BIGGEST GH6 ISO Mistakes and Myths | testing iso on the Lumix GH6 

For photos, I'll only say "DXO Photolab 5 or 6" and "NEVER shoot in V-LOG as bad things happen." For video, the engineers at Panasonic know a hell of a lot more than me and I let the camera decide most of the time with the multi-meter exposure set to "0" or above, especially in V-LOG.

The go to channel for the GH6, thank you

lens cap tests are genius. nice work. lots of misinformation about the gh6 out there but you nailed it. thank you.

Excellent work.

No expert on the subject, but really appreciate these kind of videos. I’m learning the hard way by trial and error. Overheated my Apple MacbookPro Max 1 on many occasions trying to fix or improve footage with Topaz Video AI. My biggest challenge is trying to match a GH5 and GH6 (both with Leica lenses) in a 2 cam set-up at an event. Just can’t get the footage to look the same. Tried Cinematch and played around with the settings for a few hours but still not satisfied. I always film in Apple ProRes (GH5 has a Ninja V on top). Still love the ‘softer’ look of the GH5 compared to the GH6 but I find myself having to use Neat Video denoise in almost all of my footage (business event) which really slows me down. Looking forward to future videos, thanks Rhett for all the effort you put into these videos.

Thanks for doing these tests and posting your results. I also appreciate your "real world" methods. Something else to test would be the relative DR between the GH5M2 and the GH6 for photos. Photons to Photos shows the GH5M2 having more "photographic" DR than the GH6 at every ISO value. BTW, a few months ago, I used my GH6 to take photos at a night club and found that when using a flash, the camera defaults to ISO 100. This resulted in many of those photos being underexposed by 3 to 5 stops, yet when I brought them up in post, they were VERY clean with almost no noise whatsoever. Amazing!

Always love GH6 discussion

Awesome video man, I use GH6 for photo and video, love it. You really need to know how to use it, but if you do... my god. Also yes, noise in this camera is organic and beautifull

Subscribed!!

Great video ! Which camera and lens did you use for shooting this video ?

As a gh5 and gh6 user, I can say that the noise of the gh6 is really more organic and easy to recover. When I use it in photo with the voightlanders pictures have a really analogic vibe that I really like. In video, even if in normal situations the difference compared to gh5 is not really noticeable, I tend to always use the dr boost and stay at 2000iso in vlog, as it gives more flexibility in the Highlights, noise is cleanable really easily in davinci or with neat video. Only thing I noticed, and I have to test that a bit more, when you use dr boost in lower light contrasty situations, even by slightly overexposing the image a bit a bring it down in post doesn’t seem to decrease noise. Noise seems to remain the same in darkest area when overexposed and brought down.

No experience with this camera, just the G9 but I have to say, my girlfriend recently got the OM-1 and hot damn, what a monster of a camera! Colours, noise performance, sheer speed and processing power. If up to 4k 60 is enough, OM has it down pat. Switching up my G7 for an E-M1 II and building out an Olympus setup myself. Sticking with the m43 🤘

Hi Rhett. I shoot ISO 2000 with EDR indoors and outdoors. I have also shot at 3200 indoors and would go to 5000 if I needed to and it would look good. I also only shoot HLG because it reduces noise in the blacks, unless shooting stills. I shot a thunder storm a few weeks ago on my GH5S at ISO 8000 and 12,800 and the 8000 was clean and very minimal noise at 12,800. A little NEAT NOISE and 12,800 looked great.

I forgot to say that the biggest mistake people make with the GH6 (for photography) is they think it is ISO invariant and it's not, unlike most cameras on the market today. I had a Pentax K5 that I could underexpose by 5 stops, boost it in post and the results were the same as shooting at ISO 3200. Many people shoot like that and you cannot do it with the GH6- this is why people misunderstand the GH6 because it just doesn't behave the same as other cameras in photo mode.

New mic? 🙂 Good tip on how to test native ISO with dB. Great job with this video. I think you're on point about the GH6's noise performance! I liked the 'like the button' 🤣

I've used dynamic range boost in vlog at iso 2000 almost exclusively since I have had the camera since last year. I over expose at about 1.5 stops most of the time when possible and it's really clean. Not overexposing i found its quite noisy though

Just got the GH6 a few days ago as an upgrade from a GH4 (!) Is it safe to say that the DR Boost is best used for indoor shoots? When I shot some tests in bright sunny conditions outdoors, the footage was totally blown out. Or is it just a necessity that you need to use the DR boost in conjunction with an ND Filter?

This is one of my biggest frustrations with this camera. I love the GH6, but I find it difficult to remember all these setting quirks in the field.

Hi Rhett, an anamorphic question now. My gh5 can desqueez on screen but in post is still needed. What about the gh6, no more in post? Thanks, Frans

What we need is a firmware update that allows us to shot at lower ISOs than 2,000 with DRboost on. I realize it would just be software in the camera smashing the gamma down, but it would make the footage straight out of camera very clean. This would solve a lot of complaints about this camera IMO. If you have ever shot with a BMPCC camera you would know what I mean. ISO 3200 is supposed to be second native ISO, but its noisy. They allow you to shift you to shift gamma curve in camera (change iso lower than native), so in short, you can go as low as 1250 ISO in the second native setting. All its doing is moving middle grey around, so the lower the iso, the further middle grey is from your highlights. This does cause you to loose highlight detail, but gives you very clean image to work with. This camera SHOULD be much better than it is right now. Many simple missed opportunities that other companies have paved the way forward with. Good new is, it is all fixable with firmware updates, but I won't hold my breath..... Firmware that is needed. As you said we need dynamic range boost to turn on automatically in video as it does in photo. So in Vlog, 250 iso is where it starts and then at around 1250, DR boost should be turned on and the camera should be super clean again. Yes if you want maximum highlight retention you would still want to shoot at iso 2000.

👍🏾🙏🏾

I have heard people say you should expose to right, up to +4. And you say you think +2 is too much? Can you elaborate?

This video is justified in being this long :)

I'm confused, because I can find 400 and 2500 as the native ISO all over the place, like Adorama. I'm also frustrated because I often can't go below 800 ISO and can't figure out why. There are a lot of moving parts to figure out! Now, thanks to this, I don't even know what the native ISO values are. Must keep learning.

I am not that worried about DR in stills because that can be addressed with the raw images in ACR or LR. Also not that concerned about noise anymore since buying DXO Deep Prime XD AI de-noise software. DXO is truly amazing!

I bought a gh6 and I have a strange problem. Well, the recording on the card starts 2 seconds after pressing the shutter. Is it normal?

Still wish the was an auto setting for the DR, and it would just come on when it's possible.

What are your favourite lens for GH6?

The first GH5 has better details than the GH6 at low ISO, the GH6 has some strangeness with fine details.

what about streaking issue

We all want the cleanest image... only to add grain with dehancher post.

How did you shoot at iso 200 with dynamic boost on in vlog? The camera won't allow you to shoot lower than iso 2000 with dynamic boost on in vlog??? This is what you show at 10:19 in the video.

interesting test, I've gotten mixed results about DR Boost on and off in terms of noise, sometimes its better and sometimes its not, about the dual gain sensor, I know how it works and understand what you're explaining but Lumix Indonesia posted a video that said the GH6 is a Dual Gain Sensor, not saying its true but its weird, I'll leave the link for the video below, btw what camera did you used in the exterior talking head parts ? ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-X8IHkg0OxJQ.html&ab_channel=lumixindonesia

I am more confused than before. I watched the video.

Why dynamic boost on, what’s the highest iso you can go up to?

Typo at 10:10? I think you meant to write VLOG ISO 2000 DRB ON not 200

è molto interessante ciò che dici, però credo che tu abbia fatto un pò di confusione 1- l'iso nativo non è sempre il valore iso più basso ma è il valore iso che nasce sul sensore senza nessuna amplificazione o deamplificazione del segnale video. certamente saprai che ogni modifica nell'amplificazione o deamplificazione del segnale provocherebbe ( e il condizionale è d'obbligo perchè nella realtà non è sempre così) un degrado del segnale video. per tanto si parla di dual iso ovvero abbiamo due circuiti di segnali iso nativi dove sono tarati su due valori diversi uno medio basso e l'altro medio alto. così utilizzandoli a seconda delle esigenze non spingiamo troppo sul sensore amplificandolo o meno. risultato minore rumore video. preciso il mio condizionale nell'amplificazione del segnale, come innanzi detto infatti non sempre il sensore si comporta in modo progressivo regolare molte volte alcuni sensori ( come ti è capitato) in condizioni di iso maggiori scendono di rumore rispetto ad iso inferiori. ( qui ci sono degli studi indipendenti che puoi trovare in rete vedi Photons to Photos)non stò a dilungarmi del perchè o percome...altra considerazione col dr boost. ti faccio una domanda : come puoi vedere la luce se chiudi gli occhi? lo stesso è la gamma dinamica come posso aumentarla se non esiste nella compressione che usi? per tanto se non usi un log dove la compressione è studiata per avere uno spazio di gamma dinamica che va da - 15 a + 15 stop è li che puoi gestirla altrimenti non potrai vedere nessun miglioramento. scusa per la lunghezza ma pensavo fosse giusta una precisazione ciao

all firmware is not needed if they do not fix the streaking((((((

Are you on drugs😂 the GH6 does not have dual gain ISO. Looks like you were playing with the shutter angle😆