The GH2 does not output sound over HDMI

I shoot with the GH2 and BMCC, and to be honest, I've found the Ninja or any external recording device to be useful only with machines like the BMCC, which outputs native 10bit 422 signals. For this reason, I wouldn't even use the ninja with expensive cameras like the C100, which Canon has doggedly kept as an 8 bit anomaly in today's rapidly evolving market. I have found no discernible advantage using the ninja with the GH2. In fact, the clips do get quite noisy when you "up res" 4:2:0 to 4:2:2 (see my explanation above)

If you treat PsF as progressive in your editor, there should be no difference. Technically there are fields, but the content is from the same point in time.

The DNx HD is what should make the difference but I've found it doesn't with the GH2 or 3...but it does make a big difference with my AC 160, why I don't know because it puts out 8 bit 4:2:0 also....but there s a big improvement in post.

@Gavvo888

Anything that comes out of the GH2 is 8 bit 4:2:0, whether it is written on the card (which then undergoes further compression) or straight via HDMI. Recording HDMI signal out on an external recorder like the Ninja will not give you discernible improvement over footage written on SD cards. It's true the recorder will transcode the footage on the fly to 10bit 4:2:2, but technically, the upsampling will introduce "noise" signals. Imagine the 8 bit as a small pail, and the 10 bit as a big one. Whatever the 8bit pail contains will always be capped at a certain limit, even if you fill the pail to its brim. Now pour that content into a 10bit pail, and you'll probably get a half pail full. How then to fill up the rest of the space in the 10 bit pail? There is no more info to squeeze out of the 8 bit except to fill in the blanks with noise.

@kazuo Sorry to be coming to the party so late but....I read this entire thread and am still unclear. Does the HDMI out send a higher bitrate signal if the GH2 has hacked hbr firmware? Is the HDMI output signal firmware dependent? Or is it fixed? Do you have any updates?? Thanks

IMHO, for all practical purposes, Driftwood's high-bitrate hacks, and RalphB's low-rate Sanity do cover all the bases. And with GH2 selling for less than $500 today, just go buy a second cam, and shoot something cool! :)) http://goo.gl/74DIh - I doubt there will be any lower price on this kit.

Sorry for digging out this thread but I wonder if ninja or ninja 2 could make sense for shooting in 1080i50 or 1080i60. I know, these modes are not so popular because of their worse quality. Anyway, this is the format of my work so I did a short test: I connected the HDMI-out of my GH2 with the HDMI-in of my Matrox MXO2 and recorded the 1080i50 signal with the Matrox I-frame codec at 200MBit.

After comparing it, I think the i50 quality is significant better and on the same level than 24p (interlaced of course). I couldn't see any differences in red channel other than looking cleaner with sharper borders (filmed a testchart) compared to recorded AVCHD stuff (used FlowMotion 2). But I'm not shure if this was aleady corrected by my Matrox videohardware.

I have no Ninja for further tests, so did anybody made some experiences with Ninja and the interlaced video modes?

@goanna @kavadni

I recently purchased an OEM Liteon LZT-256M3S 256GB SATAIII SSD for $169.00 AUD from a Melbourne based retailer.

Read up to 515MB/s, Write up to 440MB/s

I'm guessing you have the same drive?

Windows 7 now boots in 45 secs on a 4 1/2 year old PC.

SSD's are falling rapidly in price. I would expect 1TB SSD's be under $300 within 6 to 12 months.

I have to dispute that SSD are expensive .. even now

120G SSD = $200

64G SDXC = $150

FWIW I love the Ninja2. It adds a whole layer of professionalism to my rig because of the great display and professional audio. I use it with a D800E but have not tried it with the GH2.

Hyperdeck gets just over 12 minutes on a 120G drive, and DNxHD gets just over and hour and 15 minutes on the same drive. I haven't used ProRes.