I ust like to share with you.. as former canon guy and the negativity about the picture mode from the gh2 all over the internet I can say I did not expect this kind of picture quality from my GH2

@driftwood @thepalalias what about the competition? Who won?

@redbaron Thanks for the compliments! I love discussing lighting, so I'm happy to oblige.

Rather than bending a locations natural lighting to our own exposure needs, we use lamps to accentuate existing light sources (windows, doors, lamps, etc.) in tandem with a light meter. This approach preserves a strong sense of naturally motivated lighting while demanding fewer lights (usually only 1-3 per shot, sometimes with a bounce board). While this minimalist lighting approach may save money and reduce the productions gear burden, it also demands significant set-up time (adjusting the intensity of the light to match the natural source seamlessly is particularly time-consuming). This set-up time can translate to less opportunities for shooting "coverage" in a tight schedule. (This is not a bad trade-off in my opinion, as the trend toward shooting tons of coverage has come at the expense of creative decision-making during pre-production; too many films seem to be directed in the editing bay rather than on set these days.)

Importantly, we use lights to compliment, rather than eradicate, shadows. Some cinematographers seem preoccupied with chasing every shadow away, typically requiring complex, expensive lighting set-ups to do so.

Our stylistic decision to shoot in deep focus greatly affects perception of lighting. It's often said that deep focus requires too much lighting, but this is not quite correct: deep focus demands creative lighting. In lack of rack focusing, one is forced to direct the viewer's eye with lighting. I like this creative restraint. (I'm also tired of the claim that shallow DoF is innately "cinematic" whereas deep focus is "video-like". IMHO, this line of thinking has led to an excess of rack focusing test videos and distracting "bokeh" obsession among filmmakers. Shallow focus is a valuable storytelling tool, but for all the talk of its being innately "cinematic", Renoir, Welles, Kurosawa, Ford, Fellini, Kubrick, Wajda, Tarkovsky and many other great directors barely used it.)

Example lighting set-up:

In the shot of the young man watching a woman sleep, we placed a 2K (w/diffusion and daylight gels) outside the window above the bed, creating a subtle spotlight on the woman. We reverse key lit the young man with a 1K (w/diffusion and daylight gels) placed outside a window to his back. We accentuated the natural light entering the open door with a 650, and bounced that light into the main room for general exposure with a bounce board. The oil lamp was carefully placed to cast a warm glow on the woman's face and to add depth to the back wall.

We shot this scene with the Olympus 12mm at 4.0 f/stop and ~200 ISO. FWIW, our total budget was $9670.

Hey @driftwood,

Thanks for all your hard work. I shoot primarily documentary style pieces. It is not uncommon for my interviews to run 45 min to an hour. I recently tried the Cluster V6 Drewnet patch on a long interview and it locked up. Tried a second time on a shorter interview and same thing. I'm using a 32 GB 95mbs card. Given that I shoot long interviews and most deliverables are over the web, does it even make sense for me to bother with hacking and patches?

If so, what would you recommend? Thanks for your consideration.

Cheers!

Setting: Cluster 6
Vibrant -2-2 0-2
White balans 5400k
Iso 200
IDynamic was on standard, and is used.

Original clip settings and play time on video (vimeo video is way shorter 80 seconds or so).
Not the best edit and music choice, sorry..... i was really very short in time ;-)
No color correction is done ......

@Driftwood I really did try to get a sunrise, but the mosquito's won.

Here is my first entry for the contest Shot using Sedna AQ Max Detail, and panny 14-42 Kit lens. Set on cinema 0-0-0-0.

@onionbrain - Thanks for the mention, love your work :)

@omellan ha, the bug is great, love happy accidents

@mee oh but I didnt plan on recording their audio at all. they just asked me to film a little and make a video. so i did. that audio track is not from the show and i never planned on syncing it to a specific song. i dunno if that makes sense or im speaking jibberish :p

First post & first time video with hacked GH2 with Driftwood Canis Majoris soft skin patch (with VK Hack) Done only for tests purposes, no artistic intentions. .mts to prores 422HQ via 5DtoRGB mostly with panasonic 14-42mm, except churches clips: with Pentax 43mm f1.9 Fluid setting -2-2-1-1, 24H, 50fps (except the water clips: 80fps), Iso 160 (640 in churches). Sorry for the shaky shots.

Thank's to Driftwood & Vitaly Kiselev for the work, and thank's to all members of this forum: it took me 2 months to read all posts regarding hacking, but know I have a good tool with my GH2.

here is the ungraded version

@stanlymanly2 I often use a zoom H1 external mic for music events (great mic for the money). I keep the mic recording constantly, so that I can have the music track perfectly intact to sinc up with the musicians and with whatever works for between shots from my one and only gh2.. crowd shots, lights, my feet... etc etc..

Here are my contributions for Sunset shots, please excuse the doubles, I tried different exposures and such. I also had so much trouble uploading to Vimeo for some reason so I put them on Youtube for now. Sorry for the large quantity...

Sunrise with Sedna ungraded, because Lightworks can´t handle the file because it´s bigger than 1GB, and had to render it on Blender.