GH5 focus excellence

[Davey]

Max's latest is out regarding GH5 autofocus. I thought that he was most gracious towards the incompetent Panasonic luminary, who was sweating like a man on his last night on death row throughout the entire charade.

The conclusion is 'Should have listened to Ken Stone'

 

[jonpais]

10 minutes ago, Davey said:

Max's latest is out regarding GH5 autofocus. I thought that he was most gracious towards the incompetent Panasonic luminary, who was sweating like a man on his last night on death row throughout the entire charade.

The conclusion is 'Should have listened to Ken Stone'

 

And the fellow who doesn't even know that the little Sony shoots 4k can't even spell Max's name correctly in his own video. He manages to cull a few seconds of successes from a grueling 15 hour day in inclement weather.

[Davey]

2 minutes ago, jonpais said:

And the fellow who doesn't even know that the little Sony shoots 4k can't even spell Max's name correctly in his own video. He manages to cull a few seconds of successes from a grueling 15 hour day in inclement weather.

I can't bring myself to watch his version of events. I've seen and heard enough from him to last me a lifetime. Your report doesn't surprise me in the slightest.

[jonpais]

5 minutes ago, Davey said:

I can't bring myself to watch his version of events. I've seen and heard enough from him to last me a lifetime. Your report doesn't surprise me in the slightest.

I'm going to be sticking with my G85 for a while. I just love it, it's got almost everything I need. No need for a 'pro' camera yet.

[Emanuel]

From 19:05 on:

 

[Emanuel]

 

[Davey]

18 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

 

The heavy breathing at 5:22 is something I am familiar with. Try this with an A7Sii and 70-200 f4 with people moving in front of the lens as they try to get a cheap shot off with their Boots disposables.

Had to do the single area / half press shutter manoeuvre and even then only got half the isle shot in focus. About the same as this bloke when all said and done.

 

[jonpais]

23 minutes ago, Davey said:

The heavy breathing at 5:22 is something I am familiar with. Try this with an A7Sii and 70-200 f4 with people moving in front of the lens as they try to get a cheap shot off with their Boots disposables.

Had to do the single area / half press shutter manoeuvre and even then only got half the isle shot in focus. About the same as this bloke when all said and done.

 

Is it like an experimental film or something?

[Ken Ross]

7 hours ago, Davey said:

Max's latest is out regarding GH5 autofocus. I thought that he was most gracious towards the incompetent Panasonic luminary, who was sweating like a man on his last night on death row throughout the entire charade.

The conclusion is 'Should have listened to Ken Stone'

 

I'm sorry, I gave up after 10 minutes to see yet another round of testing to see if the camera transitions from a face to a lens 6" from the camera lens. I honestly don't know how often actual shooters face, in real life, the kind of scenarios that Max seems to love. I did the test in my house and never had an issue. And Max needs to revise his thinking about 225 point being the most horsepower, now that Panasonic is saying use 1-area. So yeah, I'm just crazy, I go out and shoot with this thing, 1-area AF, screw the custom settings, and have no AF issues whatsoever. Did that almost immediately after getting the camera and haven't seen any reason to change. This stuff just never ends nor does the misinformation. 

I also found it fascinating that no matter what settings they used, Max & Joe were getting better results than Max did in his initial testing when his brother would never come into focus? At least here, his brother always seemed to be in focus. I wonder why? Interesting stuff.

[Davey]

17 minutes ago, jonpais said:

Is it like an experimental film or something?

More a horror film when all said and done. 

[jonpais]

That must explain why I can't get to sleep

[Ken Ross]

7 hours ago, Davey said:

Max's latest is out regarding GH5 autofocus. I thought that he was most gracious towards the incompetent Panasonic luminary, who was sweating like a man on his last night on death row throughout the entire charade.

The conclusion is 'Should have listened to Ken Stone'

 

Wait, Ken Stone?

[Shield3]

22 minutes ago, Ken Ross said:

I did the test in my house and never had an issue. And Max needs to revise his thinking about 225 point being the most horsepower, now that Panasonic is saying use 1-area. So yeah, I'm just crazy, I go out and shoot with this thing, 1-area AF, screw the custom settings, and have no AF issues whatsoever.

Ken, can you simply show us footage of your GH5 shooting a subject at F/2.8 (doesn't have to be 6" from the lens, but a reasonable distance to blur the background) and show the camera autofocusing from the foreground to the background?  I mean, if you "never had an issue" this shouldn't be a problem.  Very simple test, and tons have done it with a slew of cameras (see Philip Bloom's 3 part AF test).  In the real world shooting weddings one might need to AF between subjects that aren't close to one another, and showing us tests of you slowly moving from a street sign at F/16 to a car just isn't the same.

I get Max's "suddenly pop into the frame" tests are extreme.  But there is a middle ground, and I don't feel you've backed up your claim of "good AF" with the sample videos you've provided  in this thread.

So.  Put something large and contrasty on a table 3 feet in front of you.  Have a wall 2-3 times further away.  Show your GH5 focusing on the foreground subject, then the background, then to the foreground.  I can shoot something with my C100 to provide to you if this seems too complicated.  Don't need anyone suddenly popping in the frame - just a simple pan at a reasonably shallow DOF.  Thanks.

[Ken Ross]

1 minute ago, Shield3 said:

Ken, can you simply show us footage of your GH5 shooting a subject at F/2.8 (doesn't have to be 6" from the lens, but a reasonable distance to blur the background) and show the camera autofocusing from the foreground to the background?  I mean, if you "never had an issue" this shouldn't be a problem.  Very simple test, and tons have done it with a slew of cameras (see Philip Bloom's 3 part AF test).  In the real world shooting weddings one might need to AF between subjects that aren't close to one another, and showing us tests of you slowly moving from a street sign at F/16 to a car just isn't the same.

I get Max's "suddenly pop into the frame" tests are extreme.  But there is a middle ground, and I don't feel you've backed up your claim of "good AF" with the sample in this thread.

I did the same lens test that Max did in the house and I was at 3.5. You can clearly see the focus transition from the wall in the background to the lens near the camera. I did another test, early on, with no lights on in the house, on a dark stormy day. Again, no issues. Not for nothing Shield3, but I'm done with testing. I've posted several tests at poster's request here. If these tests are not to your satisfaction, there's not much I can do or say.

I said all along that 1-area was the way to go, when everyone else was futzing with face detection, 225 area, custom this and custom that. I was proven right as Panasonic said in their recent release. If you choose not to believe me or my tests, that's fine. But I'm done with this nonsense. The AF is fine if you know how to use it. No AF is perfect and this is no exception. Learn your tools and you'll be fine.

 

 

[Davey]

12 minutes ago, Ken Ross said:

Wait, Ken Stone?

Senior moment. No idea who Ken Stone is lol.

[Ken Ross]

2 minutes ago, Davey said:

Senior moment. No idea who Ken Stone is lol.

LOL. I don't know who Ken Stone is either, but I guess he's a nice guy.

I scrubbed through the Max & Joe video quickly and lo & behold, Max came to the conclusion that leaving off the custom settings they got good results. Whod'a thunk.  Unfortunately the damage has already been done from Max's first video where nothing was in focus almost ever. It's very hard for a piece of equipment to overcome that kind of bad publicity. That's why I wasn't as kind toward Max as some of you guys, despite his good intentions. I found it very frustrating to watch that first test knowing he was wrong and knowing the damage it was doing.

[Shield3]

Ken (Ross) - I would love to see your first test done with faces instead of a lens filling 75% of the screen but I will admit it's far better than Max's tests.  I am more confused than ever.  The 2nd test was just a very slow movement test and it cut off at the end before it refocused on the background (not saying you intentionally did this - it just cut out before it was getting good).

Still, the first test had pulsing and was very abrupt, but still - far better than everything Max did with his human subject.  Again, more confused than ever.

[Ken Ross]

Shield, no editing tricks. The reason the focus did what it did at the end, was that I inadvertently hit the shutter release to stop the video instead of the movie record button. That forced a refocus. If you don't believe me, listen to the audio. You will hear a 'click' that only occurs when you use the shutter release to end a clip rather than the movie record button.

[Mattias Burling]

40 minutes ago, Ken Ross said:

Unfortunately the damage has already been done from Max's first video where nothing was in focus almost ever. It's very hard for a piece of equipment to overcome that kind of bad publicity. 

Also Dave Dougdale which have even more subscribers acknowledged that there is something "wrong" with the AF and he is waiting on a firmware fix of the issue.

From what I've seen I must agree. Something isn't how its supposed to be. The tracker follows a face perfectly and still its not in focus... The tracker should stay with the focus.

[webrunner5]

1 hour ago, Ken Ross said:

Wait, Ken Stone?

Laughing out loud! Shit.

Yeah I think Panny has some big troubles on their hand here with AF. They better fix this quick or this could get ugly. This thing reminds me of my Canon 1D mk III. It was so god damn complex you could never duplicate anything you did in the field. It had WAY too many options on AF, and that was the reason it sucked and it ended up like the GH5 is looking like. Too damn complex with all the settings it has. The 1dn mkII I had before it could AF on ANYTHING in a heartbeat. It had a very simple AF menu.

95% of the focusing problems with the 1D mkIII were user errors. But why make a camera that you can screw up AF so easy to accomplish LoL.