is better on the GM1 and the stills are slightly cleaner due to larger sensor, so you could fly in twilight and get some nice moody shots, especially with a fast aperture prime on it like the Olympus 12mm F2.0.   BTW if you use a fast shutter speed, why do you need stabilisation for stills?

That's all I'm saying about it, sorry!

I have seen some externally recorded A7S footage which is secret for now. The friend can't publish yet.   I have to say I am absolutely blown away by it.   The low light performance and dynamic range transformed the image... the shadows when graded were silky smooth with a fine noise grain, but it had latitude to catch the illumination realistically... and when the light source bounced against the shadows it looked like film... very nice. I believe it was shot externally to an Atomos Ninja... no signs of moire or aliasing and detail was good...a little soft and filmic but not exactly lacking in fine details and would sharpen nicely.