Panasonic GH2 vs 5D Mark III

[Andrew Reid]

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Today I shot this comparison between the 5D Mark III and hacked Panasonic GH2 with [url="http://www.eoshd.com/gh2-patch-vault"]EOSHD Unified Patch[/url]. The results are all in the video.

Now you just need to factor in overall aesthetics to your decision, which are important. Personally I’d say that full frame sensor aside there is no reason why I like the 5D Mark III’s cinematic image more than the GH2′s. But I do need a full frame camera! It is another look, another option.

[url="http://www.eoshd.com/content/7631/panasonic-gh2-vs-5d-mark-iii/"]Read full article[/url]

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[Schol]

Hello Andrew...


I agree with these "small improvements" from MKII to MKIII... 

Could a new firwmware improve resolution to true 2K ?  NAB suprise ?

For uncompressed RAW in full HD, A-Cam dll seem to stay the only choice  around 7 000 €uros

[url=http://vimeo.com/39019208]Siki Jayson - Where Do I Go[/url]

[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/10690372@N02]http://www.flickr.com/photos/10690372@N02[/url]

[url=http://vimeo.com/27950532]Testflight Ikonoskop[/url]

[url=http://vimeo.com/33989296]Dominik Raab - Vienna 2011[/url]

[img]http://www.ikonoskop.com/begood/image_db.php?id=227&w=700&ne=1[/img]

In this article

[url=http://www.eoshd.com/content/7074/hacked-gf2-the-300-digital-cinema-camera]http://www.eoshd.com/content/7074/hacked-gf2-the-300-digital-cinema-camera[/url]

you said :
[b]"I’m using 44Mbit AVCHD 1080/25p on the GF2 and it gives similar resolution and bitrates to the 5D Mark II – you can definitely intercut despite the smaller crop sensor. "[/b]

If MKIII and MKII are near similar for video, intercuts between  MKIII and GF2 could be nice, i presume?


I stay always curious about you  GF2 "Footage coming soon".....

[img]http://www.eoshd.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/gf2-olympus-12mm.jpg[/img]

Thanks a lot and best regards.  :)

Schol

[Andrew Reid]

Wow talk about different markets there. The GF2 and Ikonoskop! One is a bargain basement cam which punches above its weight, the other very expensive so not really a 5D Mark III alternative. I'd rather have the FS100 right now over the raw cams, much cleaner in low light and I do a lot of that. Plus the workflow is far more convenient.

[sandro]

I would like to know if Canon is completely out of the game for low budget video so me and my lenses can move on :D

[gene_can_sing]

I think Canon could pretty easily up-grade the 5D3 to true 2K since they have complete control of the inner workings of the camera and it's obvious that Digic V is capable of good 2K and even 4K.

Whether they will do it, I kind of doubt it.

For a hacker like Alex to unlock something like that would probably be really difficult.

At this point, I would pay a couple hundred bucks if Canon just offered a "Video Plus" firmware upgrade with resolution increase, some peaking, crop mode and maybe a few other video bells and whistles.

In this day and age where tons of stills and video people use the same camera, they should just offer upgrades curtailed towards the respective parties.

[Nick DG]

Hi Andrew:

I'm a big fan of your blog and I've been reading pretty much all your posts, but especially since the mkIII came out, contemplating my next camera purchases. I'm primarily an events shooter, weddings, etc. I shoot both stills and video professionally. I have the mkII, a 60D and a few GH1. I'm waiting for the price of the GH2 to dip a bit before I start adding GH2s to my stable. I've been reading your posts on the mkIII and I've been feeling the same sense of frustration, without even having the luxury of comparing the footage of mkIII to a GH2 firsthand, like you have. But I really don't need to even do the image comparisons to be frustrated and angry at Canon. Four years later, and you can't even put an articulated screen or 60fps on the successor to the mkII? Seriously? They are clearly trying to put the gini back in the bottle, as you have said in different words, but I think it is impossible and it will hurt them big time in the long run.

I'd like to add this from the POV of the events shooter. The FS100 or the AF100 or even the 5DmkIII are NOT a good option for events shooter anymore. Events shooting, at least the way I do it, is about redundancy and about having multiple cameras and angles to cover a non-repeatable event and having choices in editing. Why on earth would I spend 5k on a single camera to get 1080p when I can buy a GH1 for $400 --which I did when they were clearing them out last June-- and GH2 for $600-700? That thinking led me to dump my two 3-chip HDV Sony cameras last year, and replace them with five GH1 and a ton of great inexpensive FD glass, and I haven't look back since. Not to mention that for the past three years or so, looking at all the great footage coming out of DSLRs I hated shooting video with HDV cameras. And with the DSLRs I rekindled the joy of shooting video.

I've been referring to the 5DmkII as the leader of the "accidental revolution". With the mkIII Canon have proven that it was indeed an accident and not a stroke of marketing genius. But if they're trying to get us to buy "traditional" video cameras again, it's too late. Myself and every other serious event shooter I know, ditched the all-in-one form factor of the HDV cameras, for the superior quality and choices of the DSLRs, (and I include the GH1/GH2 in that term). The inconvenience of separate audio, buying a rig, etc, well I've gotten over it. Superior image quality always wins over convenience, if you're a true shooter.

I think there's a line in "Tora, Tora, Tora", the 70s movie about the Pearl Harbor attack, where admiral Yamamoto replies to a subordinate who's bragging about their success in Pearl Harbor, along the lines of "I fear all we did was to wake up a sleeping giant." I'm afraid all Canon did was to wake up Sony, who has not taken kindly to Canon hurting their video camera business, and responded with a myriad of options, the FS100, the NEX line, the A series etc. As far as I'm concerned, not being a "moneybags" pro shooter, as you put it, my next camera purchases would be GH2 and NEX-5n (for that 60fpsthat Canon could not include in the mkIII). Will I buy the mkIII? Maybe, but mostly because of the improved autofocus, the dual card format (for redundancy) and I hope better high ISO performance for stills. When it dips in price, and not for video. And my hunch is that it would dip in price soon, in the same way the C300 dipped almost overnight because of the Scarlet.

[jack]

Hi Andrew,

I enjoy reading your reviews, however I am wondering if it is fair comparing a camera with a stock firmware vs a heavily hacked one. (If I read correctly, you are running a hacked GH2 firmware which is probably not supported by Panasonic)

If that were true, this is actually not a case of Gh2 vs 5D3. It is a case of Hackers vs Canon Firmware Engineers.

In this match up, I must say Hackers 1 : Canon Engineers 0.

If these hackers can do so much with the GH2, I wonder what magic can they do with a 5D3.... Or a D800 for that matter.

[mike_tee_vee]

One thing preventing me from switching to a Nikon is the F lens mount.  I have a significant investment in C/Y Zeiss glass, which would be rendered obsolete.  I likely will never buy an F mount camera due to the limitations in mounting non-Nikon legacy glass.

Right now, I consider the micro four thirds lens eco system to be the best of the bunch.  The list of native AF primes are fairly complete, and a few pro zooms from Panasonic are on their way.  The EOS mount is a bit of a jack of all trades, as it facilitates modern technology like image stabilization, while maintaining adaptability to legacy glass.

[Andrew Reid]

Good point about the Contax glass / Nikon mount Mike. This is putting me off as well, some of my favourite glass is Contax Zeiss. The equivalent in Nikon AI though is not too much more expensive.

Jack, regarding the hack it is important to realise exactly what the GH2 hack did. The only improvement to image quality on the hack was to the bitrate. The 5D Mark III already has high bitrates. The main problem is resolution. Out of the box the GH2 already had superb resolution and a clean image. The sensor scaling is low level hardware related not firmware. A hack doesn't yet exist for the 5D Mark III and there is no guarantee it ever will. I certainly hope so. Magic Lantern is definitely a plus point on the 5D Mark II at the moment but in terms of feature set, not image quality improvements.

[moebius22]

Prices have and are continuing to rise on everything coming out of Japan continuing into the year. I think the days of bargains may be over.


[url=http://www.hdwarrior.co.uk/2012/03/25/price-hike-warning-from-japan/]http://www.hdwarrior.co.uk/2012/03/25/price-hike-warning-from-japan/[/url]

[gene_can_sing]

Hey Andrew,

Since you are more technically in know, do you think that a firmware update can increase the resolution?

I have no idea about the tech behind the camera, but we all certainly know that the 5D3 is capable of true 2K. It seems to me that a Beta 5D3 had to have an iteration that did have true 2K, but the powers-that-be decided against it in the final version.

I would think that 2K might already be built into the camera, but needs to be unlocked or address through a firmware type update. But like I said, I don't know any of the tech stuff, just speculating, but there it does seem logical that the 5D3 should already have the 2K built in, but it's CRIPPLED.

Or is resolution too low level for a firmware update?

Sigh......

[Andrew Reid]

It's very low level. I really doubt firmware can adjust resolution and scaling method. It is the best Canon have allowed it to be with this hardware. If it is an artificial firmware switch which is limiting the hardware, like bitrates on the GH2 then we could be in luck. But there's more chance of finding a switch that opens a flap on the viewfinder dome and a small pistol rising out of the top.

[MatthewP]

Isn't 2k only 80 pixels larger than 1080p? (1920 vs 2000).

[lubricated]

non cropped 35mm 2k is 2048 X 1536 so there is not a huge improvement in pixel count, still - in video terms every extra pixel is more than welcome:)

[themartist]

Very good review here. I've no intention to go the Canon route after these insights. I think its either the GH3 or the Nex-7 for me.

Andrew, please take a deeper look at the NEX-7 in comparison to the GH2 for video. I saw your original review on the NEX-7 for video, but I also noticed how some people had advice as far as changing the settings you were using. I'd love to see a little more head to head comparisons.

I have a hacked GH1 and a NEX-5(not n)... and ready to get rid of both to buy a new NEX-7, but have reservations. My hope is for a more portable video & stills camera. Obvious problem with the NEX is lenses... for now, I think the 30mm Sigma seems like a good walk around lens. Not too big, but unfortunately not too fast either.

Seeing how the video and 1080/60p for slow motion holds up will be very informative too.

[hoodlum]

[quote author=themartist link=topic=469.msg3008#msg3008 date=1332787688]
Seeing how the video and 1080/60p for slow motion holds up will be very informative too.
[/quote]

1080/60p halves the 24p bitrate on the NEX-7 to 14mb/s, so right there you have a big step back in quality.

[ddueck]

[quote author=themartist link=topic=469.msg3008#msg3008 date=1332787688]
Very good review here. I've no intention to go the Canon route after these insights. I think its either the GH3 or the Nex-7 for me.

Andrew, please take a deeper look at the NEX-7 in comparison to the GH2 for video. I saw your original review on the NEX-7 for video, but I also noticed how some people had advice as far as changing the settings you were using. I'd love to see a little more head to head comparisons.

I have a hacked GH1 and a NEX-5(not n)... and ready to get rid of both to buy a new NEX-7, but have reservations. My hope is for a more portable video & stills camera. Obvious problem with the NEX is lenses... for now, I think the 30mm Sigma seems like a good walk around lens. Not too big, but unfortunately not too fast either.

Seeing how the video and 1080/60p for slow motion holds up will be very informative too.
[/quote]

themartist: See my posts and 60p/slomo video here ([url=http://www.eoshd.com/comments/index.php/topic,283.msg2766.html#msg2766]http://www.eoshd.com/comments/index.php/topic,283.msg2766.html#msg2766[/url]). I own an NEX-7 (and several piles of Tamron Adaptall and Canon FD glass) and bought it primarily for video. Been shooting with it for several weeks now and I have very few complaints. I've not owned a GH2 but I have easy access to one and I hope to do some comparing of the two soon. So far, though, the benefits of NEX-7 far, far outweigh any detriments I've encountered. It's lightyears more useable, and portable, than my Canon T3i, and once my Zuiko 38mm 1.8 arrives I'm sure impromptu video shoots will happen quite a bit more often. Already I'm infintely more productive as a hobbyist photographer, now that I have such a tiny yet capable camera body, and I see the same happening with my videography.

I plan on acquiring a Tamron E-mount 18-200 sometime soon as my first (and probably only) AF lens for the camera. It's much smaller than Sony's lens, the optics and VC are impressive and it will make for a fine general-use video lens outside of low-light situations. I've already got too many brilliant fast MF primes to make the Zeiss 24mm 1.8 and 50mm 1.8 OSS worthwhile. The more I use E-mount cameras (and NEX-7 in particular) the more impressed I am. At some point an FS100 or even a VG20 would be lovely but right now I'm astonished at what I can accomplish with this little monster of a camera.

Granted, GH2 and presumably the forthcoming GH3 are powerhouses with more robust file output for half the price, but the NEX-7's larger/more versatile sensor, EVF, LCD, live histogram, 1080/60p, size, construction/build quality, incredible direct control, customization, and discreet profile are wowing me more and more as I use it. Like Andrew says in his review, it depends on what you're looking for out of a camera. For me, NEX-7 perfectly and excitingly fits the bill, as its video *usability* is far beyond my Canon DSLR, while video *image quality* is also better than Canon by a small margin (especially in the 60p dept., never thought I'd be so enamored with that framerate at 1080).

I'm doing comparisons on various creative/picture styles and hope to have some definite results to share soon. So far, as long as I (over)expose properly, I don't have a problem holding on to detail in grading, which seems to be the only really significant objection to using NEX-7 for video. That's just my experience, though :) A long ramble here, but all that to say, don't be *too* reserved about NEX-7. I think it's a far more useful and credible piece of kit than people give it credit for.

[ddueck]

[quote author=hoodlum link=topic=469.msg3014#msg3014 date=1332789464]
1080/60p halves the 24p bitrate on the NEX-7 to 14mb/s, so right there you have a big step back in quality.
[/quote]

I'm struggling to make sense of this. Clarification please?

[Nick DG]

Hey Andrew:

What cards are you using with your GH2 with the super high bitrate?

[lubricated]

yet again - anybody has any info on 1Dx video? samples did look very good, can there be some actual difference from mk3?

good comparison, wide angle detail is so much better on GH2.