Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

Father Junípero Serra founded Mission San Buenaventura in 1782, forming the basis of what would become the city of Ventura, incorporated in 1866 and commonly called San Buenaventura before 1891, which is still is the city's official name, and is the county seat of Ventura County, California, United States. This video starts at the harbor early morning and ends at the mouth and estuary of the Ventura River in the afternoon.

This video is an ongoing test shoot and learning session for my Panasonic GH3, and my aim was to collect as much footage of all kinds of different subject matter and lighting conditions as I could in two days. Being completely comfortable with my XL H1, the GH3 opened up all kinds of new learning curves for me. "Not knowing from Jack", I selected FHD 60p [All-Intra] MOV at 72Mbps from a host of different formats and bitrates offered. I was using the Panasonic 45-200mm, GH3 2X magnification factor = 90-400mm, Program Mode, ISO 200, and AF 99% of the time. You may notice that there are a few bird scenes where I shot at 90mm wide, 400mm tele, and the use of the 2X digital zoom, which isn't that bad, but I discovered that the loss-less 2.4X Extended Tele Conversion (ETC) only works when shooting 30p and 24p. After reading some of the forums, many prefer 30p MOV at 50Mbps over 60p MOV at 72Mbps, so that will be my next lesson, especially since I will be able to use the ETC. Impressions, it's a joy working with a camera and lens that weighs less than 3 pounds, a lite tripod and head and you definitely need an external mic for audio.

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

Very Cool! From what I have seen, this camera and the Panasonic X lenses look stunning to me. I just got my GH3 and 2 lenses, 12-35mm, and the the 45mm macro. Haven't had much time to use it yet, but really looking forward to it. Great work keep it coming!

Leon

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

Nice footage Don. Your tripod moves too that are in there are very smooth and the auto focus tracking looks great. I have been getting to know mine as well with the 2 F/2.8 Panny pro zoom lenses and a Panny / Leica 25mm that I haven't shot with yet. Great rig and those two zooms are very nice and sharp. I'm certain the F/1.4 25mm will be a great motion lens as well as for stills. It's an awesome "hybrid" acquisition camera for digital images.

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

Hey Don, either YouTube is getting better or that's a great video, the latter I think :)

A little CC (constructive critisism) always check the horizon is level. Eventually work on doing a story with post narration and music track,
you could sell it to the Tourist Commission.

Father Serra would be proud of you :)

Cheers.

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

Hello Allen,
Your CC's are gladly accepted, and thanks. I have always criticized photographers that publish photos of waterfowl either swimming uphill or downhill, and here I did the same thing on one of my clips. It's just being in a hurry and not paying attention, no excuses. If I have the time, I might think about a re-edit of the piece to include some music and voice over. Again, thanks for viewing it....Don

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

ND filters?

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

No ND filter, and I don't know why you would need one on the GH3. I use a 2 stop ND filter when I have my Nikon 80-400mm lens on my XL H1, and I use it so I can keep the f stop at around f8 when shooting at a 60th/second.

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

The same reason you would use an ND Filter on any camera, maintain shutter speed and to open up the iris for depth of field. Then again the lenses you're using aren't very fast. Just curious. Thank you for the response.

Re: Coastal San Buenaventura [Panasonic GH3]
 

Kevin,
I thought that might be what you wanted to achieve, a shallow DOF while maintaining a fixed shutter speed, makes sense to me.I shoot mainly wildlife, so a shallow DOF really works against me in a lot of ways.