All posts tagged GH1

2 Posts
March 21, 2012 · Uncategorized

Desert Eagle Point Five Oh

This is an old one but quite fun.

Roy, Marat and myself had never fired a gun before in our lives.

So we wanted to shoot the biggest, baddest meanest weapon the gun range had to offer. From all the movies we’ve seen — and especially ones like Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch — the biggest, baddest pistol is none other than the legendary Desert Eagle .50.

We worked our way up the smaller firearms before saving the best for last and what a finale it was! Like shooting fireworks from a metal tube out of your hand, only more powerful.

On the tech side, I had the GH1 with only the 20mm f1.7 pancake lens. This very compact and fast prime gave me an effective 40mm focal length to work with and more importantly, it was fast enough to see reasonably well in the dimly lit conditions of the firing range. I also attached the Panasonic Lumix stereo external microphone, but with no way to monitor the audio levels on the GH1, its usefulness was questionable (the GH2 eventually fixed this with audio meters, but still no audio output jack). I shot entirely at 720p/60 and the film you see above was conformed to 24p in post. While I did not use the 60p footage for any slow motion, the heightened frame rate did offer something very special: the firey frame grabs of the weapon firing at the end of the film.

Sam

March 21, 2012 · Uncategorized

Party Boat

This was shot some time ago, when I first got the GH1.

A group of friends rented a boat for the evening and I was invited along to shoot. With the boat filled to capacity, it was extremely difficult to bring any kind of stabilization on board. No tripod, no monopod, just my hands and the camera. The GH1’s 14-140mm kit lens (the only one I had at the time) was invaluable. The image stabilization in lens was a great help especially when zoomed in for telephoto.

The small form factor of the GH can be extremely helpful in tight spaces, but shooting for extended periods handheld was quite hard on the wrists. The record button especially is in an awkward position behind the shutter button.

With the incessant hum of the vessel’s motor a constant along with wind and ocean noises, I did not have much usable audio. I made the decision to sacrifice the audio track in post, opting instead for a fast powerful song to drive the narrative. I had actually shot this in the GH1’s 720p/60 mode, but conformed to 24p in post to restore a more filmic look. I had initially planned to slow down parts of the 60p footage to 24p for slow motion, but the editing pace I eventually chose did not give opportunity. Still, I am happy with the final pace of the film, which is fast and flowing, much like the events of the evening.

Sam