Neutral Density Filters,
 

I would appreciate suggestions for a neutral density for the GH2.

Buy the FADER ND filter for your lenses. Variable ND from 1 - 8 stops of light reduction.

Fader Filters vs Traditional ND Filters Vincent Laforet’s Blog

Re: Neutral Density Filters,
 

Jim, Guy, what's the disadvantage to shooting without a ND? For outdoor bridal party video shots, establishing shots of venues, etc, and street scenes what should I expect to encounter if I were not to have one?

Re: Neutral Density Filters,
 

Neutral density filter are very useful in bright light, primarily outdoors on sunny days. They limit the light so that shutter speed and aperture can be set to less extreme values. I like to keep shutter speed at 1/60th because a small amount of motion blur makes video smoother. Without a neutral density filter, it may be necessary to use much faster shutter speeds which give a 'strobey' look to video. With aperture, most lenses are at their sharpest in the center range of aperture. The 'sweet spot' is usually f 5.6 or f8 with a shutter speed of 1/60th.

I just bought this one for my GH2 http://bit.ly/eCTt08

Re: Neutral Density Filters,
 

Jim, your choice looks to be a very good one. I'm putting it on my "to buy" list. Thanks so much for the recommendation, oh and thanks for the detailed explanation about the sweet spot for the aperture.

I have found them extremely useful for shooting indoors and outdoors to achieve a very shallow DOF also.

Re: Neutral Density Filters,
 

The main idea is to be able to shoot with your lens wide-open in bright light conditions to achieve the shallow DOF look. If you have to stop down the iris on your lens, then the shallow DOF effect disappears.

Re: Neutral Density Filters,
 

Thanks, Guy, for the additional explanation. Between you and Jim it all makes sense.