Panasonic GH4 announced

ItDonnedOnMe

ItDonnedOnMe

Thought this might be of interest, looks like panasonic is really doubling down on video capabilities:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ..._gh4kbody_lumix_dmc_gh4_mirrorless_micro.html

No price yet, but likely to be the least-expensive 4k option. Personally I'd be more excited about it if it did better than 8-bit 4:2:0 on board, although the specs aren't entirely clear on what format it does for 1080p. It's got a lot of other nice features though - variable frame rates up to 96fps. high-res oled evf/screen with zebras &peaking, 10 bit 4:2:2 external, etc. There's an audio/sdi module for it too, but it's relatively huge and clunky compared to the camera itself - clearly intended more for studio work.

It's going to be interesting to see what else hits here soon as we approach NAB, it seems like 4k is going to be the primary focus this year.
 
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Breakout box:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...c_dmc_gh4_yagh_lumix_yagh_interface_unit.html

Ugly as sin, but very interesting. In theory it brings a lot to the table. Imo though, 200mbs 4:2:2: 10bit 1080 at 96fps is far more interesting than 4K on this camera. ;)

Not really sold on their "50% faster read times reduce rolling shutter," and there is quite a bit of moire in the feathers in that Yucatan demo video. That said, if you pause the video where a woman on a bike rides by, it looks pretty solid.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHKJ5eE7I1k

Note that the time lapse stuff will have better DR than the motion video, so take that into account when looking for things like lost detail in the bright skies and the like.

At any rate, very likely a worthy BMD competitor - gains variable frame rates but loses RAW for example.

Jax, if you read this, do you have any insight on why so many SDI out? Convenience or is there something I don't know about SDI where it needs multiple outs to do the job of what would be 1 out on a regular broadcast cam?
 
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David.rhsc said:
Imo though, 200mbs 4:2:2: 10bit 1080 at 96fps is far more interesting than 4K on this camera. ;)
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That's something I couldn't quite figure out though - does it do 200mps 4:2:2 10bit on board? It seems like 10 bit 422 may only be on the output, with 8bit 420 on board. If it does 10bit on board I'd definitely be interested in this for 1080 stuff with the option to do 4k when it was useful for a particular shot.
 
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ItDonnedOnMe said:
That's something I couldn't quite figure out though - does it do 200mps 4:2:2 10bit on board? It seems like 10 bit 422 may only be on the output, with 8bit 420 on board.
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I'm not sure of the sub-sampling, but I am pretty positive that it is 8-bit on board to cards. The HDMI out is more vague. In some places it implies you can get 10bit clean out on the hdmi, but in others it implies you need the break-out box and the SDI.

Beyond that I am fairly confused as to some of the fine details. :D There's some sort of i-frame difference between 200mbps and 100 that I don't know enough about to understand. VFR info is just marketing descriptions, but the specs details don't seem to list them. One thing I do think might be goood is that it has a true 24p, potentially with a true 180deg shutter (24hz mode for "cinema" frame rate).

Unfortunately I don't think any of this changes the "Panasonic GH what?" response from an owner/operator perspective, but it has some very interesting potential for a lot of uses.
 
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Australian pricing to be announced soon but approximate us pricing are as follows…

$1499 US Body only & $2999 US with interface (AG-VAGHG)
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Looks like HDMI will be a possibility for 10-bit 4:2:2 output - the idea being that you can use your SDI's for whatever purpose you want, and keep your recorder permanently plugged into the HDMI. Also, it seems it will be possible to dual-record onto the SD card, as well as via the HDMI out.

The important thing to note is that this will look very similar, picture wise, to the current GH3. The difference is mostly the resolution. This isn't a magic camera that records incredible 4k footage for $3k. It still looks like a DSLR, has a lot of the issues with moire etc. It still has average colour subsampling and average codec - of course an external recorder helps, but they allowed that with the 5DmkIII and it didn't really take off (with good reason, the footage looked barely different).


In regards to the SDI outs - you would use all four to get a 4k image out of it. You should be able to use one for an HD image, or all four for a 4k image (essentially 4x 1080 out to create a 4k image). Some might be interested in this as a way to convert a 4x stream SDI into HDMI for a consumer 4k monitor:
https://www.aja.com/en/products/mini-converters/hi54k
 
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Here is Dan Chung from DSLR Newsshooter interviewing Illya Friedman from Hot Rod Cameras, who has been shooting with the GH4. Clip starts with discussion of the camera's possible approval by Discovery and the BBC for shooting docs. During the course of the discussion, Illya mentions that the camera has "12 stops of DR":

http://vimeo.com/86130834#t=1342s
 
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David.rhsc said:
Beyond that I am fairly confused as to some of the fine details. :D
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There's quite a few fine details, and unfortunately no single source that spells them all out satisfactorily. I've been trying to piece together a picture from a lot of different sources.

There's some sort of i-frame difference between 200mbps and 100 that I don't know enough about to understand.
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You're just trading off encoding efficiency & file size for playback performance. In the 200mbps mode each frame is a discrete image which has compression applied internally (intraframe compression) but doesn't depend on information from the frames before or after it - this plays back better when you edit with it and are scrubbing around at random. The 100mbps mode also uses interframe compression, where redundant pixels between frames are only encoded once - this gives you better picture quality at lower data rates, but it's harder on your edit system because displaying a single frame may require up to 15 adjacent frames to be loaded into memory and a lot of calculations to reassemble each frame.

Quality-wise they should be comparable, but that can depend on your subject. Interframe compression tends to fall apart a bit on fast motion, while intraframe struggles more with high picture detail. This may be why they don't offer the 200mbps I-frame only mode for 4k source - the additional detail would likely require a much higher data rate to encode it cleanly. The other side of this is that 100mbps intraframe, which should handle even fast motion cleanly at 1080p, may well look great on relatively static 4k footage but be insufficient for high-motion footage.

VFR info is just marketing descriptions, but the specs details don't seem to list them. One thing I do think might be goood is that it has a true 24p, potentially with a true 180deg shutter (24hz mode for "cinema" frame rate).
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EOSHD has a chart midway down their preview that details the VFR capabilities:

http://www.eoshd.com/content/11934/panasonic-gh4-preview

Basically it's got up to 13 frame rates you can choose (depending on your base frame rate), ranging from 2fps to 96fps. So it's got some nice options for slow motion, but it also may be of interest to action projects because you can do things like undercrank slightly at 22fps to speed up something like a fight scene without it looking like it's on fast forward.

Unfortunately I don't think any of this changes the "Panasonic GH what?" response from an owner/operator perspective, but it has some very interesting potential for a lot of uses.
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I'm pretty much out of the business of shooting for anyone else at this point, so that gives me the luxury of choosing a camera based purely on my own preferences, tempered of course by the fact that whatever I buy won't likely be paying for itself any time soon. I'd been planning to pick up a bmpcc because I really like the ability to shoot 10bit prores on board such a tiny camera, but it's a trade off for things like a fixed, relatively low-quality screen, lack of a histogram, and no high frame rates. The GH4 is appealing because it addresses most of those concerns, but of course at the trade off of codec quality. Fortunately I don't have much planned to shoot for the next couple months, so I'll probably wait and see what else becomes available at NAB before making a decision.

brunerww said:
During the course of the discussion, Illya mentions that the camera has "12 stops of DR":
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I think all the cameras have "12 stops of DR" now :lol:
 
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While I can't really comment on how good this camera is (or is likely to be) for the budget filmmaker, one thing I noticed which no one has mentioned is that the DMW-YAGH optional accessory has a "Time-Code In" BNC connector. In this article. While I can't find any detailed info on it, it very much looks like this feature allows the GH4 to "Sync Lock" with a time-code capable external audio recorder!!

What's that deafening silence I hear? ... OK, so most of you don't know what this means and have probably never worked with a sync-locked camera/audio recorder before. I won't go into all the ins and outs just now but imagine treating your external recorder audio as if it were the camera audio, IE. It effectively automatically syncs with your picture when you pull it into your NLE. No more spending time lining it all up in post, plus there are a number of other significant workflow tricks and benefits of time-code, not to mention never having to worry about your audio drifting out of time with your picture!

I've only ever seen time-code capability on professional film/video cameras. Maybe this accessory is going to cost a fortune and put it more into the professional price bracket and certainly time-code capable field recorders are not cheap by lo/no budget indie standards because again, there are no consumer or even pro-sumer recorders with time-code. Nevertheless, even just the potential prospect of starting to see lower budget indie filmmakers using time-code lock is quite exciting. As a sound designer it will allow me to spend more time actually designing sound and far less time trying to figure out what all the files in that bunch of audio folders actually are, and far less time importing, auditioning and sync'ing them! Less time wasted in this area means lower audio post costs to the filmmaker and/or better quality, which is why commercial productions always use time-code sync in the first place!

G
 
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AudioPostExpert said:
While I can't really comment on how good this camera is (or is likely to be) for the budget filmmaker, one thing I noticed which no one has mentioned is that the DMW-YAGH optional accessory has a "Time-Code In" BNC connector. In this article. While I can't find any detailed info on it, it very much looks like this feature allows the GH4 to "Sync Lock" with a time-code capable external audio recorder!!
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And all with a standard connection that doesn't need funny tiny connections and joins and random wiring, unlike a certain colour camera.. ;)
 
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