Jeff,

I have experienced this problem many times. I use my GL2 primarily to shoot birds of prey. With distant subjects, the only thing that seems to help is to keep the subject near the center of the picture. Sometimes, if I am zoomed in all the way, I may have to zoom out slightly and the focus "catches up".

If the subject is changing distance rapidly, then the autofocus really has problems. I have not found any solution for this. As a TV news videographer using manually focusing lenses every day at work, I find these autofocus problems very frustrating at times. I rely heavily on the focus ring stop points on "pro lenses" to quickly get me in focus - not possible with most autofocus cameras.

Bill

proud new father...
 

...of a GL2 :) Took me long enough, but I finally plopped down the cash and bought a kit from Zotz (who rock, by the way). I've been geeking out with it since I received it Thurs. evening, and man, I'm in love. What a great camera. This thing will be paying for itself in no time.

Thanks to this community for helping me make a wise decision.

. . . and its name is?


Congrats . . . G

Moon Shots
 

Out of curiosity, thought I'd try a few lunar eclipse shots with a GL2. These were shot from a city location at full optical zoom, 1/30 and 12db.

http://www.beaconvideo.net/lunar1.htm

they look great, congrats

Enlarge the view from viewfinder
 

Are there any gadgets out there that attach onto the viewfinder (not the LCD) that enlarge the image, so you don’t have to have it close to you eye?

I believe that Century Optics is currently working on an adaptor that will enlarge the image on a viefinder such as you mention - perhaps we will see a demo of this at a tradeshow in the near future.

Will keep you posted if I see any more developments.

- don

Hey cool. Here is a clip I shot recently with my XL1s using a PL-XL mechanical lens mount adaptor and an Angenieux S16 zoom lens.
http://noisybrain.com/SDTV/PL-XL/moo...ieux10-150.mov

- don

One hot shoe
 

I should be receiving my dm-50 microphone sometime this week. Now I want to buy VL-3 video light. The problem is GL2 only has one accessory hot shoe.

I am wondering how you guys are set up? I would like to have the DM-50 microphone and the VL-3 light together in my GL2.

OR should I opt for another video light that doesn't use the GL2 hot shoe and what would you recommend?

Many thanks in advance. I am learning ..........

Danny,

you can get a unit to use both, search the forum as I have seen it somewhere (sorry out of time otherwise I would look for you).

Danny,

Not sure I've ever seen anything that will add another "Hot" shoe to the GL2. You would need to have both electically connected to the cam and all of the extra hot shoe devices I've seen are a second mount only, no electical connections. Between the two, I would opt for the VL3. I've used it frequently for close up (3-4 ft) interview type stuff and it does a good job of lighting without blinding the subject or annoying others in the area. DM50 is a good mic but there are better ones out there (most would required an XLR adapter though).

Shooting the Moon
 

I've been playing around with this as well. In my case I've had a Sony 1.7x teleconverter on the camera as well.

I've found that with a typical full moon this arrangment has so much light coming in that the details of the moon get 'blown out'. One way of restoring detail is to turn the ND filter on. The other way is to go to full manual exposure and start "underexposing" until the details are restored. Under these conditions the light meter is pretty much worthless. It may tell you that you are fully underexposed (the sky is). What I've found is that what I'm seeing in the EVF is pretty much what I will see on the monitor as well - so I ignore the light meter.

For the lunar eclipse last Saturday I found I was able to shoot from moonrise until near totality. Most of this time I was at 1/60, 2.8 with no gain. This worked until there was only the barest sliver of a moon left at which point in time I had to kick up the gain. I should have quit while I was ahead as the increase in gain easily shows up as noise in the picture and I'll have to delete the footage anyway. I was not able to capture any of the soft reddish glow at full totality though - just not enough light.

check out hoodman
 

check out the product line from http://www.hoodmanusa.com/

blue white balance
 

I want to shoot a video-clip, outside during the day. What white balance card color should I use for a very blue, maybe even dark effect. Or should I ad the dark effect in post? Im using FCP.

TIA

Erwin.

Erwin,
There are two components to your stated objective: color and exposure.

To make something dark, simply underexpose the image. Be careful not to go too far with this. You'll have more control over your image brightness and contrast with your editing program.

To lend a blue cast to your image you can simply select the tungsten preset white balance. You can also experiment with blue-ish cards such as those from WarmCards.com.