GS400 low light performance

27th Mar 2005 05:21 #1

Member

Hi,

I have read the reviews of GS400 in Camcorder Info and DVSpot. I'm gonna buy this camera in the middle of April, but I am just getting more curious about the low light performance. It's not something which is a must to me, but would be nice to have. So, how well does the GS400 perform let's say in downtown streets during night? Or when filming some rock concert where is quite dark, but many bright color spotlights? Does the noise go to something like a cheap consumer camcorder has or does it perform a lot better? Would be also cool if you could point me to some clips filmed with GS400 in low-light conditions...

Thanks!!!

Quote

27th Mar 2005 11:52 #2

Red96TA

Member

I did a low-light wedding in January using my GS400. They were serious when they said it was 2 lux! Despite being a VERY low-lit ceremony, there were no problems or noise at all on the GS400. One thing to consider is the F-Stop functionality. For the low-lit ceremony, I had the GS400 at open iris and 18db of gain and because of the iris size and pixel count, my Sony VX2100 beats the crap out of it in low light (as well it should considering the price difference). My GS400 at 18db looked the same as my VX2100 at 4.8. If I open up the iris on the VX2100 and add 18db, it can make near pitch black look like normal daylight!

Just like the comparison between the GS400 and the much better VX2100, the difference between the GS400 and ANY single CCD of 1/6" or 1/4" sizes is lightyears. The GS400 decimates them. For the wedding I did in January, I was using the GS400 as a primary camera and had a JVC 1/4"ccd camera at the back of the sactuary as the secondary cam (I had not bought the VX at the time). When I put everything into post, the differences were REALLY harsh. The GS400 did a stellar job with the low-light, but the single ccd JVC had tons of noise and the colors were muted really badly or overexposed in the areas where there actually was light. I ended up cutting almost all of the footage from the JVC from the wedding because it looked to bad to make a presentable package out of it.

If you want/need more info, drop me a backchannel at: airbrushdvd@hotmail.com