Inazuma

Hi araucaria, I'm not looking for sharpest picture at the moment but rather the one with the best colours, highlight detail and shadow boosting (in-camera or in post) :)

Hi, your second link is the wrong picture and your first link looks very oversharpened?

This intrigues me somewhat :/ Do you think the hacker will add features such as focus peaking? Do you think the hack will be ported to d5300? Do you find the image to be more gradable? Ie. You can lift shadows up and change colours with less problems. Could you post comparison pictures of what the image looks like before and after the hack?

That lens looks beautiful and your pictures are gorgeous!

The camera is out of warranty; I sent it for a repair quotation and they said it needed a replacement sensor - £500! The black spot I can deal with because I rarely shoot above f2.8 and it's not visible at this aperture. After playing with the footage from the EM1, G6, GX7 and Nikon d5300 (+ my old d5200) more I'm just extremely torn. The Nikon gives the best tones and colour (and grades really well) but you can't shoot video casually and the noise tends to be very blotchy. The EM1 you can shoot very casually because of the nice EVF and stabilisation but the colours are no good, especially not for grading. It is less noisy than the G6 but resolves detail poorly and has a terrible highlight roll-off. More importantly I can't really afford it... The Panasonic G6 is a contender mainly because it's so cheap and a delight to use. But whilst it is very sharp and probably has a nice fine grain noise, it falls short in DR and colours compared to the Nikon, which is less than £100 more expensive. Since I plan to do less casual video shooting, I am inclined to go with the Nikon. Since my GX7 is unsellable now, I could keep it for use when I really want that sharp image or need to shoot at ISO 3200. Or maybe I should sod it all and stay with the GX7 :)

I actually really like the GX7 ergonomics. It works really well for small lenses like the Olympus 17mm f1.8 or even the Panny 12-35mm f2.8. The problem is my GX7 is actually a little damaged. There are several large dead pixels on the sensor as well as a black dot that gets bigger as I narrow my lens apertures. And yes the small grip is a problem for big lenses. And actually the other thing is that the viewfinder's colours are very off, not to mention the eyecup is very small and hard to use in daylight (ironically). I might join you and Andy in the G6 club afterall :) Yes the DR and noise is worse.. but it's at least >better than the GH2, which was loved by a lot of indie film makers.

Good to hear this every once in a while :) A sensor that's excellent in DR and noise is no substitute for good lighting, composition and content. Though it can help.

After you made that comment, my interest just piqued. I went to Calumet this morning (very close to where I live) and tried the Nikon d5300 against my GX7. Would have done the GH3 but it's all packed up ready to be sent back to Panasonic. The result surprised me a bit!

Thanks Matt. Is the d5300 really that much better in low light?

That's very interesting. Can any of you confirm that guy's findings? I just did a quick test with similar settings on my GX7 and the noise at each ISO level was as expected (ie. more with each higher iso value) Also, does your speedbooster have any play at the camera mount of the G6?

Try this

Yes that's right. Although I have been studying the footage for the last two hours now and will say it's maybe not as bad as I thought. It's probably because i wasnt used to seeing a piece of footage having fast pans mixed with complete stability.

OK so I got back from the store (Jessops). It happens that not only did they have the Panasonic G6 on display, they also had the OMD EM1! Panasonic G6 The viewfinder and LCD are definitely more usable (than the GH3), especially with the focus peaking! The viewfinder is a little bit bigger than the GH3's and doesn't have the smearing when you look at the edges. The most surprising thing though was that the camera was actually as easy (if not easier) to hold as my GH3! With the speed booster and Sigma 18-35mm attached (which in total is about the length of an elephant's trunk and about 2 tonnes in weight). One strange thing was that when you click to get on the menu, you are presented with four or five icons, like the Sony NEX series. Not sure if you can turn this off. The sharpness of the picture is as expected - BUT - the amount of noise when using flat settings (at iso 200) is incredible. Worse than my GX7 for sure. And probably worse than my GH3. Olympus OM-D E-M1 In between looking at this and the G6, I looked at the Fujifilm XT1. That camera has a ridiculously large and clear viewfinder. The EM'1 is not quite as large, but still noticeably bigger and clearer than any others I've tried (NEX 6, a6000, GX7, GH3, G6). I could manual focus without any focus aids. It was basically as good as an optical viewfinder. The grip on the camera is probably the best I've used. It just seems to fit in your hand so securely. Menu system isn't as straight forward as Panasonic's but its not awful like the NEX series was. The stabilisation system is completely ridiculous. Granted, it's been a while since I've used any stabilised lens, but this really does kick ass. I set it at 18mm and my lens was stable throughout its zoom range. But here's the real kicker. The video quality at flat settings (NR off and -2 sharpness, saturation, contrast) is better than expected. OK it doesn't resolve as much detail. If you take a frame from a Panasonic video, it looks like a downscaled picture. With the Olympus you have to downscale the video to about 75% for it to look somewhat as detailed as a photo. However, there is far less noise. The highlight retention might be better; not too sure. And the stabilisation isn't as frantic as it was on the E-P5. The video image is basically what the G6 would be if it had been stabilised in post and a strong NR had been applied (however, the G6 image with NR applied looks worse than the EM1). But there is one big problem. Shooting at 1/50th makes all movement jarring. This camera really does need a 25p option or it is unusable in artificial 50hz light. Some comparison pictures (not much but they're the only frames with almost the same exposure setting and framing): http://imgur.com/a/wk9DJ Overall I'm not sure what to do. With the G6 you have to push shadows up a lot to bring it to the same dynamic range as the EM1, but then you get a lot of noise. However it is a lot cheaper and the image is more detailed (I prefer detail to noise-freeness). But then there's that lovely stabilisation... But then there's the frame rate issue... argh...

Ahhhh turns out the store doesn't have a display model :( Thanks for the info anyway utsira! Really wish I could get a hold of some EM1 footage showing landscape with flattest settings, no sharpening and no NR

Hi everyone, I am considering moving from a GH3 to an Olympus OMD EM1. Mainly because the GH3's viewfinder and LCD are too low resolution to find critical focus with manual lenses quickly and easily. Yes I have an LCD magnifier but it really doesn't help much on this screen. I'll be trying out one at a shop over the weeknd and was wondering if anyone could give me tips on how to quickly set the camera up for best video settings/flattest image. As you may be aware, the camera only shoots at 30p. So what is the ideal shutter speed for cinematic motion if I want to convert the footage to 24 or 25p? If I shoot at 1/50th and downsample the footage from 30 to 25p, will the motion look slower or faster compared to a normal 25p video shot at 1/50th? How effective is Premiere Pro's frameblending? Finally, I plan to mainly use the camera with a Sigma 18-35mm f1.8 and speed booster. I know that Andrew says it works alright if the stabilizer is set to 20mm, but I was wondering if anyone else has experiences with this or similar combinations?

I can't say for sure but I do think the noise you are experiencing in those indoor shots is mainly because the image is underexposed and partly because you've lifted shadows too much. Essentially you are trying to lift detail out of areas where there is just not enough exposure.

No, you should either use your eyes or use the Zebras function, as explained here: http://eng.faq.panasonic.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/26426/~/what-is-the-zebra-pattern%3F---dmc-gh4 In short, if you set the function to 100%, it will put a black and white pattern on any part of the image that has burnt out highlights (ie. white). You should expose your image so that there are none of these patterns showing. Although sometimes it is simply unavoidable, such as shooting someone against a window in a dark room on a very bright day.

The problem with the first two (indoor) videos is that you have underexposed by quite a lot. Noise always comes from shadows afterall. It is best to expose for highlights and then underexpose it in post if that's the look you're going for.

I am convinced the problems are down to individual lenses (bad quality control?). Otherwise the problems would be reported more widely. Anyway, here's a video i took with the 12-35 No problems here

I was thinking Canon APS-C too actually because of the colours and the way edges are rendered quite harshly, eg 49 seconds in.

There is indeed a lot of jitter there. Have you tried emailing Panasonic about the issue? It's kind of fruitless to ask about it here. I used to have a Panasonic 12-35mm f2.8 but never had this issue.

I also emailed him a couple weeks/months ago because Id lost my guide but he never got back to me

This is definitely one of the more intriguing trailers I've seen recently. Great job :) Only thing I'd say is some of the VFX is quite jarring. In particular the shots of the mountain (close and far) are too crisp. And no, no idea what camera :)

The quote in the article was talking about what's compatible with Canon EF in general, not what's compatible with the speedbooster. The speed booster is compatible with Canon EF mount lenses, including any made by third parties. Third party lenses made for APS-C are still Canon EF, not EF-S. It does raise another interesting question though about whether you can adapt Nikon, M42, Contax Zeiss, Leica R and Olympus OM lenses on to the speed booster.

Haha what :D No, this adapter is to adapt Canon lenses on to an MFT camera. The Sigma 18-35mm is made for APS-C cameras (Nikon, Canon EF, Sony A). The lens will therefore not vignette when put on this speed booster made for MFT.