Interesting. The Canon seems a little more film-like.

Thanks Mike very insightful!

Thanks Mike this is really helpful. Do you know the price difference between the two?

Panasonic is more focused than Canon.

finally you got your GH1? ;-)
I think if you change the lens on the GH1 the performance will be much better although it will be far better in most situations than the average camcorder... Keep sharing the results...

The kit lens is unsuitable to this kind of lighting....try a 1.8 or 1.4...it really looks great...Keep sharing the results. Thank you

interesting, thanx for sharing it!
cu =)

thanks for the video. seems to me 5D has more vivid color than GH! but I like the quality of the Panasonic and dislike 4/3 system!

Yeah a different lens will show much improvement in the Panasonic. But anyways these two cams looked like they can match up perfectly. Thanks.

So this is 720p?

Thank you for the side by side comparison. I agree the Cannon is better. Although the price is a hugh factor.

Great comparison, thanks a lot. It says a lot.

How's the retail availability of the GH1 in Manhattan? Adorama's web site still says it's out of stock.

Thank you for presentation! Quality of video and of colour me very suits. Colours look natural.

Quality looks great, especially for the price, but how is the jello effect, and does GH1 shoot 720 24p?

what do you think about the nikon d90?

Mike thanks for doing that.

I just loaded both of these clips in to a Beyonwiz DP-P2 PVR connected (via HDMI) to a Panasonic 50" PZ850 series Plasma, and viewed @ 2metres.

Canon 5D2 - nothing to report, asbsolutely rock solid, no artifacts any where in the picture - looks like a DSLR still shot.

Panasonic GH1... oh boy.. where do I start...
GH1: 0:0 to 0:12 - very noticeable sharpening contours in the sky - this is the low light 'mud' effect every one is talking about. Lots, and I mean lots, of dancing block artifacts in the sky. It doesnt' look good at all.

Lots of dancing blocks in the red areas of the Arizona can at both infinity and close focus

It would seem you get what you pay for.

Too bad you exported one clip in 1080p and the other one in 720p, both should have been same resolution/bitrate exported as, so we can download them. Maybe you can replace this one?

Interesting Data. Thanks for this

The defaults seen by Pepster are also easy vewable on a 17 '' usual computer screen (full screen).

Jean-Marc Lonfils

This one looks muddy to me. The buildings have less defined edges. The depth of field in the second shot is nowhere near as deep as the canon. I will never understand how you can drink cold tea. It should be served with milk and sugar and it should be hot. Piping hot. With biscuits. (cookies)

Um...

This isn't a fair comparison because you've dropped the bit rate of the GH1 to such a low level the image breaks up and you have also only shot at 720p whilst the 5D footage is shot at 1080p.

Care to explain?

Ahh I see. It's just showing the GH1 in bad light but I guess people should know not to compare the two files on here, because they're at different bit rates, resolutions. What did you compress the GH1 footage to, what bit rate? The 5D does seem to have more DOF because it's got a bigger sensor but the GH1 can hold it's own in low light with a fast but cheap Canon FD lens... lens adaptability is very good. I have some Zeiss lenses for mine. (Rock on!! haha) These also have much shallower depth of field. Bokeh and DOF depend 90% on the lens.

Thanks for the test! I'm about to buy a GH1... Seems promising...

I really wanted to buy the GH1 but in this footage you can see tons of artifacts on the building areas. (I actually think it might just be because the footage was compressed). Artifacts are annoying for visual effects artists.

Thanks for testing.

Next time your should try the GH1 in 1080 mode. There is far more resolution in the 1080 extraction from the sensor.

No disrespect but this is not a good example of what this camera can do. Anyone interested, try checking out what Philip Bloom does with it... vimeo.com/4405518

Yep - the GH1 would have to look a whole lot better before being considered seriously.

I can see the compression contours in the clouds and flashing blocks on the darker areas on the lower LHS, from 0:0 to 0:12, when viewed on my 14" Toshiba laptop.

It looks very bad when viewed on 50" Plasma @ 2m.

No pixel peeping here.

I plan to make short trailers about my friends artists (potery, sculptures, etc.) Between the GH1 and the D90 what would you recommand (I already have a D80 with Nikkor 50mmf1.4 and a 18x200). I was initially thinking about the panasonic HMC41E but your experience with the GH1 is really impressive.

Sorry, Mike completely mis-read this whole thing DUH! Great test. Yeah both cameras are sick. Wold love to have them both.

great comparison thankyou

A few guys are crying and complaining in the forums that you did not encode the gh1 to its full capability. Is their anyway you could had made the gh1 look a little better in the low light ? Or is it just the canon 5d is just a beast in low light ? and in that area , the gh1 cant up because of its low bit rate?

I like the muted colors coming out of the GH-1. Also the less depth of field actually. DOF is overrated. Watch how many movies actually go crazy with it...close to zero. No Country for Old Men comes to mind.

The 5D seems to enance colors a bit. Actual film leans more toward the dull side which accounts for the color correction during telecine/post.