I worked for a long time as a first responder, free lance camera crews in LA used to carry these incredibly powerful portable camera lights. They'd just blast an incident with light and actually made our jobs easier in a lot of cases. That was a different time though. Pre dslr, pre HD even.

@brianluce Btw, I'm based in Pasadena. If you ever have a slow weekend, I love spending time talking shop with other GH2 users in the area. :) (That is if you are still in the L.A. area).

@brianluce Funny world - I lived in SB most of the time for most of the 90s and some of the last decade. :)

Well, then I guess I'll have to be the one to hit you up. I come to SB to shoot beaches or ranches sometimes, or to visit old friends.

I especially like these features among others:

"Multi-area Mode Full HD Video: FX/DX, and 2.7x crop mode at 1080p video modes - Whether shooting for depth of field in FX format mode, or looking for the extra 1.5X telephoto benefits of DX mode, the high resolution sensor of the D4 allows videographers to retain full 1080P HD resolution no matter what mode they choose. With the 2.7x crop, users can experience ultra-telephoto benefits in full HD resolution all at 16:9 aspect ratio."

"Simultaneous live view output without display / simultaneous monitor - Shooters have the option to send the display signal directly to an attached monitor via the HDMI port. This signal can be viewed on the camera’s LCD screen and external monitor simultaneously. Additionally, the image data display can be cleared from the screen, to remove distracting data or when feeding a live signal."

"Time lapse shooting - This new feature combines a selected frame rate and “shooting interval” in a dedicated time lapse photography menu. Playback can be achieved with a wide variety of speeds from 24x to 36,000x while producing a fully finished movie file output for faster multimedia workflows."

@Vitaliy

You are probably right, But I guess we will have to see future test to see how good it really is.

Here is the official PDF for the D4 from Nikon imaging

http://imaging.nikon.com/lineup/dslr/d4/

How are they dead? You're not going to get less dynamic range because you cropped the source... geez

This guy obviously had hands on D4. At around 17:20 min he says HDMI output is 8 bit 4:2:2 At 18:47 he says a 30 sec clip (h.264) is about 130MB

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jT0Pb5SNXmU

Joe Mcnally about D4:

Video quality and new features. Wow. We’re in the final stages of post right now for what we shot. Check back sometime next week for the full scoop. It’s a game changer.<

http://www.joemcnally.com/blog/2012/01/06/shooting-the-d4/

I am suspicious when someone says "game changer", so I won't believe until I see sample videos.

No problem bleach551, but you gonna love this one: First D4 video!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=nZZMIo7Zfys

@Stip,

Most of the scenes in the video look really great and some..not so much. I dont know if it is the Youtube compression , but I see some aliasing in some scenes with some light falloff in the corners in other scenes, possibly from the specific lenses that were used or as an vignetting effect done in post. Hopefully, as time goes by, there will be more examples form others whom have secretly had the D4 for a while.

Thank you very much for sharing this.

yep, I agree, it doesn't really blow me away, especially considering resolution and dynamic range. Then again, it's easy to overcrank contrast with Nikons and I'm sure with some tweakings of settings it could look much better. Youtube is shit also. Not worth the $6K just for video though I think, maybe D800 will show up soon. Also will be interesting to see some HDMI captured samples.

For a 6000 dollar cam I wouldn't expect less........

How would a 6000 dollar GH3 look like ;-)

Serious, the D4 looks like a nice cam but not revolutionary, just an upgrade.

DPReview overview of the Nikon D4:

http://www.dpreview.com/articles/7799914638/nikon-d4-overview

"The D4 gains improved aperture control in movie mode, with the addition of 'Power aperture'. This simply means that the user can adjust the aperture while recording video in the A and M exposure modes. It's also possible to set the aperture much more precisely in video live view mode before recording starts, in 1/8 stop increments"

Hard to judge detail on the Youtube sport video because of the youtube and perhaps avchd compression. It looks a little plasticky but no definite judgement before we see some proper avchd or even uncompressed output. Only little disappointment spec-wise is the 8 bit output. As a Nikon shooter, this camera is a bit out of my budget. The rumored d800 is more in line and I hope this tech tickle down to something like a d400 camera.