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GH3 Best Video Settings
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  • @maxr in your low light video there are almost no midtones at all. You have good lighted areas and no light areas, completely dark so you are safe, I mentioned it before, the problem with noise is in midtones, where the sensor doen't know exactly what it sees, for example, in f/1.2 and iso 1600 I shot the "thriller" video the midtones are about in the same range that in reality our eyes see but not to say for sure what they see :). @maxr About panning, I am not sure if I explained it right but I tried in page 3 july 24 in this same forum. @maddog15 wherever the light is ok 3200 would be acceptable with neat video of course, unfortunately I agree with you and prefer the same, darker but cleaner image, unfortunately because we have no choise of higher iso than 1600 but, if its toooo dark, when you boost in post the pressed colors they go nowhere, those are the times with a tear in my eye I choose to go to 3200 and 6400 at least to catch some color and the bride to be a noisy bride and not any living being. If sometime we'are gonna have a raw shooting hack like 5d, probably we will be able to shoot at any iso with no noise at all...probably, hopefuly...NEVER :p

  • @starios. Ditto and I hear ya bro.

  • Hi All,

    Been following this thread, just hobbyist not film maker :) just testing with lower light filming, Std -2,-2,0,-5 ISO2000 f1.4 25mm Pany Leica prime cleaned up with neatvideo with a couple of 40w bulbs at night, was trying some of the more aggressive -numbers but this seemed to retain more detail and scopes showed I'd not crushed or clipped anything so was not sure what going less contrast, saturation etc. would gain in that instance ?, colours as shot just took it to studio rgb levels before uploading to youtube.

  • @Umii This looks great. Really helps when you bath a dark shot with a key/spot light like you did with the lamp. With YouTube compression it's hard to tell but your noise level appears to be almost nonexistent. (Thanks to Neat!) A lot of credit has to be given to that wonderful f1.4 Leica lens I think. From the settings you listed above I'm assuming the -5 is noise reduction?

    Nice test and thanks for posting.

  • A little off-topic, but is it definitely not possible to shoot video at 125 ISO? A bunch of settings present in the photo settings menu are not in the video one, and while some apply to both (1/3 stop ISO for instance), Extended ISO does not seem to.

    Really, I'm not very happy with the stock firmware - there's not enough customizability. I don't need either aperture control or shutter speed bound to the thumb wheel things, as I shoot video with manual glass, yet I can't change them.

  • Yes the lowest ISO for video is 200

  • I'm hoping the hack, if/when it happens, can fix that.

  • @maddog15 thanks! Yes -5 is noise reduction I just let neat handle it I probably took a bit too much out on this neat is such a nice tool taking the time to do a profile for the iso setting specifically really seems to pay off. Love the lens as well I've got a 45mm 1.8 Olympus on order as well which seems to deliver good bang for the buck, will be interesting. Would love to invest in some fancy manual glass but can't justify it (yet ;) ) managing to workaround most focus issues with the fly by wire stuff and neat is good enough for my expectations to let me work at higher iso with slower lenses.

  • @Umii As far as getting the best GH3 video in low light and nice manual prime lenses go... Google the Voigtlander Nokton 25mm or 17.5mm if you haven't already. They're Micro 4/3 lenses. The incredible feature....both have an f-stop of 0.95! Also feature a "non-click" aperture ring for silent adjustments while filming. Very pricey but talk about a piece of glass...wow.

    Sorry to the group for getting off topic a bit :)

  • 25mm does not have a stepless aperture ring.

  • I've been exclusively shooting in Natural -5s but this tread made me rethink it, considering the chalky skin tones. So, I tried a little Standard -3s and it did seem a little better. Although, looking at the histogram, I would have liked more range to work with in Post. Also note that I'm working with the Voigtlander 25mm and it's usually softer and yellower than the Lumix lenses.

  • @SuperSet Can you post a vid of your results. I for one would love to see your results. I. believe I'm coming to similar conclusion. Standard, all at -5, has yielded great results fir me in post for most everything I shoot. It's only when skin is present that things become...difficult ...to say the least. I'm retesting with Standard -3 -3 -2 -3. I'll post results when I've completed my tests.

  • Yes it's more visible in red/magenta/purple colors I believe the post processing has some flaw (maybe intentional) in this regard.

    And yes all -5 there is loss in those red's and also in blown highlights they tend to get greyish hard to recover vividly and natural, without destroying the footage.

    Now if you are shooting without skins or red stuff, and no blown highlights go for all -5 it does give slight margin in post. Like low light dark places that's a good example where all -5 wins.

    CHEERS

  • For me it is absolutely NATURAL -5 -5 -2 -5. Shot my first shortmovie with this setting after weeks of testing prior to production. Grades very nicely. Used only 2 lenses => mostly the Voightländer 0.95 25mm and the SLR Magic 12mm Hyperprime for some wides.

    http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/comment/141352#Comment_141352

    Great camera!

  • Hey guys, I've read through most of the last 7 pages and I'm still confused which settings is better suited for me!

    I've been filming with 2x GH2 hacked with lovely results. I've just purchased the GH3 and it's on its way. I'll be employing 1080P 50P and I'm just wondering which will be better AVCHD or .mov? I don't mind the extra workflow of GH3 as 5DtoRGB has treated me well. Some say GH3 is better low light, some say GH2. Some say .mov and some say avchd.

    -I'm looking for better low light noise performance -using T0.95 lenses from slr magic and F0.95 from voigtlander

    thanks!

  • Hi @zihan I have shot iso 3200 in f3.5 and though my footage was total lost, even though Hit the record button. Y got to premiere CC and my surprise is WOW is usable ;-)

    Also keep in mind lenses have lot to do with noise. I tested Samyang and Panny lenses only.

    So didn't have experience on GH2, but as for sub 2k canon dslr the GH3 is MILES AHEAD, in both DR and LowLight.

    For me, higher than iso 1250/1600 go for AVCHD below that .mov.

    Only issue for me (no real problem), is RED colour, its weird how GH3 manaje that channel, mostly if you dial saturation and contrast down to -5, sometimes so good sometimes greyish that affects skintones badly.

    With T0.95 lenses, you can shoot very nice noise at iso 1600 almost no light.

  • I own Nex5R and Lumix GH3. I tried to match picture profiles to be as much as close for both cameras.

    I found out that MOV recording on GH3 has much more contrast than AVCHD format. But MOV is much better picture. Is there any way to choose some other settings? Here are my examples.

    LumixNex.jpg
    1695 x 1080 - 1M
    lumixnex1.jpg
    1920 x 2160 - 2M
  • @miza have you tried decreasing the contrast on the picture setting? also, which picture profile are you using?

    last, you might be able to recover some of the shadows while color correcting by lifting the midtones.

  • Went on holiday to San Diego, California. I shot entirely on MOV 60p, standard setting -3, -3, -3, 0. All hand held.... yuck. CC and grading in Premiere Pro CS6.

    Learned a couple good lessons. Do not accidentally leave the camera on auto white balance. Color and temperature shifts and changes during recording! Do not use any of the iDynamic settings. Randomly changes exposure in odd inappropriate places while recording. Never use iResolution. It's almost the equivocate to filtering your shots with a "peaking focus" effect. Live and learn. :)

  • @maddog15 thanks for posting. My initial tests with iResolution just showed that it brought some more sharpening on the edges. Need to do more tests. Maybe this week. I'm using the GH2 as my "holy grail" for sharpness. So far tests have shown that GH3 is much softer. I haven't read through the entirety of this post. So I look to you guys for filling in some of the gaps on what I know/don't know. :)

  • @5thwall. Yep I'm not a fan of any "in -camera image enhancement" for video or images. I prefer to do that stuff in post. While I want to use my GH3 and GH2 for indie film making kinda stuff I have to remember the GH3 is built a "consumer" M4/3 camera. I'm sure many folks like the in camera features for their personal taste. :) Though not necessarily marketed as a pro videographers camera, I think the GH3's footage rivals and out perfoms many established video DSLR's. That's just my two cents.

  • @maddog15 B-but... http://i.imgur.com/XnhNTmS.jpg What made you change your mind?

  • @wgtwo change my mind about about....?

  • Shot this company spotlight over at DV Expo yesterday. GH3 + Voigtlander 25 + Monopod. Audio captured with Juicedlink RM-202 direct into the camera. Mic was Sennheiser 416 mounted on top of the camera.

    In-camera settings 0, 0, -2, 0. I'm messing around with i.Resolution (yeah, @maddog15, I know you said don't do it ;-D ) and had it set to low.

    I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. Minor color correction in FCP - just took the blacks down a smidge and increased the saturation a hair. I was pretty happy with the in-camera color balance, which was set to 2800k. I shot some stuff the day prior at 3200k and it was pretty difficult to get skin tones back to normal. I feel like you really want to "nail the kelvin" on the GH3. BTW "Nailin' the Kelvin" is also the name for a great track from the soundtrack for the JJ Abrams Star Trek reboot!

  • Maddog - just went through this whole thread. Thanks for all this great info. Trying to gauge your opinion on GH3. I've been using GH2 for about 2 years. My main work is documentary style stuff. I've never been able to find a hack that is stable enough to handle 40 minute interviews. So I've used GH2 with factory settings. I've been considering upgrading to GH3. My main motives for upgrading are (1) increased low light ability (I never go above 640iso on GH2), (2) better dynamic range and (3) more latitude to grade and correct in post. Factory GH2 is hard to push around in post.

    In your opinion does GH3 address these needs? Thanks much!