A few more GL2 video clips of California
 

Hi:

If you scroll half way down the page in my link you'll come to the November 2002 portion which contains some more GL2 stills and video clips.
Two of the clips: Brother Buzz and Emerson were taken at night.
They came out better than I was expecting when doing playback from the GL2 to the TV. All the clips were done handheld, many at 20x power. The only tripod shot was of an Acorn woodpecker on a tree in the "Autumn in Wine Country" clip. All editing was done using Pinnacle 8.

http://www.ahoooadventure.com/California2002.html

Thanks to everyone for the wonderful tips in this forum. I'm now focusing on spending more time shooting longer on my subjects and less panning. I love the GL2!!!!!


Steve

your stuff is incredible!
 

Buddy, visited your site and saw your footage - my goodness, it looks incredible - wow, the camera is excellent, although I suspect some skill operating the GL2 maybe also has come into play!

I'm very impressed - based on your footage, that's that - my next cam is a GL2 for sure.

Mark

Buddy,
I've been checking out your footage on the GL2 for a while now, great stuff. It helped me decide to get one myself! Question... Islands of Adventure? You live near Orlando? I do myself; just wondering.

Entry-level wireless Mics...
 

A friend and I have been looking a various wireless mic systems and we're debating btwn the Sennheiser Evolution 100s and the Audio-Technica 100 Series. Can anyone shed some light on either of these two systems.

Thanks.

I'll throw a third wireless unit into the mix. The AKG 81 series. It's a UHF diversity lav. system. The transmitter, receiver and lav should be well under $500. I've used them and they compare very favorably to my Lectrosonic's costing more than double the price. I believe they represent the best value on the market today.

Jeff

Ooh. That was the 3rd one I was pointed towards... any reason on those vs. the Senns as the price seems similar plus the Senn includes a Plug-On transmitter.

The AKG looks pretty good and Jeff has great advice.

But I will put a good word in on the Sennheiser. I have one, I love it and it has served me well. I only wish I had two instead of one.

A couple of things about the 100 series. It is not a true diversity system. That said, I never had any problem with breakup when using the 800 MHz units.

It also does not have XLR connections (I am not sure if the handheld transmitter is XLR or not, it be). No big deal either, but if you need or want XLR, the 100 is not it.

I have used the 100 bodypack transmitter with other mics and it worked fine.

So whichever you use I think you will be happy.

Recording LCD info to tape
 

I want to try different settings in several recording situations.
Does anyone know if it's possible to record the information that is shown on the LCD display to tape?
I want to record some footage with the settings information "burned" on tape ... like you would burn the date and time on tape.

It's just for testing only, I don't want to write down all manual settings with the corresponding time code. I want the LCD information burned together with the footage on tape.

When viewing the recorded footage afterwards, I can immediatly see which settings were used ...

You can and it literally records EVERYTHING on the LCD. Canan's control names sometimes leave much to the imagination, I don't recall the exact option, I beleive it is somehting to do with SCREEN options. It is in the manual, albeit buried.

Xm1 -> Xm2 it' s just a sw improvement?
 

Ok my post is a little strange post!
We Know very well the differences between the two cameras.
Xm2 has a better resolution (new CCD) and many many features than XM1.
Do you think is there the possibility to have some Xm2 features on the Xm1 such as variable zebra, disactivation of audio ACG, slow shutter speed (less than 1/50) amd much more, just by doing a sw modification (like dv-in activation)?
Looking foreward your reply
Regards

No.

Canon offers no such firmware upgrades.

Ok but is this a canon limitation, or nobody has tried to make a firmware updating?

Such inquiries have been made on the GL1 and the XL1. Not gonna happen, regardless of whose limitations are involved. I suspect that it wouldn't be possible even if Canon wanted to do so.

Setting the GL2 for Theater Lighting.
 

My loving wife is involved with a small musical produced by a local community theater. She and the director of this musical asked that I tape a rehearsal or two for notes, etc. I, of course, thinking it's a great opportunity to learn how to use my new GL2, enthusiastically said, "Yes!"

Knowing the lighting challanges ahead of me, last night I shot two acts worth of video. I put the zebra line guides on, and set the camera so that I may adjust the exposure manually (I think) using that little push-button thingy on the bottom left front corner of the camera. This seemed to work MOST of the time. There were times, though, when performers were nearly white-washed out because of the bright spot light and the fact that they wore white shirts or dresses, etc.

If I had my way, I would request a day when I could shoot when using lighting more video-camera friendly. I would also like to work with a script with lighting and action notes so that I can best anticipate the next camera adjustment to meet the next lighting situation on stage. However, there just simply is no time for any of this.

I know that theatrical lighting and lighting for video taping are two different beasts. Still I need to ask these questions.

For normal theatrical lighting - house lights out (of course), various degrees of brightness/darkness on stage, various different colored lights, the occasional use of a white & bright spot light on a performer, and the occasional time when all lights go black - what setting do you use and/or recommend for the GL2? What are your shooting strategies under similar situations?

Thank you for your inputs!

Ted Fiebke

P. S. - I also set up some a couple of mics and cabled them to the GL2. Sounded great!!! My loving wife, of course, sounded wonderful! :)

Ted, be sure to try the "spotlight" program mode on the GL2. It's intended exactly for this type of shooting.