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GH5 stress-test of the various modes is here: The case for going back to 1080 is strong.

Ok, here's the test. Video tests the best 24p GH5 modes. Modes: 1080p 422 10-bit ALL-I 200Mbps h264 3.3K 422 10-bit ALL-I 400Mbps h264 (4:3 cropped) C4K 422 10-bit Long-GOP 150Mbps h264 C4K 422 10-bit ALL-I 400Mbps h264 5K 420 10-bit Long-GOP 200Mbps h265 (4:3 cropped) Tests: Motion stress-test x 2 (beach and tree) Motion cadence test Skintone and colour density test All shots in HLG profile. The export file (that I uploaded to YT) is here: https://www.sugarsync.com/pf/D8480669_08693060_8967657 It's C2K Prores (LT I think) at ~87Mbps and 1.17Gb. I can export a C4K version if there is enough interest. I went with C2K as people make feature films in 1080p Prores HQ, so if we can't tell the difference between GH5 modes in Prores LT then what are we even talking about? 🙂 Interesting observations from editing this was that during rendering, the 1080p mode was fastest (at around 30fps), and the 3.3K and 4K ALL-I modes were next at around 18fps, followed by the 4K Long-GOP around 13-15, then the 5K h265 at about 5fps. I don't have hardware h265 decoding so that probably explains the 5K mode, but why is the Long-GOP codec slower when it's a straight sequential export? If I was playing the file backwards or seeking then I understand that ALL-I has the advantage, but in a straight export I don't understand why it would be slower. Regardless, it was something I noticed. Also, in editing, the 4K Long-GOP files aren't that nice to work with, but the ALL-I files are great, playing forwards and backwards basically without hesitation, on my 2016 Dual-Core MBP laptop. Something to consider.

I do feel a bit badly about it because I got it and haven't shot with it yet. In a sense it's all dressed up with no-where to go! It's my first true cine camera, so that's taking some adjustment too 🙂 The goal is actually to understand it. To understand its colour science, to understand its resolution, to understand it's motion cadence. Many would be amazed at some of the things that I've found when replicating it. What it does to skin tones for example. It pushes around the colour space in ways that shouldn't even work, let alone actually look good. The BMCC was compared very favourably to the Alexa (as in, it held up!) and there's no way I'm getting an Alexa to play with, so this is a kind of close-second for a no-where-near price. BM know what they're doing with colour, and comparing the colour charts, and some other things I've done that I don't think I've shared yet, there is some crazy sh*t going on in there. Once I have learned its secrets, which it's not giving up so easily BTW even after I've matched it almost exactly a couple of times, then I can integrate them into my workflow if I like, so it ads another set of techniques that I can apply if I want. I typically shoot projects on my phone, an action camera, and the GH5, and I have to match them all, so the more I know about colour the better off I am. In terms of this thread, I "went back" to use the Micro as a reference for colour science and motion cadence, because it delivers colour a lot less accurately than modern cameras. Sony wins the accuracy race for colour science, so we should have learned by now that accuracy isn't automatically better.

I haven't done that yet, but it's on the list. I haven't even really shot anything with it yet, except some colour tests. Disappointing I know, but covid cancelled all my travel plans, my work went through the roof, and the family wore PJs all day and didn't want to be filmed lol. I was contemplating the GH5 to BMMCC conversion project and was thinking that a more practical pinnacle would be to shoot a bunch of random things with each camera (not A/B of the same thing, just random shots) and grade the GH5 with the BMMCC characteristics and just put up a video saying shot A, shot B, shot C, and then put out a poll asking if people could tell which was which, with options as Definitely BMMCC, maybe BMMCC, not sure, maybe GH5 and definitely GH5, and see if people could pick the shots easily or not. If they couldn't I'd declare victory. The rationale is that when we watch something we're not given another version of the same thing shot on some other camera, so side-by-side tests aren't really needed for a successful imitation, only for a perfect replication.

How many times do you have to stop a shoot in order to change lenses because of the 4K60 crop? How many times are you shooting 120p and find that the 1080p image quality is an issue in post? How many times have you picked up and turned on your camera, or been looking at the files in your NLE and thought "gee, I really wish this brand had more market share". I wouldn't be so sure that they've maxed it out. The GH5 received incremental updates for years afterwards, and they made the original firmware look puny in comparison. I look at the current crop of cameras and don't feel at all left behind - 4K 400Mbps 422 10-bit ALL-I internal h264 without any crop compared to the 24p modes isn't that much lower than the current offerings. In fact, the GH5 wasn't even maxed out. There was talk within Panasonic of a firmware update to have a higher resolution than 5K (maybe 8K?) coming out of the camera - I saw this an excerpt of an interview with a Panasonic staff member, but had a quick look and couldn't find it again just now. I suspect it would have been de-squeezing the anamorphic modes in-camera. It has the capability to write 400Mbps to the card, and it has h265 capability, so an 8K 2.35:1 or 2.66:1 400Mbps h265 mode may very well have been possible. In 2017.

This conversation seems to have wandered into OLD = BAD = DISTORTED and NEW = GOOD = PRISTINE and I think that in many ways this is fundamentally wrong. Yes, a 1080p sensor creates a lower resolution image than reality, which has infinite resolution, but with the greater resolution cameras there are often sacrifices made along the way. Motion Cadence is one of the things that I am thinking of. Items such as a global shutter don't automatically come with a higher resolution camera. In this sense, the more modern stuff is worse. I'm perhaps one of the biggest fans of 'doing it in post' on these forums, but I'm yet to read anywhere about how you can improve motion cadence in post. As someone who chose very early on to get a neutral capture and process heavily in post I've been consuming every camera review, grading breakdown, lens review, technical white paper, codec quality analysis, etc with the single question in mind of "how do I do this in post?" and I have found that most of the time the various qualities of image that are being talked about are degradations of one kind or other, but not all of them. I discovered with my Canon 700D that you can't remove the Canon Cripple Hammer in post, and I 'went 4K'. The XC10 was 4K and high-bitrate (and had those Canon colours!!) but I discovered that you can't simulate a larger aperture (convincingly) in post (yet), you also can't simulate a higher bit-depth in post, and you can't simulate great low-light in post either. I bought the GH5 but had to go to Voigtlander f0.95 lenses to get the low-light and DoF flexibility that I wanted, but even then the lenses are a little soft wide-open and while you can sharpen them up a little in post to do a quick-and-dirty cover up for a couple of shots, you can't simulate higher resolution or higher contrast lenses in post either. Don't succumb to oversimplification - newer is better in ways that sell cameras but not in every way that matters to the connoisseurs amongst us.

In a sense yes, and in a sense no. Things like the OG Pocket probably don't make sense commercially any more, but @Geoff CB gets value from his F3 because it's more professional in form-factor than most alternatives at that price point, rather than more finicky in form factor. Yes, I agree about that. Although that many would say that the motion cadence of some of the older cameras bests some of the new cameras. Certainly shooting RAW on the OG Pocket is nicer than most h264 codecs, and would be more gradable, so if we take character to mean 'distortions' then actually compressed codecs lose out and RAW is actually less distorted as it's got higher bit-depth and less/no compression distortion.

I just watched this video by Of Two Lands, where he talks about why he bought an OG BMPCC / P2K in 2020. Some of his reasons were sentimental, as he owned one early in his career and it worked well for him, but he also mentioned that a lot of people are going back to shooting S16, or are getting sick of a super-clear image, or don't want to have the 'crutches' of AF or slow-motion or the challenges and limitations of an older fully-manual camera. We also had the P4K firmware update that added a S16 crop mode, the Ursa 12K camera has a S16 crop mode, and @JimJones argued that the new Ursa might attract purchasers purely for its S16 mode: @crevice Argued that the BMMCC still matters, and received much agreement. When the P4K first came out there was a lot of anticipation of getting a 4K BMPCC but then disappointment that the image wasn't the same, and that it looked too modern and too clean and too high resolution. After all this I wondered what it was about the image from these cameras that attracted so much praise. I even heard that the BMMCC was a "baby Alexa" due partially to its colour science, but also in other ways too, such as motion cadence, resolution and codec support. I bought one and tried emulating its image with my GH5 (a project which is still ongoing): I had a theory that this interest in lower-sharpness (and to some extent low resolution) cinema was a nostalgic thing amongst those who grew up with cinema being celluloid rather than digital acquisition and distribution, but the " cinematic / film / organic / LUT / hipster " crowd is getting younger and more interested rather than less, so I wonder - is this a thing? Are people feeling a pull to go back? ....to go back to S16? ....to go back to MF? ....to shooting slower and more deliberately?

Why is no-one talking about the most scandalous part of this leaked image.... that the screen says SONY on it, but it's only the right way up when it's in selfie mode. The new A7SIII. Vlogging camera to the stars.

When you get one I want to see a BTS on your BTS video so I can see the mirror in action. Of course, if your BTS BTS is also shot on Sony with a mirror, I'll need a BTS of that too.

Wouldn't the C100 be Canon Colour Gamut and Canon Log (as opposed to C-Log 2 or 3)? That's what I was using when processing XC10 footage from C-Log. Essentially then you'd be converting from Canon Colour Gamut / Canon Log to Rec.709 / Rec.709 for delivering standard DR, and Canon Colour Gamut / Canon Log to Rec.2020 / Rec.2020 for delivering HDR. After the conversion you'd then be grading the image to get the look you want before exporting.

I should also add that in the above shot we were about 50m from the shore and there was no lighting in the boat - only those spotlights you can see up and down the banks of the river.

That's my impression - we're still in the early days of h265 hardware support permeating through all the hardware and then that hardware support permeating into all the software so it gets used. It makes sense that h265 would be the topic of the day and we'd gradually get our act together because....... h266 has just been released!

Those mirror attachments are a pretty ingenious device to get a selfie screen when you need it. The alternative is to just go wide (anything under 20mm should be great) and just stare down the barrel. I tried selfie shots (not vlogging I promise!!) with an action camera and the width really made it great - not only because you don't have to get framing completely right, but also you don't have to hold the camera as far away as possible like it smells really bad or something - a 15mm equivalent FOV can be held at about reading distance and you still get a nice frame that doesn't feel too cramped or too intimate.

Speaking of Voigtlander, I'm (finally) editing the trip we took to India in late 2018 and pulled out a few hero shots and did a basic grade to get a feel for the project and to get some inspiration. That was the first trip I took with the GH5 and Voigtlander 17.5mm and one of the concerns that I had was low light performance as the GH5 isn't known for it, but it wasn't until I got back to the hotel and looked at this footage that I realised how good the combination really is. Here's a sample grab of the tour guide when we went to Varanasi to watch the nightly religious celebrations and see the cremations on the shore. No idea if it was wide-open or not, but this is a basic grade, some NR, and some film grain over the top, no sharpening applied, and it's even got a small negative amount of mid-tone detail. GH5 was in 150Mbps 4K IPB and HLG. I can't recommend these lenses enough.

It ended up that I couldn't shoot in the ETC mode for some reason - it was disabled so not sure what that was about. Anyway, I just zoomed in post, which is pretty easy to do. I'd zoom in a bit more, or just adjust vignette in post. I should do more tests to see how much it sharpens up when stopped down. The Voigts are like that, two lenses for the price of one basically 🙂

Just did this Cosmicar 12.5mm C-Mount lens test for a friend and thought I'd share. GH5 shooting C4K in 400Mbps Cosmicar 12.5mm F1.9 shot mostly wide open Cine-D with Noam Kroll settings Contrast 0 Sat -5 NR -5 Sat -5 Hue 0, no processing in post except zoom. This combo is seems like a winner!

That's really useful @Video Hummus. At one point the wife and I were talking about starting an online training platform where we'd sell online courses and content and one of the potential business partners (who is a high-end working pro and a source of one of the first courses) lives interstate and I was contemplating how to set up a kit like this and ship it and have them set it up themselves.

I don't have any real shoots planned for this setup, but was just part of getting to know the camera and prepared in case.

Perhaps a basic question, but how much of what AP does is video vs stills? My impression of AP was for print media - do they have a big video arm too? with journalists reporting from wherever? I only ever remember seeing the old "Credit: AP" "Source: AP" type captions on photographs.

Played around and got this configuration which seems to meet all the criteria... It's a bit top heavy, but it's balanced (it literally stands up on the QR plate when placed on a flat surface). You can get to the handle, at least from the left, without touching anything but the handle, and the big hole in the vertical support even lines up very nicely with the coiled cable for the mic making a convenient cable tidy! It's not exactly compact or elegant though!

@Sage on the GH5 have you compared the 1080p 422 200Mbps All-I vs the 4K 422 400Mbps All-I vs the 3.3k 422 200Mbps All-I anamorphic modes? IIRC you said that the 1080p 200Mbps mode had better colours than the 4K 400Mbps mode, but I don't recall any comments around the 3.3K 422 All-I 400Mbps mode. It has less bits/pixel (2.7x the pixels and only 2x the bitrate) but the bitrate is 2X for the whole image which includes the same amount of tonal variation in the subject (you've got the same FOV and twice the bitrate to describe it) so when watching full-screen the pixels from the 3.3K mode aren't quite as good but they're much smaller, so maybe that offsets it? If you haven't tested it but are curious, I can share some sample stills with skin tones and a colour checker for you to look at.

Haven't had a chance to look at the above links, but I found this recently which is an interesting comparison of two lenses, listing their pros and cons and with comparison footage:

Follow-up question. I have a grey card, so can do custom WB. Is there any way to reliably set the levels with it using GH5? I don't recall there being anything that will tell you what IRE something sits at.

Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking - to design my own view-assist LUT and just be able to turn it on and off. IIRC there are two zebras and you can set them to be whatever you like. I got the impression you could only choose one of them at a time though, so I don't think you could have zebras showing 40-60IRE for example. If I could design my own view-assist LUT I was thinking of something that I could use all the time instead of turning on and off, like making the middle range colour and maybe expanding them a little, the shadows and highlights compressed and B&W, and have bright yellow and bright red as clipped or black. Something to be technical enough to tell you about your exposure, but something that wouldn't make me creatively blind to what I was shooting, considering that I shoot my holidays and family events and have basically no control of a situation whatsoever, so I'd want to be able to react to new things going on, etc. Oh well.