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95 Minutes Long Concert & 7 GH2
  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    We are in a preproduction stage for a GH2 Hack multicamera set up, (7) for a classical chamber music concert. The concert is about 90 minutes. We are trying to obtain at least 95 minutes continue recording with the GH2 hack later version. The recordings have a random stop- interruptions before the card even reach 11, 30, 44 minutes.

    Setting: Movie Mode/1080/24/ 44MB/s. We have reformatted the card, used a different ones.The cards are Sandisk 32MB 95/s. Any help would be appreciated

  • 49 Replies sorted by
  • duartixduartix

    Which hack are you using?

    Which ISO are you shooting at? Have you tried lowering the ISO?

    Which lens(es)?

    Are you using ETC?

    Have you tried low-level formatting in Windows? http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2134/speeding-up-your-sd-card-the-unexpected-way#Item_8

  • bradleysteenkampbradleysteenkamp

    Sounds like a very cool project! I've only ever used 4 cameras for a shoot, usually a combo of GH2/GH1/GF1 and Canon's. From that I've learned that it's risky to leave a camera unattended in case it gives up during the show. My hacked GF1 (which I had tested quite extensively) gave up on me a few times during a live show. I'd left it in a safe area at the back near the sound desk and lost quite a bit of material.

    I'd personally say that it's essential to have someone operating each camera. That way they will be able to re start it should it stop. You'd only loose a few seconds here and there and it's very unlikely to happen on all 7 cameras at the same time!

    Alternatively I'd say hack the GH2 firmware to allow unlimited shooting but leave the bit rate alone and shoot at the high quality 24/25p mode. That would still give you good quality footage but with much less risk of the camera giving up.

  • Alfi666Alfi666

    I have same issues with hacked GH2... it randomly stops recording - but as I found out, its not random - it can happen at time when GH2 reaches 4 gig and should span - this is not working all the time.

    I had these issues until I lowered the bitrate even under the stock settings :( ... from then on, I can record even 5 hours in line

  • duartixduartix

    I'd also advise you to use a patch that is proven not to cause speed issues when spanning. Lpowell's FlowMotion or Balazer's Cake can be very economical when using low ISOs and tripod mounted setups.

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    Thank you all for the help.

    • Hack AquaMotion, PTool, Load firmware V.10
    • ISO: 640
    • Lens: 14-140
    • We are not using ETC
    • Have you tried low-level formatting in Windows? No

    We are going to try the suggestions posted here, and we will post the results too

  • tinbeotinbeo

    All 7 gh2 shoot with 14-140 panasonic lense?

  • duartixduartix

    Just one more thing: I've seen ISO tests suggesting ISO640 to be the best, however, last night after a few patch tests I noted it wasn't the least noisy. And what we know for sure is that noise stresses the bitrate if the patch set you are using has a VBR nature. IIRC, ISO640 used about 50% more bitrate than ISO160.

  • JDNJDN

    Have you tried focusing manually? Sometimes helps. I've never had problems with Aquamotion spanning on the Sandisk 30 mbps 32 gig cards -- maybe there's something off with the 95 mbps? Are you planning on swapping out cards with Aquamotion? I only get 45 minutes or so....

    I think you can safetly go with GOP3 rather than I frame for such a recording as well. Back in the day I used Kae's 66mb GOP3 setting for many long shoots and it worked like a charm on any ol' class 10 card. Hope that helps. Good luck.

  • JDNJDN

    @duartix yes, I noticed the same when doing hi iso hi speed filming. I suspect with the 14-140 and not primes that 640 would be minimum for shooting indoors. But if you can get away with 160, nothing wrong with it -- used it many times. 320, not so much.

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    No. The lens are going to be different. We are planning to have a combination of telephoto, wide angle and zoom lens, the last ones to reframe from point A to B, but the time it would takes to go from A to B is going to be cut in editing, except when they would add some dramatic values to the performance.

    Thanks for asking.

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    Originally, we were using 30MB/s, we changed to 95MB/s hoping to enhance the time recording.

  • balazerbalazer

    Are you using Aquamotion v1 or v2? I've seen anecdotal reports of v2 being less reliable than v1.

    The Sandisk Extreme Pro 95 MB/s 32 GB cards are not recommended. They might be alright, but we know they don't span as reliably as the 64 GB cards at 146 Mbps in GOP1, and they haven't been tested in large amounts like the HD Video cards have been. I'd suggest switching to the 64 GB 95 MB/s card, or HD Video 32 GB card and using more economical patch settings like Cake.

    64 GB with Aquamotion v1 will give about 97 minutes of recording time. 32 GB with Cake at ISO 640 on a tripod will give about 140 minutes of recording time.

    And make sure you are working around the ISO noise bug at 640.

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    balazer, thanks for your reply and suggestion. It is on the list of suggestions that we are collecting here to try this week.

  • troyjasontroyjason

    Powering the GH2s buy plugging them in I assume. Doubt batteries will last that long with some patches - do lots of testing because some patches are intensive on battery life and might not make 90 minutes continuous. - make sure you plan out your cables and plugs.

  • balazerbalazer

    A regular GH2 battery lasts more than 90 minutes.

  • duartixduartix

    I have ~4h timelapses on stock battery.

  • mmbandmmband

    Shooting concerts I use different cameras (1080/24p or 1080/25p): Two cameras Canon 5D Mark II, two cameras GH1 (120MB SDHD 20,30,45,95Mb/s 10 Class), One GH2 (176MB), two video camera: Canon XF100, Legria HFS20. ZOOM Q3HD for similar plans.On the GH1 with the 32GB SDHC card can capture video without a break 240 minutes. GH2 CDHC 32GB can record 82 minutes (10 Class 30mb/s-95mbs) (driftwood path) http://osgfilms.com/hack-the-panasonic-gh2/ The more cameras the greater the different possibilities. I am using Final Cut Pro7, Final Cut ProX. My work: http://www.youtube.com/user/1953band

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    mmband, thank you for sharing with us your experience in the multi-camera work. You have nice reels at your site, thanks for sharing that too.

    We are going to try the path you have recommended too. From the technical and aesthetic point of view, how do you deal with color space and contrast ratio with so many different camera models? We prefer to stick with one camera model to make the postproduction process easy. I would like to hear about your approach in post.

  • AlexAlex

    its a very good approach to only have one type of camera setup! I did a concert with 5 cameras where 4 had been EX1s and 1 HVX200. Pana and Sony are tough to match. The main challenge will be to deal with 7x90 minutes of footage! Make sure to nail your look in camera. Every thing that you might want to fix/do in post becomes a tedious task. In hindsight I would say that fighting with the light and stage design department is most important. Much more relevant than all technical problems. I loved to geek out the perfect workflow and production pipe and hated to deal with grumpy lighting guys. The perfect light and stage design for your 7 cams might be pretty unpleasant for the audience (if its a live show) and this can quickly force you into compromises ...

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    troyjason ,

    Thank you for the advice. We are awarded of the battery issue. All camera are going to change battery during the concert intermission. It would be the same for the card, the problem is not we are not even getting 30 minutes out of the card at 1080/44Mb/s in Movie Mode.

  • willianalemanwillianaleman

    Alex, thanks for your reply. In our favor, it is a classical concert, so, we don't have to deal  with on stage lighting changes. Lighting in classical hall for concert  is very flat with the exception of opera. But, yes, I have been in  the venue you are mentioning, and I know it is very  difficult, specially matching color camera angles. And worse than  that, we can not do color balance because that will take away the  aesthetic purpose of the on stage lighting.

  • duartixduartix

    What if you find and set a neutral WB equal for all the cameras? Wouldn't that solve the color matching between angles?

    As for the recording length, that's the problem with CBR patches, they'll try to spend the whole bitrate they were designed to spend. Since this looks like the kind of footage where little complex movement is involved and except for lighting there will be little else changing I'd suggest you give it a go with one of the VBR patches (like lpowell's FlowMotion or balazer's Cake). If the used ISO is low, you'll probably get away with much less bitrate for the same IQ, and thus longer recording time.

  • JDNJDN

    @balazer sorry, off topic a bit but I'm getting confused on this noise issue -- one day I read iso 640 is the least noisy, but here I read it is buggy? What in particular is the bug (or is it just the fact you gotta go from a higher iso down to 640?).

    @duartix, your suggestion makes sense -- manual white balance on gh2 is pretty consistent camera to camera in my tests so he could just make sure the house lights are set in concert condition, pop the cameras off the sticks and do a manual wb to grey card on all of them and then be set.

  • balazerbalazer

    @willianaleman, what do you mean by 44 Mb/s? Which patch settings? Aquamotion is not 44 Mbps.

  • balazerbalazer

    @JDN, you can read what I said about ISO noise levels in these topics:

    http://personal-view.com/talks/discussion/1280/gh2-iso-noise-bug-at-320-640-and-1250

    http://personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2078/gh2-iso-noise-tests.-lows-mids-highs.-magic-iso-#Item_13

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