Hi,
I'm very concern about this topic.
Until now I've been focussing my learning, for circunstancial reasons, on the post production area, mainly editing footage from others, P2, Sony and Red format. In what filming is concerned, the experiences I had were always in controled light configuration and indoor.
Since I started to involve myself in the shooting itself in more diversified situations, issues appeared more clearly under certain circunstances and the one I'm really concern about, specially after the GH2 bad experience, is the banding-posterization problem. It's hugly and nor the bitrate neither post cure it at all.
The informations I could collect in internet and talking to people on set are showing that the problem comes from a sum of many factors. 8 bits, 4:2:0, codec used, light incidence, plane surface, log etc...
Rainer's footage shows that the GH2 is worse than the 5D2 on that aspect, but the 5D2 isn't free of it either. It just resolves it better but far from being ideal.
But my concern is that recording to an external device in 4:2:2 from those still cameras does yes improve a lot, but still is present to some extend.
I've noticed that the light angle is critical too.
Then, I watched many high-end video advertising campaigns and there is absolutly no banding involved.
Are those dslrs-evils absolutly unable to record a banding free-footage?
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I'd like, if possible, Michael to report on the Nex 7 with and without the HDMI recorder on that aspect too because it's an issue that has been completly ignored by reviewers on the GH2 and the only voices you could hear ww were that this camera is a little motion bomb, and then, surprises. It could lead to confusion on what real uses should we expect. When you're experienced, you know those things, but when you're rather new, it's more difficult to get a clear picture. There are so many new things to learn that the attention is focussed on this or that aspect and it's a constant discovery of problems that seems to never end.
Like many people, I've been attracted by the dslr-motion wave and the convergence idea, mainly for the form factor and wanted to see in this fload a suitable solution that technology now allows us to enjoy. But it seems that it's not the case yet. The footage deliver by those mini cameras isn't suitable for many high-end or professional requierements.
As many people who are just coming into motion, I'm learning the hard way, from mistakes, tries and conclusions from field experience. You can be lucky and see an issue immediatly or not, it depends.
But if reviewers all over the world were a little more explicit on certain aspects, it would be really helpull not to have to go through those testings and then realise later that the camera-system involved is useless or really weak. You can see in internet that many GH2 owners have bought this camera because of its price-size-reputation, and then started to discover serious issues later, not without surprise. Those complains are hidden in the middle of the overall crazyness and enthousiasm ww the camera still enjoy to date.
It happened to me too exactly the same way, I've been recommended this camera, I've seen experienced pros using it on set and then the worse is that I also recommended with confidence this camera to some people who asked me for a light reduced high performance motion gear and then realised quickly that it was a mistake because of those output problems discoveries. Lesson learned, never recommend something that hasn't been tested for a long time even if the rest of the world is saying it's the best, better than the 5D2 etc... (without talking about the discutible HDMI implementation etc...). There are things we can sacrifice, but the image quality no.
Don't get me wrong: I'm not asking the reviewers to think for me and avoid field testings. In my case I started late the field testings and those issues actually are much more pronunced under certain circunstances. I'm just asking the reviewers to report as much as they can, when things are not normal and-or could represent a serious uncurable downside. In the case of GH2 it is exacerbated by a factory engineering issue and Panasonic is aware of it.
Actually, some motion-video pro and one photographer of this forum warned me on the dslr-evil cameras. I thought that it was a glimpse of orthodoxy from their part and was so enthousiastic on the format that didn't listen, I must admit now that they were right.
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This is not a big deal. The camera was cheap, I didn't invest in m4/3 lenses and I'll simply buy a more solid tool. It's just been an incredible time consuming and false economies.
Back to the tread: about those banding posterization problems in general...
Any thoughts?