Panasonic GH7

[PannySVHS]

5 hours ago, PPNS said:

if any of you gave as much shit about making, or working on interesting art on here and sharing it instead of jacking off your lil dingdongs over new gear

Producing art of our penises or with our penises? It's been not too long, when I peed a Smiley into the snow. I didn't even take a Selfie of me and my happy snowface though.

At the moment I disguise working in a crew, maybe never really will again. @PPNS I created my own recreational filming challenge which I have been doing for six days in a row until last week.  @eatstoomuchjam has asked me what kinda "challenge" we could do when I was suggesting to do one. As being too picky about thinking of something exiting for everyone and myself I just created one for myself: unrigged og Bmpcc, with four internal batteries, 25mm Tevidon or boosted 28mm Pentax F2 non Hollywood. Tell you what, art happened infront and with my camera whenever the battery quit working.😊

[kye]

12 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Right, but that is proving my point.  There is no medium format look.  Maybe there are dozens of medium format looks depending on which lens set somebody chooses, but with a definition like "it means different things to different people," you might as well be saying "I prefer a cinematic look" or "I prefer something that looks more filmic."

And of course not all lenses have the same character, but my point is really just that by the definitions given, I have actual large format and medium format film cameras that don't achieve the "medium format look" (as described by people here) and I have smaller sensor cameras that have a real chance of getting there instead, depending on which lenses I put on or whether I mount them on the back of a LF field camera using a vintage lens.

And of course 8mm film and any modern-ish phone camera, not just the iPhone 4, will look substantially different.  This is, again, a place where there are a number of characteristics which are fairly common among 8mm cameras/film, including 18fps, gate weave, huge grain, and a response curve typical to the film being used - some of which could be simulated on the phone and some not so much.  

I'm not proving your point.  The picture is fuzzy, and there isn't a single definition, but these things do exist.

Take "the film look".

If you ask people what the film look is, you will have arguments until the end of time.  Any attempt to define the film look will fail.  However, that doesn't mean there is no film look...  imagine two scenarios:

Scenario 1: I shoot images with an 8K sensor at base ISO, Zeiss Otis prime, sharpened h264 codec, 709 profile, and I edit in a 4K timeline without colour grading, and upload to YT.

Scenario 2: I shoot images with a 2K sensor at ISO 800, Contax Zeiss prime wide-open, in RAW, and I edit on a 2K timeline and in post I apply a Kodak 250D and 2383 colour transform, I add grain, I add gate weave, and I upload to YT.

I then show both videos to 100 people.  Probably all of them would say the second has a "film look" to it.  

Just because you can't define it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

If I then shoot images and I add a film-like contrast curve, some grain, some subtractive saturation, soften the edges slightly, and do a warm/cool split-tone, people who saw it might start to say it's got a "bit of a film look".

It's the same with the medium format look.  Or the Kodak look.  Or the S16 look.  Or the Technicolour look.  Or the Wes Anderson look.  Or the Tarantino look.  Or the VHS look.  etc.  

These things don't have a single precise and universally agreed definition, but it doesn't mean they don't exist.

Or it might be that you're not seeing it.  That's fine, no-one here is even remotely close to seeing everything in the images. When the top cinematographers, colourists, editors, production designers, etc all look at things they all see things we don't.  I mean, if interior designers can walk into a room and see the influence of late-18th century French sensibilities in a room, that leaves the rest of us practically blind by comparison, right?

[kye]

3 minutes ago, PannySVHS said:

Tell you what, art happened infront and with my camera whenever the battery quit working.😊

Maybe you need two...  one to have the battery fail and the other one to be rolling and catch the moment!

[Emanuel]

22 minutes ago, kye said:

I'm not proving your point.  The picture is fuzzy, and there isn't a single definition, but these things do exist.

Take "the film look".

If you ask people what the film look is, you will have arguments until the end of time.  Any attempt to define the film look will fail.  However, that doesn't mean there is no film look...  imagine two scenarios:

Scenario 1: I shoot images with an 8K sensor at base ISO, Zeiss Otis prime, sharpened h264 codec, 709 profile, and I edit in a 4K timeline without colour grading, and upload to YT.

Scenario 2: I shoot images with a 2K sensor at ISO 800, Contax Zeiss prime wide-open, in RAW, and I edit on a 2K timeline and in post I apply a Kodak 250D and 2383 colour transform, I add grain, I add gate weave, and I upload to YT.

I then show both videos to 100 people.  Probably all of them would say the second has a "film look" to it.  

Just because you can't define it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

If I then shoot images and I add a film-like contrast curve, some grain, some subtractive saturation, soften the edges slightly, and do a warm/cool split-tone, people who saw it might start to say it's got a "bit of a film look".

It's the same with the medium format look.  Or the Kodak look.  Or the S16 look.  Or the Technicolour look.  Or the Wes Anderson look.  Or the Tarantino look.  Or the VHS look.  etc.  

These things don't have a single precise and universally agreed definition, but it doesn't mean they don't exist.

Or it might be that you're not seeing it.  That's fine, no-one here is even remotely close to seeing everything in the images. When the top cinematographers, colourists, editors, production designers, etc all look at things they all see things we don't.  I mean, if interior designers can walk into a room and see the influence of late-18th century French sensibilities in a room, that leaves the rest of us practically blind by comparison, right?

LOL Loved the way you and @PannySVHS address the arena BTW ; )

Speaking of devil, Paul Lockhart, a mathematician, someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, mathematicians so to speak but also everyone of us simple mortal users, he once stated: "Doing mathematics should always mean finding patterns and crafting beautiful and meaningful explanations".

Understanding is the ability to catch sight of something aka comprehension. But also sympathetic awareness/tolerance.

Yet, math is a language, just not the only one.

Math is basics. One doesn't necessarily exclude another one outside.

Trouble comes when people see the things solely built on rankings. They lose the sense of ridicule.

- EAG

[PannySVHS]

A nerve wrecking affair extra ordinaire.😂 I would pee horrified Smileys into the sand afterwards. @kye

[Emanuel]

Those who ignore philosophy as science will struggle to identify any branch of it, namely aesthetics as something non-existent. If it is non-existent, why the hell there's any need to learn or even think about it? : D

- EAG

[eatstoomuchjam]

9 hours ago, kye said:

I'm not proving your point.  The picture is fuzzy, and there isn't a single definition, but these things do exist.

Take "the film look".

If you ask people what the film look is, you will have arguments until the end of time.  Any attempt to define the film look will fail.  However, that doesn't mean there is no film look...  imagine two scenarios:

Scenario 1: I shoot images with an 8K sensor at base ISO, Zeiss Otis prime, sharpened h264 codec, 709 profile, and I edit in a 4K timeline without colour grading, and upload to YT.

Scenario 2: I shoot images with a 2K sensor at ISO 800, Contax Zeiss prime wide-open, in RAW, and I edit on a 2K timeline and in post I apply a Kodak 250D and 2383 colour transform, I add grain, I add gate weave, and I upload to YT.

I then show both videos to 100 people.  Probably all of them would say the second has a "film look" to it.  

Just because you can't define it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

If I then shoot images and I add a film-like contrast curve, some grain, some subtractive saturation, soften the edges slightly, and do a warm/cool split-tone, people who saw it might start to say it's got a "bit of a film look".

It's the same with the medium format look.  Or the Kodak look.  Or the S16 look.  Or the Technicolour look.  Or the Wes Anderson look.  Or the Tarantino look.  Or the VHS look.  etc.  

These things don't have a single precise and universally agreed definition, but it doesn't mean they don't exist.

Or it might be that you're not seeing it.  That's fine, no-one here is even remotely close to seeing everything in the images. When the top cinematographers, colourists, editors, production designers, etc all look at things they all see things we don't.  I mean, if interior designers can walk into a room and see the influence of late-18th century French sensibilities in a room, that leaves the rest of us practically blind by comparison, right?

No, I'm sorry.  That's bullshit.  If a term has no clear definition, then the term is just plain useless.  Otherwise we're just shouting at each other that the images aren't "old-timey" enough.  Also, even in your example of two different grades, if the 100 people you show things to are not video nerds, I think a lot fewer of them are going to rate the second "film look" than you think.  They might say the second one looks older, especially because of gate weave.

Ad of course it's that I'm not seeing "the medium format look."  You can't see what doesn't fucking exist.  I was pretty sure it did exist when I started shooting medium and large format over 20 years ago.  Over years and using many different combinations of lens and film, I've realized how there's no look intrinsic to any format.  Lenses definitely have different looks, but if I have medium and large format film cameras that wouldn't fit the descriptions people give for "the medium format look" or "the large format look," those descriptions are wrong and/or imaginary.

[kye]

1 hour ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

No, I'm sorry.  That's bullshit.  If a term has no clear definition, then the term is just plain useless.  Otherwise we're just shouting at each other that the images aren't "old-timey" enough.  Also, even in your example of two different grades, if the 100 people you show things to are not video nerds, I think a lot fewer of them are going to rate the second "film look" than you think.  They might say the second one looks older, especially because of gate weave.

Ad of course it's that I'm not seeing "the medium format look."  You can't see what doesn't fucking exist.  I was pretty sure it did exist when I started shooting medium and large format over 20 years ago.  Over years and using many different combinations of lens and film, I've realized how there's no look intrinsic to any format.  Lenses definitely have different looks, but if I have medium and large format film cameras that wouldn't fit the descriptions people give for "the medium format look" or "the large format look," those descriptions are wrong and/or imaginary.

It must be amazing to know everything and have nothing else to learn.

I can't imagine what that must be like.

To see everything.  To know everything.  Wow.

We truly are lucky to have you here to correct all of us in our silly and naive delusions.

Please...  tell us what else we all collectively believe that is also wrong...  enlighten us...  your omnipotence!

 

[eatstoomuchjam]

1 hour ago, kye said:

It must be amazing to know everything and have nothing else to learn.

I can't imagine what that must be like.

To see everything.  To know everything.  Wow.

We truly are lucky to have you here to correct all of us in our silly and naive delusions.

Please...  tell us what else we all collectively believe that is also wrong...  enlighten us...  your omnipotence!

 

Come on, now.  I'm not claiming to know everything, but it's also clear that after 20+ years of shooting medium and large format cameras, I have more experience in the format than people who have never touched one and yet are talking about the "look."  I don't have to know everything to know anything at all which is a lot more than the majority of people chiming in on this topic know.

Have you shot thousands of images over the last 20 years with medium and large format cameras?  How many of them have you ever used?  Or even touched?  Without looking it up, could you even tell me what the Scheimpflug's principle is?  What about reciprocity failure?

Somebody doesn't have to be omniscient to know more about a topic than somebody else.

 

[Emanuel]

@kye it's useless, the most funny is that people who think this way (I don't mean it's the case of this fellow because I don't REALLY appreciate to say anything about someone I have no clue about, other than this poster knows Tarkovsky exists, so double shame on such a level of arrogancy then... nonetheless, keeps the need for more often the 'fucking' word written everywhere or is not cool enough LMAO : D), they think they are aware of knowledge they usually even have ZERO clue that exists -- hence that remark on aesthetics/philosophy above ; )

The fact is though that we need a microscope to see that imaginary world to only exist in the head of a scientist.

@eatstoomuchjam Thanks for introducing Scheimpflug anyway. Never heard about him before. What about André Bazin? Have you ever read anything about him? Because I guess you had heard about this guy who knew more about film than all people after him and as DoP never shot nor directed a single frame we had noticed from.

That said, film is far to be mere technology, whether everyone like it or not.

- EAG

 

[Emanuel]

45 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Somebody doesn't have to be omniscient to know more about a topic than somebody else.

Well posted, thank you! ; )

The fact you have a point doesn't mean some other point about both the use of a terminology or some realm outside the knowledge you have, makes you know about this specific topic more than the other side.

That's all about that ;- )

[eatstoomuchjam]

19 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

What about André Bazin? Have you ever read anything about him?

Andre Bazin, the film critic/theorist?  Yes, I am familiar.  Why?  Is he relevant to medium format film?

2 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

Well seen : ) The fact you have a point doesn't mean some other point about both the use of a terminology or some realm outside the knowledge you have, makes you know about this specific topic more than the other side. This is all about that :- )

It does mean that I'm not talking out of my ass.  I've likely taken far more images on medium and large format film than anybody else in this discussion which, I feel, is a pretty decent qualification for talking about what those formats look like.  I've also built several medium and large format cameras over the years.  What are your qualifications in discussing the look of medium and/or large format film?

FWIW, I also have spent a lot of time with others who shoot medium and large format film.  Wanna guess which phrase they never use?  "Medium format look."  The discussions tend to be a lot more around what specific lenses look like/do, whether those lenses will cover a certain format, and lately, how much film costs.  A box of 8x20 is just about enough to send a person to the poorhouse.

 

[Emanuel]

So, time for more show off now? : D

I am a professional producer for three decades today. Film and TV producer. I have produced along MORE than only one from those key players of the mainstream of this industry. I will even omit to publicize now the names of them here because feels so ugly such an unnecessary silliness for these boards' sake. This is a reasonable discussion not a decadent show, please.

My work and background (not only from a full 4-year program at the film school among a few other postgraduate and craft qualifications with first-rate ASC members used to see their work to be nominated/awarded by the Academy BTW beyond A-class film festivals or BAFTA, among others) are public and at the distance of a single click.

As photographer/cinematographer, I have shot since the decade of 80 of the last century since film to digital in practically all main formats used in the business. Narrative and documentary. As closer of pure artistic as possible. Not fashion nor commercials, hence medium and large formats are not formats I am used to, as shooter per se. But...

Why Bazin?

Because you don't need to ever shoot a single frame to be entitled to give lessons. Yes, I have been hired to cross international borders to teach other people how to work with any single camera in the world. Trust and mark my words, never had to make a single phone call to make it happen ; )

Bazin would be entitled to teach you what you don't know. To you, to me too for sure. About medium and large formats you're familiar with for two decades as you say.

The problem with your posts doesn't look like to strictly be from a technical side of the craft. But a craft is far to only be such an important aspect, i.e., it's not the only one.

Got your point. I even think no one here fully disagrees with you.

You're just claiming both a certain terminology used is wrong and the use of a larger sensor size doesn't add any to the equation whereas glass (or other variables such as distance to the subject I've called tricks and someone else tried to infer as some improper jargon when it is not) may not balance it.

The discussion hasn't evolved yet to match the agree to disagree path because of lack of tolerance with and people struggle to figure out.

Technique is based on variables. Each one introduces some characteristics for a certain purpose or effect. A larger sensor size no less. What's so hard to accept people may call it something you think as not adequate? LOL : ) Let alone the fact it'is not even far from the reality the adoption of that exact nomenclature.

Ah OK, because you see it strictly from a technical POV (we cannot call it exclusively scientific because math is not the only science on Earth ; ) but at same time, that standpoint looks : P to completely ignore perception as some specific reality and TBH subject of some other multiple sciences of their kind.

Without mention the case study, coming from a method eminently scientific as far as the introduction of variables into an equation concerns.

- EAG :- )

[kye]

7 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Come on, now.  I'm not claiming to know everything, but it's also clear that after 20+ years of shooting medium and large format cameras, I have more experience in the format than people who have never touched one and yet are talking about the "look."  I don't have to know everything to know anything at all which is a lot more than the majority of people chiming in on this topic know.

Have you shot thousands of images over the last 20 years with medium and large format cameras?  How many of them have you ever used?  Or even touched?  Without looking it up, could you even tell me what the Scheimpflug's principle is?  What about reciprocity failure?

Somebody doesn't have to be omniscient to know more about a topic than somebody else.

In life I've continually found that when people around me generally agree on something that I can't see when I look, I have found that there was something there and I just hadn't learned to see it yet.

It's about being smart enough to know that you don't know everything.

By claiming that something doesn't exist, you are claiming to know everything - otherwise how can you know it doesn't exist?  It might just be in the part of the sum total of human knowledge and experience that you haven't experienced yet.  The only way you can know something isn't in there is if you have all of it.

You're not claiming you know more than us about it, you're claiming to know everything about it.  The logic is very simple.

[eatstoomuchjam]

38 minutes ago, kye said:

In life I've continually found that when people around me generally agree on something that I can't see when I look, I have found that there was something there and I just hadn't learned to see it yet.

It's about being smart enough to know that you don't know everything.

By claiming that something doesn't exist, you are claiming to know everything - otherwise how can you know it doesn't exist?  It might just be in the part of the sum total of human knowledge and experience that you haven't experienced yet.  The only way you can know something isn't in there is if you have all of it.

You're not claiming you know more than us about it, you're claiming to know everything about it.  The logic is very simple.

Again, I can know something about a thing without knowing everything about a thing..  And yes, unless you have exposed and/or examined thousands of images on medium and large format film over many years, I know more about it than you do.  Similarly, you know more about color space transforms than I do.  The main difference is that I don't suffer from Dunning-Kruger enough to think that I should argue with you about the thing that you know better.

If you're in a crowd of people saying that all vaccines don't work, they're not right.  If you're in a crowd of people who tell you that the earth is flat, they are not right.  If you're in a group of people who interpret the bible literally and think that a huge flood killed all life on earth except for the pairs of animals that a single man put on a boat, they are not right.  They don't know facts that you haven't learned to see yet.  They're just victims of incorrect groupthink.  Vaccines have been demonstrated safe and effective.  Earth is an oblate spheroid.  There was no enormous flood that simultaneously impacted every continent on Earth.  There is no magical "medium format look" that is common to all medium format camera/lens combinations (or even a decent subset of them).

 

[mercer]

Then why spend tens of thousands of dollars, and hours, on a format that doesn't offer any advantage, if it doesn't exist?

Anyway, the GH7 seems like a very capable camera. One thing I learned from that video, in the comments section, is that Panasonic changed their color science recently, is that true?

It does make sense, when I used the GH6, it did seem to lean toward green a bit but then the S5iiX definitely had more of a magenta look to it and it seems that the magenta has carried over to the GH7. So the LogC profile could possibly work better with the GH6 since the Alexa is known to have a green bias straight out of camera.

[Emanuel]

56 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

There is no magical "medium format look" that is common to all medium format camera/lens combinations (or even a decent subset of them).

I really struggle to understand why you insist to not see the fallacy of that... : ) You are accurate on your point. Nobody can deny. No jokes for this paragraph. Magical "medium format look". OK, who has here call it like that?

The only point you take your chance to call ignorants to other people and write from a superior position where you don't lose a single opportunity to intend such place for yourself, is the one everyone agrees, yes Master! : D Half way now ; ) So, a larger sensor size introduces zero add-ons when the other variables stand. Right : X

[eatstoomuchjam]

55 minutes ago, mercer said:

Then why spend tens of thousands of dollars, and hours, on a format that doesn't offer any advantage, if it doesn't exist?

100 megapixels is more than 61 megapixels.  That's an advantage.  The 110/2 is my favorite portrait lens for any system.  In fact, every lens made for the GF system is excellent.  Also, because I like the ergonomics and I like any number of other things about the system.  It's possible to like a thing without inventing imaginary characteristics to apply to it.

With film, I like my large format gear especially because I enjoy the contemplative experience of shooting with it.  I like using gear that by its very nature demands slow and deliberative composition/shooting.  It's a great contrast to gear that invites me to shoot hundreds of photos and end up with only a handful of keepers.

4 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

I really struggle to understand why you insist to not see the fallacy of that... : ) You are accurate on your point. Nobody can deny. No jokes for this paragraph. Magical "medium format look". OK, who has here call it like that?

If you mean the word "magical," that was my embellishment.  As far as people applying various inconsistent and fanciful attributes such as "you can walk right into the image," various people in the thread have done exactly that.

6 minutes ago, Emanuel said:

So, a larger sensor size introduces zero add-ons when the other variables stand

With a given focal length and aperture combination, for a given field of view, a larger sensor will obviously provide shallower depth of field.  This is not controversial.  But there is more than one lens in the world so it would be silly to limit oneself to just those variables, especially when it's simply math to determine which combination will provide nearly identical results on a different format.

It is also not controversial that with large film formats, one can achieve a depth of field that is shallower than is possible with any lens ever made for a smaller format.  As I said before, a 450mm f/5.6 lens on 8x20 inch film yields ridiculously shallow DOF (unusably so, even).  However, that is not traditionally why anybody shot larger formats - in fact, photographers like Adams used to stop down to tiny apertures in order to regain depth of field with large format cameras - to the point where their club was called "f/64."  If the medium or large format look is defined by shallow depth of field, it is certainly ironic that history's most famous users of those formats did everything in their power to not have that look, including using camera movements to increase depth of field (one of the reasons I brought up Scheimpflug earlier).

Later in his career, Adams also frequently preferred to use a 6x6cm Hasselblad to his 8x10 field camera and even sometimes shot on 35mm film.  Guess he must have just grown sick to death of feeling able to walk right into his images.

[mercer]

16 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

100 megapixels is more than 61 megapixels.  That's an advantage.  The 110/2 is my favorite portrait lens for any system.  In fact, every lens made for the GF system is excellent.

All part of the look.

18 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

It's possible to like a thing without inventing imaginary characteristics to apply to it.

Can you prove it doesn't exist?

Perhaps your style of photography doesn't lend to the look, so you haven't been able to adequately capture it?

17 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Also, because I like the ergonomics and I like any number of other things about the system.  It's possible to like a thing without inventing imaginary characteristics to apply to it.

With film, I like my large format gear especially because I enjoy the contemplative experience of shooting with it.  I like using gear that by its very nature demands slow and deliberative composition/shooting.  It's a great contrast to gear that invites me to shoot hundreds of photos and end up with only a handful of keepers.

Valid point.

[Emanuel]

39 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

It's possible to like a thing without inventing imaginary characteristics to apply to it.

Things don't need to be uncontroversial to not be or become "imaginary"... : D Other than that, well, who can deny it? Imaginary stuff is what pictures are made of, isn't it? LOL : )

EDIT -- haha @mercer we both didn't let slide... The like button had already been triggered this time anyway ;- )