For me, the TM900 is the best camcorder I have used

I shoot using shutter priority mode (so aperture, iso, wb are auto mostly). You put the camera in manual mode, and in the menu set the shutter only. I always use 1/60th when I shoot 108060p (which is what I always do). Does not depend on whether I am shooting sports or talking heads.

Given I am in manual mode, if I need to lower the amount of light coming in as well, I then set the "iris" looking at the zebra stripes to tell me how far I should adjust. If I do not like what auto wb is doing, I also set the wb. All of these additional manual settings, and even manual versus auto focus are in the same menu, so it is easy to go from just shutter priority to setting some of the other things off auto.

The TM900 uses focus peaking rather than enlargement - so you see (if you want) color fringing on focused parts. That works really well and makes focusing faster (for me) than pushing buttons to get enlarged views. Generally focus in auto is really good, and the focus peaking is great even in bright light.

That's also very helpful. I haven't used "focus peaking", but it sounds easy, provided it will work in relatively dim light. Sounds like focus peaking works similarly to the whiteout areas which indicate blown highlights with my still cameras.

Do you shoot action often? A significant part of my video is clips of dogs competing in obedience, rally, and agility. Obedience and rally involve only motion at walking/trotting speed, except for the jumps, which in still shots require 1/360 to 1/500 second to freeze action. I know that with video you don't really want to freeze action, depending instead on a bit of blur and on the optical trickery of the "flicker fusion speed" to imply motion. Agility, of course, uses a lot of very rapid motion. So - what shutter speed would you suggest for that - or can you just stay at 1/60?

The manual adjustments still sound a little daunting, but then I've been used to the Canon way of doing it for years now. My Canon Vixia's menus are exactly the same as the menus I've used on my various Canon compacts. Knowing that I can step through the various menus by turning the front ring is quite reassuring.

Thanks again -
--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

"Do you shoot action often? A significant part of my video is clips of dogs competing in obedience, rally, and agility. Obedience and rally involve only motion at walking/trotting speed, except for the jumps, which in still shots require 1/360 to 1/500 second to freeze action. I know that with video you don't really want to freeze action, depending instead on a bit of blur and on the optical trickery of the "flicker fusion speed" to imply motion. Agility, of course, uses a lot of very rapid motion. So - what shutter speed would you suggest for that - or can you just stay at 1/60?"

I shoot basketball, baseball, hockey, football - all at 108060p and 1/60th shutter. They look fine -smooth motion, no trailing.

Here, though, is a recent video that has dogs running and retrieving (in some parts) and a close walking seagull, which has erratice movements. Shot at 108060p with 1/60th shutter.

http://vimeo.com/35550839

Markr - Just received my TM900. See - you are a very good salesman!!

Have you used an external microphone with your TM900? I'm looking for a very simple and light weight clip-on external mic which would be compatible.

I'm really looking forward to tryishooting comparison clips with the Panny and my Canon Vixia HG20, but I'll have to wait several days for that.
--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

Clip on to: camera, person?

Stereo?

Why an external mic?

--mono - clip on to me - very simple. I'd like to be able to narrate a few words about location, etc. Maybe much later I'll want a more "professional" mic.

I noticed that I can not use shutter speeds less than 1/60 seconds when shooting video, but when shooting stills I can use much slower shutter speeds. Am I correct that this is normal for this model of camcorder ? (The Canon will shoot video at 1/30 sec, but of course that's at 60i, while I've been using 60p with the Panny.

Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

Right, shutter speed should be 1X or 2X (the latter is nice for slow motion) the frame rate. So, 1/60th is fine for 60P.

Wired lavalier or wireless? With wireless, you or your subject have freedom to move around. Then you need a receiver - fits in the accessory slot and transmitter - attached to the belt. The mic plugs into the transmitter and the receiver plugs into the mic input.

If it is just you behind the camera doing live narration of scenes without you in them, then wired is fine. Of course, narration done in post may be better - you can narrate the edited movie, and use a better microphone and control the noise (no wind at home).

Here are some wired lavaliers:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Lavalier/ci/8535/N/4291086006

Omnidirectional is better (not as sensitive to head movements). I have used Audio_Technica ones and have been happy.

Thanks Mark - For a trip which is coming up s soon, I just want to comment very briefly on scenes as I video them. On these long trips I occasionally forget which castle, which mountain,etc. So in my uninformed mind a clip on mic, wired, would be fine. Good suggestion about omnidirectional.I would not have thought of that. I' ve bookmarked your reply so I can look up the brand when I get home (I'm off in Texas now).

With the Canon Vixia I had good luck in low light situations with video at 1/30 sec as long as thee was no rapid movement - but I think the video gain on the Panny works much better, a as long a it doesn't introduce too much noise.

Thanks again - Bill

--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

Outdoor sport:

http://vimeo.com/38663820

Indoor sport:

http://vimeo.com/37751356

Markr - Those are gorgeous!!! I especially like the flower scene, but the baseball and hockey scenes are just as good in their own rights.

When uploading, do you use a video compressor? Which one? What can you tell me about the settings you use with the video compressor?

I'm delighted with my TM900, leaning how to shoot and render good HD video....but upload file times are very long for HD video (a 12 minute video will take 4-5 hours to upload to YouTube). So far, I'm not getting acceptable quality from my experiments with Handbrake, the only video compressor I've used so far. (Tried to download and install Adobe Media Encoder, but couldn't get it to install despite the fact that I have Photo Shop CS5 and Adobe Flash player installed).

--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

I do not compress.

Thanks. That's the secret then. The vids I've uploaded in uncompressed format look almost as good as the original M2Ts - almost, but not quite. My experience with compressors has been unsatisfactory.
--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

How dynamic range compares to a DSLR?

Is it similar to a Canon 5DmkII or Nikon D5100-D7000.

it is still a small sensor cam after all.

Thanks
János

DYnamic range of the TM900 is very limited, as you'd expect. It's more limited than my compact cameras, the Canon G9 and G10, are. You'll have to live with the fact that in mixed sun and shade, there will be times when, to get subject in the shade exposed properly, bightly sunlit areas will be way overexposed. For me, that's not what I'd like, but I can live with it.

No other small sensor "prosumer" camera is going to have a larger sensor, and therefore a wider dynamic range. There may be some cameras which have a similar sized sensor but far less pixels (and therefore less pixel density, wider DR) but they will have much less ability to record detail.
--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

Thanks

I would be soooo nice to see some video samples, the same difficult scene recorded with small sensor and DSLR

Thanks
jano

Honestly, you don't need to see samples, especially of the video. The difference is striking. For me, it's well worth it to get a high definition video from a camera with (what I feel is) excellent ergonomics and all the flexibility I could want. If dynamic rageapproaching that of a DSLR is something you need, you'll have to go to a professional video camera at $3000 and more in price - and even then, I'm not sure you'd get the same sort of DR.

For still images, it's not so bad. While a small sensor compact still camera won't give you the DR of a DSLR, you can gain a great deal by underexposing when you shoot and then bringing up the shadows during processing. You can't do that with video.
--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA

Thanks

My problem that I am using a 3 year old Sony handycam for video (and a NIKON D300 for photography) and I had to record a theatrical performance with big black curtains and strong stage lightening on the faces of the actors...huge contrast.

I was really struggeling with the handycam I cannot use auto exposure because the faces of the actors became much too light. I had to turn down exposition but still it was not perfect. And even autofocus did not really worked.

Just too much for the small sensor cam, I am thinking about a video DSLR, wouzld that be a lot better???

rockjano said:

My problem that I am using a 3 year old Sony handycam for video (and a NIKON D300 for photography) and I had to record a theatrical performance with big black curtains and strong stage lightening on the faces of the actors...huge contrast.

I was really struggeling with the handycam I cannot use auto exposure because the faces of the actors became much too light. I had to turn down exposition but still it was not perfect. And even autofocus did not really worked.

Just too much for the small sensor cam, I am thinking about a video DSLR, wouzld that be a lot better???

Click to expand...

I do exactly the same thing with a GH2 and fight with the same issues. Black box theater is a really tough video environment. In one play, the leading man was wearing a brilliant white shirt and the background was totally black.

I finally got pretty good exposure using scene averaging, but it's still not perfect. I recently got a Panasonic TM900 as a second camera and am planning on using its face tracking exposure mode to see if it will work better.

I'd don't normally use center weighted averaging because I don't want to pan the camera a lot to keep the actor's face centered. In addition, the lighting keeps changing as they move around the stage into brighter or dimmer lighting. I'm hoping the face tracking exposure will help with both these problems.

For shooting plays, large sensor DLSRs have a problem with slow lenses. Whereas a camcorder normally will have at least an f/1.8 or faster zoom lens, DLSR zooms generally are more like f/4 or so. I find that really marginal for theatrical lighting and makes the dynamic range and noise issues worse as well.

To answer your original question, in comparing the GH2 and TM900 at moderate light levels for dynamic range, the GH2 is slightly better. I doubt it is enough to make a significant difference for black box theater.

OTOH, the GH2 video is absolutely amazing! The TM900 is a very good consumer camcorder with high resolution and good color, but the GH2 video looks significantly better.

Thanks for the answer RDoc...

RDoc said:

I do exactly the same thing with a GH2 and fight with the same issues. Black box theater is a really tough video environment. In one play, the leading man was wearing a brilliant white shirt and the background was totally black.

Click to expand...

Thansk so it is not just me

RDoc said:

I finally got pretty good exposure using scene averaging, but it's still not perfect. I recently got a Panasonic TM900 as a second camera and am planning on using its face tracking exposure mode to see if it will work better.

Click to expand...

Problem it is not just the faces but white shirts etc...

RDoc said:

I'd don't normally use center weighted averaging because I don't want to pan the camera a lot to keep the actor's face centered.

Click to expand...

Yeah sure I hate panning too..

RDoc said:

In addition, the lighting keeps changing as they move around the stage into brighter or dimmer lighting. I'm hoping the face tracking exposure will help with both these problems.

Click to expand...

Exactly... if they stand under a light (1000W tungsten + color foil) it is hot they step one and it is very different...

RDoc said:

For shooting plays, large sensor DLSRs have a problem with slow lenses. Whereas a camcorder normally will have at least an f/1.8 or faster zoom lens, DLSR zooms generally are more like f/4 or so. I find that really marginal for theatrical lighting and makes the dynamic range and noise issues worse as well.

Click to expand...

Well I have some f2,8 zooms like Sigma 50-150 2.8 or 18-50 2.8 those could be good or not? (I have never tried)

I also have 50/30mm 1,4 prime

RDoc said:

To answer your original question, in comparing the GH2 and TM900 at moderate light levels for dynamic range, the GH2 is slightly better. I doubt it is enough to make a significant difference for black box theater.

Click to expand...

So the GH2 with it's significantly larger sensor still not a LOT better than a smalll sensor cam like the TM 900 or any other. That is bad.

Could the full frame be better, like Canon 5dII or Nikon D800? Or DX cam like Niko D5100 - Canon D60???

Or do I have to get a professional video cam sometimes to record these blackbox theatre stuff???

RDoc said:

OTOH, the GH2 video is absolutely amazing! The TM900 is a very good consumer camcorder with high resolution and good color, but the GH2 video looks significantly better.

Click to expand...

Yes I heard that the GH2 is great. The only problem is that it can only accept my Nikkor lenses with adapter and no AF of course (sometimes that is just not bad to have)

Thanks
jano

I can't be certain that thePanny TM900 would resolve your problems with shooting concerts in extremely low lighting. But - my guess is that it would do very well, probably every bit as well as the Canon if you choose your settings properly.

If you use the Panny in Manual mode Shutter speeds as slow as 1/30 can be used, and "iris" (aperture) gains equivalent to 18 DB can be set - easily. Even in a very dimly lit room, good exposures can be made.

If using the TM900 at a concert, be sure to set "auto slow shutter" (Menu/Record Setup/Auto Slow Shutter), then go to the "iris" and open it up all the way to +18DB if necessary. Use manual focus if you need to - but you probably won't need to. Look at the faces on your LCD screen (not at the histogram, in this case), and set "iris" (aperture) so they look nice and bright. If the resulting video of faces is still not bright enough to suit you, you can bring faces up quite a long way during processing, without ruining video quality.

Finally - anything shot at very low lighting may (or may not) have considerable video noise, just like still photos shot in very low lighting. You can apply sufficient video noise reduction to mitigate the noise, or even eliminate it. Especially for internet displays you should be able to get good to excellent quality.

--
Bill Hansen
Ithaca NY, USA