Panasonic LUMIX GH5 for underwater video

Planning to make the switch from my AX100. The 10bit color space should really help quite a bit in color correcting UW stuff - I would hope! And if they deliver on their firmware update promise for summer (4k 10bit 60fps), then I don't see anything comparable and reasonably priced/sized coming up on the camcorder front. Been playing around with the GH5 overland for 2 weeks now. Not very intense as I had other things going on but hope to dip more deeply into it the coming days.

I'd preferably want to wait for availability of the Aquatica housing to compare this with Nauticam. But if it takes much longer (and gets too close to my next trip-date), I may order the Nauticam housing.

I'm considering taking the big leap of upgrading from my old GH2 to the GH5, but I'm starting to get seriously worried by all the reports out there of the GH5 having autofocus issues. Does anyone have real-world experience of how it handles in this regard underwater?

It's all well and good having 4k 50fps, 10-bit 4:2:2, 180 fps (manual focus only?) etc. etc. etc., but if the camera is focused on particles in the water rather than the intended subject, then the shot is screwed anyway!

Matt

I'm considering taking the big leap of upgrading from my old GH2 to the GH5, but I'm starting to get seriously worried by all the reports out there of the GH5 having autofocus issues. Does anyone have real-world experience of how it handles in this regard underwater?

 

It's all well and good having 4k 50fps, 10-bit 4:2:2, 180 fps (manual focus only?) etc. etc. etc., but if the camera is focused on particles in the water rather than the intended subject, then the shot is screwed anyway!

 

Matt

Autofocus issues other than GH4 already has?

It would be really nice to have a good thought-for-video-shooting autofocus but is not a big deal for me because most of the time I would still use manual focus.

Anyway I believe that the autofocus works fine and really fast... is made for a still camera. To have a usefull autofocus for us I guess it shoud have a different behabior or "mode" when recording video.

Same thing with f steps... no point in changing aperture while recording because it "jumps" roughfully from one one value to another, not like a videocamera does.

GH54 or GH5 are still a photography camera:(

Planning to make the switch from my AX100. The 10bit color space should really help quite a bit in color correcting UW stuff - I would hope! And if they deliver on their firmware update promise for summer (4k 10bit 60fps), then I don't see anything comparable and reasonably priced/sized coming up on the camcorder front. Been playing around with the GH5 overland for 2 weeks now. Not very intense as I had other things going on but hope to dip more deeply into it the coming days.

It's probabably not worse than the GH4.

However people seems to expect more in 2017 than 2015. Especially since several other hybrid cams have superb autofocus.

Anyway I believe that the autofocus works fine and really fast... is made for a still camera. To have a usefull autofocus for us I guess it shoud have a different behabior or "mode" when recording video.

Same thing with f steps... no point in changing aperture while recording because it "jumps" roughfully from one one value to another, not like a videocamera does.

GH54 or GH5 are still a photography camera:(

Have you seen the reports about the autofocus working considerably better if you use an external recorder?

This seems to indicate that the internal processing power is really limiting the performance.

Also, everything is much worse in 4K than 1080p. Also the manual acknowledges this fact.

For those interested I posted a couple links to footage from my first dive with GH5 under Editing, Post Production etc.

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=60128

Constructive criticism would be welcome as I am new to Underwater Video

Regards,

Adam

Thx for the replies.

@adamtaylor - your video was reassuring! Some of the things I saw on the internet were suggesting that the autofocus was virtually unusable, but your autofocus seemed perfectly normal to me.

Cheers,

Matt

When you say 'auto focus' do you mean 'continuous auto focus'? The GH5 has no issue at all with auto focus (automatically obtaining focus before the shot/video starts. Continuous auto focus is where there can be some challenges, but with a fisheye I don't see why it would be needed unless you are doing close focus/wide angle video.

In my case, when I mention auto focus regarding video shooting I always mean continuous auto focus. In any camcorder is what AF means.

Etc, the continuos autofocus is contrast detect based, so probably no more usable in video on the GH5 than it was on the GH4, or, for that matter, pretty much every other large sensor camera out there other then a few Canon offerings with dual-pixel autofocus. CDAF is always going to hunt a bit when shifting focus, which looks terrible in video. Even the Sony cameras which have PDAF don't really do that great if you leave continuous autofocus on for underwater video -- they'll often shift focus from your main subject to particles or small fish closer to the lens, ruining your shot. So I'm rather distrustful in any sort of continuous autofocus for wide angle underwater video. There's simply to many things that can distract the focus from your main subject and no good way to tell the camera what your main subject is.

But honesty, shooting wide lenses and with narrow apertures as is normally the case with wide angle video, you can just pre-focus and lock focus before filming and be ok in the vast majority of cases. Now for macro, I would love to have a good continuous autofocus system since critters are always moving and your depth of field is miniscule. But I don't know of any such systems out there. Perhaps the Canon 70d/80d/7dII/1dxii/5d4 or their cinema-line cameras can pull it off. I've never tried them or seen underwater footage from them shot with continuous autofocus, so I can't really comment.

When speaking about DSRL, continuous AF is a complete bullshit. It's like unicorns: everybody speak about them but nobody caught them on tape

Maybe Canon latest dual-pixel AF makes miracles but, as dreifish wrote, I've yet to see it working under all condition. Once you have done enough experience with prefocus and lock-AF you can count on it. On the contrary I would never rely of C-AF on a serious shot.

I know that macro is different but current technology on large sensors still doesn't compare to small camcorders AF.

Bye

An u/w pro shooter friend of mine switched from GH4 to Canon 1DXii and says he's now able to leave AF on for most stuff.

An u/w pro shooter friend of mine switched from GH4 to Canon 1DXii and says he's now able to leave AF on for most stuff.

Sounds nice. Canon seems like the the best option for underwater work, but the 1DXII is ultimately unappealing given the price. Since white balancing seems to work well on the GH5, I feel like autofocus is a small enough thing to sacrifice in return for the $7000 when you add up the body and housing.

Maybe Nauticam will come out with a (well-priced) housing for the new Canon C200. That camera seems to tick a lot of boxes for both topside and underwater shooting.

This sunday, my plan is to film some nudibranches with my Gh5. If you want, I can shoot some footage for you in 10bit 422. What kind of shot would you like to have to colorgrade?

This sunday, my plan is to film some nudibranches with my Gh5. If you want, I can shoot some footage for you in 10bit 422. What kind of shot would you like to have to colorgrade?

Thanks Rollin, is that possible to have something deeper than 15m without using video light?

This sunday, my plan is to film some nudibranches with my Gh5. If you want, I can shoot some footage for you in 10bit 422. What kind of shot would you like to have to colorgrade?

Yeah!.

It would be great short shot at arround -20, MWB, sunlight, pointing to some redish stuff (is possible), blue background. A little of sandy bottom in the frame would be perfect. After that, same shot al 8bit 420 would be ven more perfect!!!!!! :) :)

It will be not so deep, but visibility will be low and the water is very greenish. Lots of color cast to work with :-).

I'll see what I can do for you guys.

An u/w pro shooter friend of mine switched from GH4 to Canon 1DXii and says he's now able to leave AF on for most stuff.

I know only of one pro who shots the Canon 1DXii underwater - so thats probably D.A.

Great quality pics. But the cam is a monster and seriously expensive. To me, it has some considerable downsides too:

- two different CFlash card standards in one body - what the heck is this ???

- the Video JPEG "codec" is a bit of a joke...

So, thanks but no thanks :-) GH5 Housing should arrive tomorrow...