powderbanks

personally, i'm not a big fan of the warp stabilizer. it can end up causing some really weird warping and jelloing (which technically i suppose is working correctly, but i don't like it) in more shots than expected; if i need to do some stabilization i like using the motion tracking in AE. but that's kind of moot since OP is using final cut. 1) it is and it isn't a 'lesser' HD. the difference is in the ipb frames, frame rate and bitrate. the all i hd mode means every frame at 24fps is its own individual 'picture,' whereas other modes there are predicted frames between the keyframes. this allows more compression of the video. for the most part, it's hardly noticeable, especially at 60fps. frame rate, 24fps vs 60fps, pretty obvious. if you take your 60fps footage and conform it to 24fps, you have some really nice ~40% slow motion. and with the lower bitrate as well, as nahua said, it will take up less space on your memory card (helpful for #4). 2) it looked like there was a little bit of banding in the opening fade in from inside the tent. though i think it was only exacerbated by the fade in. 3) i shoot with a gh2, but i have the noise reduction as low as possible, no matter what i'm shooting. if i get into the higher iso's, i just make sure i use a faster lens (or add lights to the scene if i can) to help lessen the amount of noise in the darker areas of the image. and if i go the whole way to 12800, the only way to make it really usable is to shoot it in b&w; and even then, bumping up the NR does very little. 4) the image flatness/color profile should remain near enough the same between the AVCHD and h.264 video

  gh2/3, and really m4/3 in general, was never really intended for the pro photographer. until the gh3, panny never really incorporated 'pro-user' features; or at least advertised them as such. the gh series just happened to have some really good video output, and then only made better by vitaly and others. if you look at how these cameras were/are marketed, the intended segments aren't the pro photographer, let alone filmmaker...the users made them as such.   i don't think it would make sense for canon to make a specific 'gh3 killer,' because if you look at the buyers of these cameras, i'd say the indie filmmaker is actually a fairly small percentage. canon wouldn't make a full frame, top of the line 'pro model' dslr, and then cram it full of top of the line 'pro model' cinema eos stuff as well. people shooting dedicated stills don't need 4:2:2 color, 4k or any of the lauded video features; and people shooting dedicated video may not want the dslr form factor, rolling shutter issues or so on. it reminds me of the 'old' car saying, 'fast, cheap, reliable...pick 2.' there is no such thing as the 'perfect' all-in-one; in cameras or otherwise, because it has to be good at everything, it doesn't excel at anything.   if you already haven't bought into a canon/nikon system, (someone like me) m4/3 is at a more affordable price point for lenses (legacy lenses). there are drawbacks with crop factor, manual focus and so on, but i rarely use autofocus, even for stills, and i really haven't had any issues with the 14mm end of the kit lens not being wide enough. so for me, and i think many others, the benefits of a great video camera, pretty decent stills camera, a bunch of adaptable, fairly affordable, lenses, smaller form factor and other little details (audio levels, histogram, pretty much no moire, etc) and then the pricing of the cameras themselves, brought them to their purchasing decision. i believe canon will remain top of the camera makers, for a while. but these kind of oddball cameras like the gh series are doing enough to cause the big guys pay attention

like you said in the article, canon never really intended to get into the indie filmmaking business. nikon was a little late to the party, and if it wasn't for vitaly and the rest of the 'hacker' community, i doubt panasonic would have the success of the gh-series that they see now. these cameras all started out as stills cameras (some much better than others) that happened to do hd video; then people realized the potential. they were never designed as cinema cameras, let alone really 'serious' video cameras.   i think what is happening is the convergence of devices that are basically cannibalizing the companies' different product lines. they (canon) are obviously going to nerf the firmware and performance for the lower priced cameras so as not to threaten the high end models. why there are such a drastic jump in prices, i'm not sure; but there's obviously enough incentive (money) to continue to make video specific camcorders, video-capable dslr's and full on cinema-spec cameras. i think this issue happens with panasonic as well, though they claim their divisions are all independent; but i can't see a company purposely undercutting themselves like that.   i watched a top gear episode the other night where jeremy clarkson was reviewing the, new at the time, porsche cayman...good car, handles well, all that. but, if you look at it compared to the cheaper boxter and the more expensive 911, it fits perfectly in the middle; price, specs, performance and so on. i feel like canon is doing that with their product lines. camcorders are the boxters, cinema eos is the 911, and now the dslr's are the caymans. somewhere stuck in the middle between being better than average, but not quite the full potential.   i'm not sure what canon is thinking with the threat of legal action for hacking. didn't they learn anything from microsoft and the kinect? it is the homebrew/hacker people that are really driving the innovation and what is possible with these cameras. it's like honda threatening legal action for potentially modifying a civic. on a side note, why hasn't panasonic hired vitaly, driftwood and the like onto their development/firmware/something team? they obviously know how to get the most out of the cameras..

  i wouldn't say it's one of the all-time greats, but it was a good movie. in 3D, it was like watching the same movie, but not a movie..if that makes any sense...like it was trying to be something that it wasn't. the 3D took away from the story; it drew the attention to the visuals, sets, costume, makeup, etc, to the extent that it felt like it was a 3 hour camera test more so than a movie. add in the high frame rate and things just got weird. so yes, i'd say without 3D, the hobbit was a great movie; with 3D (specifically 3D hfr) it was mediocre at best

  they said the same thing about sound and color in cinema though..;) i'm not advocating 3d in movies, i think it's terrible; but the argument surrounding the artistic merit of 3d is the same as when film first originated, then the introduction of sound, then color, then digital, and so on. in some cases, it can work really well, but overall, i don't see it 'revolutionizing' cinema to a new point. but, where i think 3D will take off is with virtual reality stuff     yes..i saw the hobbit in 2D, then a few weeks later saw it in hfr 3D. it felt like watching a video game...for 3 hours. i didn't connect to the characters at all, if i hadn't seen it prior i wouldn't have understood anything that was going on, and it was overall, an unexpected journey into disappointment. i think it's great peter jackson took a gamble and was trying something different, but for me, it failed.   my feeling is that 3D (especially hfr) is nudging right up on the uncanny valley for some, if not most people. the illusion is too close to reality; and something about it forces your brain to reject it as ridiculous

  OP could even get by with a gh1. the hacks for that when i used it were great as well. last i saw the gh2 body was going for $500 on amazon. pair it with a canon fd mount 50mm/1.8 or 1.4 and you should be set. though with the crop factor, 50mm (100mm equiv) could potentially be a little too long, depending on your photobooth setup. if you need autofocus, go with a native lens

3d can be used very effectively in cinema. the first 3d movie i saw was the new tron, in imax, and it was great. the hobbit in hfr 3d though...didn't like it at all.   there were a couple curved display 3d tv's (the couple i saw pictures of were 3 panels) that looked like it had promise; as far as 3d in the home goes, but i can't see it being 'the future' of tv. though the trouble of content for 4k televisions (aside from the price obviously) could be harder to contend with for the time being. as far as 3d being 'dead' i think the new oculous rift is proving otherwise

from that one picture, it seems like it is some sort of chromatic abberation from the fisheye, or something similar to lens flare; although i've never seen red lens flare. since you can see what should be behind the red bits and you also said it moves around, it doesn't seem like it's an artifact from digital issues, but the light itself. if it were a dead pixel or something like that with the sensor, it'd be in the same spot on every picture

it was part of the music track

i shot this last night. used the smc takumar m42 55mm/1.8 with a sankor compact anamorphic. all shot at pretty high iso's, mostly 12800, but some shots were at lower. there's 2k mjpeg, 1080p/24fps and 720p/60fps (@24 fps) all in there, i used driftwood's sedna b matrix/patch, because i grabbed my bag on the way to the pier; i would've preferred to use the canis majoris night patch and 2fps mjpeg, but oh well. no color correction/grading   https://vimeo.com/57121092

that happens with any non-fixed aperture zoom lens...but i just saw that it's a set 2.8 aperture. definitely odd, but it seems like it would be an issue on a lens by lens basis, not so much the camera bodies

  thanks. i need to shoot some more stuff anamorphic. as to why people use mjpeg, like i said earlier, there are some things you can do to the mjpeg settings that you can't do to the avchd settings. you can tweak the settings for different resolutions, like 1920x720 for the 2.66 ratio with a 2x anamorphic or 2k (2048x1152). you can drop the frame rate to 2fps for time lapse. with the gh1, i think i had mjpeg mode in a 4:2:2 color space, which is beneficial for green screen/chromakey work. and mjpeg takes up significantly less space on sd cards. on a 64gb card, i can shoot a little over 2 hours of mjpeg footage, as opposed to just under 1 hour in avchd. having said all that, i rarely shoot mjpeg. it's more of a special use setting than anything else

i know with my gh2 i get ~60min on a 64gb card. but that is also hacked. on the gh1, hacked, i could get ~2hours on a 32gb card. and the data-rate the gh3 uses, i'm 99% sure is a variable bit rate, so it's only going to be hitting 50mbps in super high detail, well lit scenes. the rest of the time it'll probably much lower. so i'd say your math is pretty close. i just did it for a 176Mbps patch with a 64gb card and came up with 49.65 minutes. which seems about right, because that is assuming a cbr of 176Mbps.

the noise is due to the way the different codecs work; and probably also the way the camera is putting the image it into the 1920x720 frame..something like with what happens in extele mode. mjpeg is also only in 30fps. i have a 2x anamorphic and i rarely use the mjpeg modes. though i did find a patch that takes the hd mjpeg mode into 2k...so i need to test that out. the footage is still plenty usable. i shot this video with a 2x anamorphic and the canon fd 50mm/1.8. i was curious to see how the anamorphic fared handheld..(i'm still getting used to the dual focusing, there's some spots, most notably in the interview bits, where i was off..) https://vimeo.com/53870989   the only reason i'd use mjpeg is for the instant aspect ratio correction. and i can get ~2hrs of footage on my 64 gb card in mjpeg as opposed to just under 1hr in avchd/24p cinema mode (driftwood's canis majoris night or sedna patches). if you use the mjpeg mode, you don't need to do anything to the aspect ratio; it's correct and properly de-squeezed to use right off the card. for avchd footage that i shoot anamorphic, i interpret the footage and force the pixel size to anamorphic 2x. and the only reason why it is in mjpeg mode is because you can't adjust the avchd dimensions like mjpeg. i'm guessing it has to do with the avchd codec being designed for hd formats, so it only works with the standard 1080/720 dimensions..but that's a complete guess. another advantage of mjpeg is that you can drop the frame rate down to 2fps for timelapse. i'm not sure if it would work to change the framerate to 24fps, without having issues. i haven't seen a patch with that, so i would assume it crashes. 

questech: i don't doubt there's more noise, but for me, the gains in other areas are worth it. and for the most part, in well lit scenes at mid to low iso's, the difference to the average person is negligible. for doing comparison shopping though, for the price range i don't think you can go wrong with the gh2. especially now that the gh3 is out and gh2 prices are dropping

  are you aware of the iso bug with the gh2? from the hacks i've tried, noise pretty much remains the same as stock (driftwood's GOPstoppa and sedna patches) with the exception of maybe his canis majoris patch. but with that one the noise is much finer and more natural looking. you may gain a bit of noise, but you get rid of a lot of macroblocking in high detail/motion areas versus the standard bitrates, not to mention some that make it an AVCHD-INTRA codec. there are pluses and minuses to hacking, no doubt, but from my experience, it's definitely worth it.   why do people equate shallow depth of field with a 'cinematic look'? yes, it's important, but there's a lot more to it that just having everything out of focus except for a teeny tiny focal plane. you can get shallow DOF with the panasonic 14-42mm kit lens @ f3.5, and even 5.6. you don't need a huge sensor or a gaping aperature..   and just curious, is your project going to be in color? check out some of the footage of a hacked gh2 at 12800 iso in black and white. it's pretty astonishing

pretty cool, but i've been pricing out a workstation build and the starting price for these are about what i have priced out. probably go the diy route, but something to keep in mind

is this a c mount lens? i have 3 that i use (one doesn't fit past the flange of the gh2) and they cost ~$15 each. i just shot some stills with a 25mm c mount cctv lens. they aren't the highest optical quality, but they're fun to mess around with. i haven't tried any of the 'higher end' tv/film lenses, so i can't speak for their quality.   these are the photos with the one lens, and i do have a video in the screening room forum with a couple c mount lenses. keep in mind most of these were shot wide open (~1.4) and when you stop it down, it gets a lot sharper  http://www.flickr.com/photos/honorableninja/sets/72157632301067490/

this is total guess work, as i'm not 100% sure as what i takes to playback/edit raw, but i would say you should plan on getting a desktop replacement level laptop. ssd replacing the standard hdd, replace the optical drive with that said hdd drive (or a big ssd) for your cache. a top end mobile video card. usb 3.0 (or some other fast transfer speed i/o port). at least 8gb of ram. quad core processor. probably going to want an external raid array or two for your media files (i'd have one with mirrored disks for redundancy/back up and one with the data spread across several disks for speed/editing). all in all, i think you'd probably end up just barely able to work with raw files. why not build/buy a workstation?

  I'm working a music video now that i shot with a 2x anamorphic and regular primes...going from the super wide 3.55:1 shots to the 16:9 shots was jarring, to me. So i just cropped the top and bottom of the 16:9 footage to roughly the cinemascope aspect ratio (2.35:1). That made the cuts between the different aspect ratios much less noticable.   I made a post in the screening room forum with a couple different primes and my 2x anamorphic lens...gives you something of an idea of what works

I should have mentioned that i try to use the evf when i can, but there are occasions where i either don't want to for whatever reason or the camera position just makes it impractical.

i take one of those keffiyeh scarves with me if it's really sunny. i drape it over my head/camera, and i got myself a nice little 'hood' so i can see the lcd screen. i might look like a total goober, but whatever, it works. if you go that route, i'd suggest getting one of the green/black ones; the white/black ones might keep you a bit cooler in warmer weather, but doesn't help much in blocking light. any big-ish, dark cloth would work

anyone can go buy a canvas and some paint, are they not a painter/artist? i wouldn't call myself a cinematographer, maybe videographer,..or the even more generalized 'camera man' is probably more apt for myself; but if someone else wants to call themselves a cinematographer, go for it. judge someone by their work, not their title.   when i do the credits for a music video or other short, i usually just credit myself with 'shot by' or 'shot and edited by.' it gets around those tricky nomenclature issues. having said that, the people i've worked with, i'm given free range of what i envision for the given song/idea (the perks of low/no budget i suppose); and after reading the wikipedia entry on 'cinematographer,' it's actually spot on to what i do..in addition to directing. but i still wouldn't put 'cinematographer' on a resume.

i like using my canon fd 50mm/1.8 with my isco compact anamorphic. look around on ebay for some deals on anamorphics.   you could always crop the frame to get more of the 'widescreen' feel. i did that with a music video i shot where there was 2x anamorphic and regular 16x9 footage. i put a cinemascope (2.35:1) crop on the 16x9 footage so it wasn't so jarring when it cut to the super wide 3.55:1 with the anamorphic. there's a couple different ways of doing it. i just made a matte in photoshop and put that on a separate video track. but i'm using premier. using the 'crop' effect you have to use percentages, and it was too much maths for my liking

  as a skate video, yeah, misses the mark. but as a video about skateland, i thought it was well put together. the focus wasn't on any of the specific skaters or tricks they were landing, but more about the people who run this park and those who skate there. i'd agree, the skate footage shown was 'meh' trick wise, but again, that wasn't the point of the video. i didn't care for the slow motion either   was this shot in one of the gh3's b&w modes, or the b&w done in post? also, what fisheye did you use?