silly gh4 experiment at DVinfo.net

Andrew Dean · April 17th, 2014, 06:53 PM

The girls from our camera shootout asked for a version of their song without all the camera test stuff. The shots from the shootout were static locked down on tripods so it didn't seem very interesting. For fun i dropped to a 1024x576 pal timeline and did "pan and scan" to move around the image and create motion from the two static shots.

Youtube destroyed the image and as noted before, our gh4 footage was kinda noisy to start with, but the footage looked pretty good in the NLE and it was still an interesting thought experiment. You could absolutely use the gh4 footage for interviews to give you a CU and wide at the same time. Dropping to 720 (or SD) you could get a pair of closeups from a single 4k wide if the two people weren't miles apart and the frame too wide.

Anyways, ugly resolution aside, here's the silly "frame it in post" version of the test video.

Again, this is a locked down wide and a locked down medium shot. All zooms/pans/tilts are added in post. Cheers! oh, fyi, i never scale larger than 90% in the video so the image holds up ok.

heres a grab from qt to show the "before youtube" quality.http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/attachme...1&d=1397782427
-a

Noa Put · April 18th, 2014, 09:05 AM

How did you manage to get so smooth start and stops of your panning motion? That definitely made it look like it was done with a tripod, looked very convincing, which nle was used?

Andrew Dean · April 18th, 2014, 02:28 PM

I just used premier for that. I applied temporal "ease" to the motion and scale keyframes. also, i adjusted some of the paths to be something other than a straight line. It seemed that a little bit of drift made the moves seem a bit more real.

cheers!

Noa Put · April 19th, 2014, 02:02 AM

Not sure if my edius pro is able to do that but those smooth start and stops sure make it look very real.

Andrew Dean · April 19th, 2014, 04:19 AM

Thanks! I did the test as a giggle, but i'm actually considering how you could shoot a pair of gh4 @4k of a live performance and get a bunch of perfect cutaways and moves out of it...

Noa Put · April 19th, 2014, 05:59 AM

Quote:

I did the test as a giggle

You actually proved it is possible to simulate a multicamera environment using a static 4k image cropped in post and make it look convincing. It doesn't look like a ken burns effect but looks like a cameraman was operating the tripod.

William Hohauser · April 19th, 2014, 06:21 AM

I do this all the time by editing in 720p with 1080 footage. It works great with lock off shots combined with camera person operated cameras such as an unmanned camera shooting thru an open grand piano or a wide shot. The drawback is that the movements are two dimensional and do not have the slight change in perspective that a hand-held or tripod controlled movement have. An animated zoom doesn't have the change in DOF a real zoom has, it remains flat. Used in moderation, post production camera movement looks good.

Andrew Dean · April 19th, 2014, 07:43 AM

This video worked because there wasn't any foreground to speak of. The paralax of a long lens on a tripod won't be much different than a pan/scan. Obviously no sliders or jib shots implied here, as the perspective doesn't change.

The unique part of this test was whether the 4k file could survive getting close to 1:1 pixel mapping in a SD timeline. When you move SD around a 4k frame, you have a LOT more motion possible, which i think also helps this video look like more than what we'd normally see for digital pans/tilts.

So i couldn't see this replacing normal shooting, but if you are running 1-man-band, having a 4k on wide gives you a HEAP of cutaway options.

April 17th, 2014, 06:53 PM	#1
Andrew Dean Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Motukarara, New Zealand Posts: 475	silly gh4 experiment The girls from our camera shootout asked for a version of their song without all the camera test stuff. The shots from the shootout were static locked down on tripods so it didn't seem very interesting. For fun i dropped to a 1024x576 pal timeline and did "pan and scan" to move around the image and create motion from the two static shots. Youtube destroyed the image and as noted before, our gh4 footage was kinda noisy to start with, but the footage looked pretty good in the NLE and it was still an interesting thought experiment. You could absolutely use the gh4 footage for interviews to give you a CU and wide at the same time. Dropping to 720 (or SD) you could get a pair of closeups from a single 4k wide if the two people weren't miles apart and the frame too wide. Anyways, ugly resolution aside, here's the silly "frame it in post" version of the test video. Again, this is a locked down wide and a locked down medium shot. All zooms/pans/tilts are added in post. Cheers! oh, fyi, i never scale larger than 90% in the video so the image holds up ok. heres a grab from qt to show the "before youtube" quality.http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/attachme...1&d=1397782427 -a Music Video playing with GH4 4k pan and scan into SD - YouTube Attached Thumbnails

April 18th, 2014, 09:05 AM	#2
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,510	Re: silly gh4 experiment How did you manage to get so smooth start and stops of your panning motion? That definitely made it look like it was done with a tripod, looked very convincing, which nle was used?

April 18th, 2014, 02:28 PM	#3
Andrew Dean Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Motukarara, New Zealand Posts: 475	Re: silly gh4 experiment I just used premier for that. I applied temporal "ease" to the motion and scale keyframes. also, i adjusted some of the paths to be something other than a straight line. It seemed that a little bit of drift made the moves seem a bit more real. cheers!

April 19th, 2014, 02:02 AM	#4
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,510	Re: silly gh4 experiment Not sure if my edius pro is able to do that but those smooth start and stops sure make it look very real.

April 19th, 2014, 04:19 AM	#5
Andrew Dean Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Motukarara, New Zealand Posts: 475	Re: silly gh4 experiment Thanks! I did the test as a giggle, but i'm actually considering how you could shoot a pair of gh4 @4k of a live performance and get a bunch of perfect cutaways and moves out of it...

April 19th, 2014, 06:21 AM	#7
William Hohauser Inner Circle Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: New York City Posts: 2,650	Re: silly gh4 experiment I do this all the time by editing in 720p with 1080 footage. It works great with lock off shots combined with camera person operated cameras such as an unmanned camera shooting thru an open grand piano or a wide shot. The drawback is that the movements are two dimensional and do not have the slight change in perspective that a hand-held or tripod controlled movement have. An animated zoom doesn't have the change in DOF a real zoom has, it remains flat. Used in moderation, post production camera movement looks good. __________________ William Hohauser - New York City Producer/Edit/Camera/Animation

April 19th, 2014, 07:43 AM	#8
Andrew Dean Major Player Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Motukarara, New Zealand Posts: 475	Re: silly gh4 experiment This video worked because there wasn't any foreground to speak of. The paralax of a long lens on a tripod won't be much different than a pan/scan. Obviously no sliders or jib shots implied here, as the perspective doesn't change. The unique part of this test was whether the 4k file could survive getting close to 1:1 pixel mapping in a SD timeline. When you move SD around a 4k frame, you have a LOT more motion possible, which i think also helps this video look like more than what we'd normally see for digital pans/tilts. So i couldn't see this replacing normal shooting, but if you are running 1-man-band, having a 4k on wide gives you a HEAP of cutaway options.