GH2 & an Economical Wide lens?

Jack Lynt

Jack Lynt

I'm thinking of getting a GH2. I'm hoping to get a lens that will give me some kind of wide angle focal length. I'm rather partial to fix lens as opposed to zooms.

I'm hoping my fd lenses, a 24, a 50, and an 85 will give me good coverage in the higher focal point range.

I'm looking at the Panasonic - Lumix G 14mm F2.5 ASPH Lens. Customer reviews on B&H are kind of all over the place.

What do you think of that lens? Is the 14-42 kit lens actually a better lens, or more useful, or do you like the fixed 14mm? Or is there something else that's economical that I should be looking at for a wide?

Thanks for any help. =)
 
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richy said:
Uh oh. Why do you think that, Gonzo? Isn't the GH2 supposed to be better out of the box with moire and rolling shutter?
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Somewhat better with moire and rolling shutter, at the cost of "over" sharpness that GH2 users have to fight with, as well as the baked in colors you get without access to color profiles including flat picture styles. It also has a smaller than S35 sensor (5D is bigger, APS-C is the same size as S35). Out of the box IMO it's slightly inferior to the APS-C cameras and vastly inferior to the 5D. With the hack, it's probably a little better than the APS-C and comparable to the 5D (depending on your taste). I personally don't like the footage all that much, but I can see why some people do.

Spend some time reading GH2 forums and you'll see they fight their own set of issues. They are different, but issues none the less.

Also throw in the name recognition. If you are trying to get commercial, industrial, music video, wedding work there is a fair chance when you say "I shoot on a 5D" they will recognize that as a "good" camera. If you say "GH2", they'll say "What's that".

I may get one as a second cam for certain situations, but not me as my "A" cam.
 
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Gonzo_Entertainment said:
Also throw in the name recognition. If you are trying to get commercial, industrial, music video, wedding work there is a fair chance when you say "I shoot on a 5D" they will recognize that as a "good" camera. If you say "GH2", they'll say "What's that".
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xD I'll tell ya what name recognition gets you with Canons in my hood "Please god no". Name recognition is for craigslist DPs.


I may get one as a second cam for certain situations, but not me as my "A" cam.
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That's what they all say. lol Literally

So, yeah, every camera in general has its own set of quirks. We had to sit and figure out Epic as well, no big deal. At the end of the day:

http://vimeo.com/36254775
http://vimeo.com/36113535

None.. I mean NONE of the other DSLRs on the market are doing this. Period. If that's not someone's cup of tea, then all good. But that's pretty much indisputable.

Take it or leave it, but there aren't many formats (outside of film) that I haven't shot or owned. They cannot hang.
 
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Gonzo_Entertainment said:
Somewhat better with moire and rolling shutter, at the cost of "over" sharpness that GH2 users have to fight with,.
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That's a new one on me, I like high resolution, and that's what the GH2 gives you -- real resolution (hacked or unhacked), not some fake electronic sharpening. The Canons are all notoriously soft, and there's some question as to whether the actual usable resolution of the Canons is true HD, looks more like 480p for a lot of us.

And "Somewhat better with moire and (aliasing!) and rolling shutter" is an understatement based on my experience as a Canon 7d owner. Huge difference.
 
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"looks more like 480p for a lot of us."

That's just ridiculous.

It's a taste thing. I don't like the GH2 image as a general rule for most of the stuff I do. If I shot on one I'd be softening it in post and trying to figure out how to deal with the terrible dynamic range.

That being said, for the price I'm considering one for 60 fps, event stuff, some exteriors (those prone to aliasing), if I think I can get the footage to match up reasonably well.
 
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Gonzo_Entertainment said:
"looks more like 480p for a lot of us."

That's just ridiculous.
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It was measured forever ago. Canons shoot around 540 lines of actual resolution.

At best, they're 720P cameras. =[



It's a taste thing. I don't like the GH2 image as a general rule for most of the stuff I do. If I shot on one I'd be softening it in post and trying to figure out how to deal with the terrible dynamic range.
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Canon DSLR footage's usable DR is around 8 stops because of the noise floor and low resolution. GH2's usable DR is about 7.5.

What difference? lol

Don't mistake the valid lack of picture profile adjustment for usable DR. Or, the appearance of "better highlight roll off" for a camera's inherent ability to handle luminance and chrominance value shifts in the upper IRE range. The only "better highlight roll off" your'e getting from canon is its upscaled 540P to "1080P" softness.

Shoot the same thing with the same lens on a GH2 (Canon EFs), reduce the size to 540, scale it back to 1080 by stretching the image in Quicktime. Notice how much it looks like Canon footage.

That being said, for the price I'm considering one for 60 fps, event stuff, some exteriors (those prone to aliasing), if I think I can get the footage to match up reasonably well.
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You can definitely destroy GH2 footage to match 5D footage.

But again, you will never get 5D footage to hold up to Epic footage. In any way shape or form.
 
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I owned both cameras. I sold the Canon. The panasonic, without the hack, does better video than the canon no question.

A 28mm fd mount lens is a really useable setup on the GH2............
 
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After all that yappin' about wides, I decided to order the Sigma 20/1.8 in EF (Canon) mount.

It'll be here thursday, gonna shoot part of this broadcast spot on it over the weekend for sure.

Thoughts and info soon.

Anim8 said:
I owned both cameras. I sold the Canon. The panasonic, without the hack, does better video than the canon no question.

A 28mm fd mount lens is a really useable setup on the GH2............
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We got rid of our 5D luckily. Maybe if the MKIII can actually match GH2 then I'll get one immediately to go with the GH2, if not though.

Oh well. GH3 lookin'. :D
 
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Kholi said:
After all that yappin' about wides, I decided to order the Sigma 20/1.8 in EF (Canon) mount.

It'll be here thursday, gonna shoot part of this broadcast spot on it over the weekend for sure.

Thoughts and info soon.
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Haven't been too impressed with the stills I've seen of it wide open, but I'd definitely be interested to see what you think of it!
 
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chilipie said:
Haven't been too impressed with the stills I've seen of it wide open, but I'd definitely be interested to see what you think of it!
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Agreed on this. It probably wouldn't be my main choice for stills, but video?

Consider the high frequency moire aliasing produced by video from DSLRS, and how CA (chromatic abberation) and diffraction reduces the appearance of it. Wide open, it actually should be decent for DSLR video, and a bit better by 2.8~4 splits.

This is also why I like using super slow glass in broad daylight, because typically cheap stuff like that's got CA all over the place wide open.

Epic on the other hand? Maybe not good. It's like using the 28/T2.1 Zeiss Standard Speed wide open... sucker blooms like the beginning of Spring, man.

Will report back with footages!


wheatgrinder said:
how do you run that lens on the GH2.. whats the adapter? Can you set aperture manually?
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I'm using mostly EF's on my GH2 with a Kipon adapter, and when we DID have the 5D I could set aperture on that and the put the lens on the GH2. Now I'm gonna go out and get a 30.00 throw away film body to do that job.

The Sigma 30/1.8 AI-S (nikon) has manual aperture. I didn't get that one because I'm not a Nikon body fan, if we go to any camera next it'll have an EF mount anyway so might as well prepare!

The Kipon iris adapter is kinda weird, I like it and I don't like it, which means it's usable for some stuff but not all. xD
 
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Kholi said:
I'm using mostly EF's on my GH2 with a Kipon adapter, and when we DID have the 5D I could set aperture on that and the put the lens on the GH2. Now I'm gonna go out and get a 30.00 throw away film body to do that job.

The Sigma 30/1.8 AI-S (nikon) has manual aperture. I didn't get that one because I'm not a Nikon body fan, if we go to any camera next it'll have an EF mount anyway so might as well prepare!

The Kipon iris adapter is kinda weird, I like it and I don't like it, which means it's usable for some stuff but not all. xD
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Just a side comment, but I wish I could shoot like this, but I never ever ever, no matter what I'm shooting, have the luxury of time. Even my follow focus tends to collect dust. Finding time to screw on a simple ND filter, often feels like a huge moral victory. My destiny is apparently to be a running gunner.

Perhaps someday I'll have money and afford myself the luxury of a matte box and lots of cool filters. And I'd also like a Script Supervisor. Yeah. Script Supervisor, that'd be nice.
 
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Haha. Actually it sounds like much more of a headache than it is.

There are only two points where I need the exposure adjustment, it's either wide open or down to 2.8~4 split

The rest of the exposure's done with NDs. So, basically, I adjust the lens once in broad daylight (2.8~4) then us the NDs or Kipon to deal with the rest.

Then night, open it back up to 1.8 and leave it there.

I don't like Matteboxes or Follow Focuses. =X They add too much time to the day.
 
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Kholi said:
...Now I'm gonna go out and get a 30.00 throw away film body to do that job...
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Get an EOS IX lite for about $10. Since they are EPS cameras, you should be able to score one for next to zero. Check thrift stores and flea markets. I bought one for $25 because it had a decent lens with it that I didn't already own.
 
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I'm not sure how many times I'll have to say I LIKE the softness of the Canon's before you'll believe I really mean it. I find it aesthetically very pleasing. Hell pretty much every (since they are all 40 or 50 years old) lens I own has internal dust and scratches that soften it even MORE.
 
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