[Chip Thome]

OK… my $10. mic stand arrived and shipping was $7.95. And you know what…. THEY THREW A MIC IN ON THE DEAL !!!! 🙂

I have played a bit with it, still learning Audition CS5.5 and how to save audio there. 🙂 When I get it all up and flying, will do a sample test of this free mic and $10 mic stand and compare it to my Rode Stereo Videomic. I am hoping the Rode blows it away…. or I really got screwed on the Rode !!! 🙂

[Chip Thome]

Not only do I agree with Jason but so do these guys. Also you might want to notice, this isn’t what you’d call a real “panasonic propoganda” site:

https://www.eoshd.com/content/459/first-look-panasonic-gh2-versus-canon-60d

If you do some more investigating I think you will find the reason so many are shooting with Canons is you can buy the thing anywhere. What has really hampered Panasonic has been issues with their distribution. Coupling that with the quake, the result is their supply channel has been dry for months. The distribution issues were self inflicted. The quake set all the Japanese companies back for several months. But in the numbers race, Canon is definitely king.

[Chip Thome]

David you can accomplish this is Excel, just create more columns. I have been doing the “categorizing” for my boss’ client. What you are talking about sounds almost what we do in “categorizing”.

You add three columns, or more if you like, and use “categories” to attach to each movie. An example would be:

Category 1 – Child’s name
Category 2 – Age range
Category 3 – Content

The key to making this work is reusing “categories” or attributes. Such as Child’s name is always the same not a mix of given and then nicknames. The ages or age range are all from a set list. Category 3 is where you can make it about anything you wish. Then when all your movies are “categorized” all you need to do is “sort” Excel using a custom sort and pick the category you wish to sort on. If you sorted on Category 1, all of Johnny’s movies would be grouped together. If you sorted on Category 2, all the kids movies would be grouped by age. Once the sort is done you just scroll down to the grouping you are looking for. Or if you prefer to use the “Filter” option you can group them that way too.

The pile of stuff I am working on now for my boss is 19,000 items and 4500 variations of Categories 1,2 and 3. It’s all being done in Excel and then used from within Excel too.

[Chip Thome]

I’ve got a GH1 and have had a ball buying some old “legacy” lenses. They didn’t cost much and each needs an adapter. All that I have bought look to be near new.

I have had some fun playing with each and every one. Then I slap on one of the Panasonic Lumix lenses and get discouraged with my cheap buys. As hard as I wanted these “legacy” lenses to be as good, they just don’t come close to matching the Panny lenses.

For all around shooting you are hard pressed to beat the 14-45 or 14-140 and the 20mm. The 20mm is great for low light. The two zooms are tack sharp for well lit conditions.

[Chip Thome]

I have read a ton of posts and various threads on this and it always seems to go about 50/50. The only difference has been there were more who switched to DVRs than switched away from them. Those who held steadfast with the wireless used monitoring the audio as their reason. The truth of that matter is, no matter which lav system you use, if it goes out during the middle of a “one take” event, you are equally as screwed with either one.

That brings up the need for redundancy so you have backup options if needed. Lots accomplish this with a second lav set up on the officiant if it’s a wedding. It also can be done with a shotgun mic, if you are close enough, riding on top the cam.

But starting out you need at least two sources for the audio capture. Crap happens and when it does, you need something else to fall back on.

[Chip Thome]

If these are going to be inside you have low light to contend with.

About the only thing out there that matches all your requirements would be a Panasonic GH1 with a 32gb card. The older GH1 had a larger and longer lasting battery than the newer GH2. The GH2 would be better in low light, but without enough battery it doesn’t make a lot of difference. You can now hack any GH1 and if you hack it to the lowest bit rates, which are still very good, you can easily get well over an hour on a 32gb card. You might even be able to go up a step in bit rate and still get it all in.

As far as audio, Peter’s dead on, no camera is going to do the choir justice and you should plan on external audio recording.

Without knowing where the choir is performing, it is difficult for us to make any lens recommendations. But you are going to need lenses that compliment the environment you are in.

If I were you my plan of attack would be first to determine the environment. Second would be to select a camera and lenses to work well enough with your skills and where you will be shooting. Next you have to work on your audio set up and decide what is needed there. When you have your selections made, go price it all out. Then give consideration to the rest of the gear on your list.

I have bought most of what I have now over the past year and have done some scrounging to get it at the prices I did. I probably already own all you would need, except the shoulder rig, and I’ll bet I still have $2500-$3000 invested in that stuff. I would say, when your “wish list” is complete don’t be surprised if you are far closer to that 5K than you want to be.

[Chip Thome]

Oh boy….. I shoulda maybe waited before spending the whole $17.97 shipped to my door !!! [/sarcasm] 🙂 🙂 🙂

I quickly sailed through the reviews on Amazon, it looks like it is probably an acceptable mic. What got me to pop was the desktop mic stand. If it gives me a decent usable desktop mic and happens to perform better than the onboard mic on the GH1…. then hey, it’s a screaming deal !!!

[Chip Thome]

If it were me, and it has been in my own purchases, I wouldn’t buy 64gb cards. You are entrusting too much of the day to one card and praying that one card doesn’t fail.

The class rating on cards is how fast a card will accept the data the camera sends it. The higher the number, the faster the card, supposedly. If your card is too slow, the camera will render errors, causing you to loose footage.

Most cameras are able to utilize most Class 10 cards and do just fine. I have seen people suggest a very expensive brand of card for my camera, which I haven’t found a need for. I use a good but less expensive card, the Patriot LX 16gb and with my Panasonic I can get upwards of two hours of footage on it, depending on my settings.

Some people prefer shoulder rigs, but your tripod will also work well too. I also use a Manfrotto 561B monopod instead of the shoulder rig and I love it!

Good luck !!!!

[Chip Thome]

Honestly, a hacked GH1 is going to blow the doors off of most every Canon made.

What the hack does is remove the restrictions Panasonic placed into the camera’s firmware. So now instead of a data rate of 17mbps you can see 30, 40 or even 50s. It also removes the “i” wrapper so a hacked GH1 can now shoot native 24P.

This entire section discusses the hack and various settings:

https://www.dvxuser.com/V6/forumdisplay.php?206-GH13-The-GH-Firmware-Hack

This is the site of the man who wrote the hack for the early GH1s and also now in the last few weeks, the hack for the recent “unahackable” ones too:

https://www.personal-view.com./talks/discussions

For examples of video produced with hacked and unhacked GH1s, Vimeo has an entire section devoted to them:

https://www.vimeo.com/groups/gh1

Recent music video created with the hacked GH1:

https://vimeo.com/24595447

So there’s just a ton of information out there to digest about the GH1 and hacking it. The procedure to hack the camera is simple, the tough part is selecting which group of settings maximizes the camera for your own use.

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[Chip Thome]

Take a look at the left over new Panasonic GH1s for $399 and then the hack that was just released for them.