This is the second in my series of tests on the Panasonic DMC FZ1000. As with the first test, this is a straight out of the box test. No camera settings have been changed from the time I opened the box. The purpose is to show how the camera performs when you point-and-shoot.

As we all know, the weakness in digital video is the low-light conditions. No better way than to take the camera to Downtown Houston after sunset and see what it will do.

NOTE: This video has a slight brightness adjustment prior to uploading to YouTube that is more representative of what you see in Adobe Premiere and is much more accurate to the true video out of the camera. We have included the first video upload to YouTube for reference, it is at the bottom of the post.

I am pleasantly surprised with the blacks. But you can clearly see in orange skies from the city lights we have serious noise.

As I was putting the video together I wanted to lay down a little music to keep everyone’s attention, while at the same time show you the output. Hope I did that for you.

Again, this is a consumer level test. Grab the camera and shoot. Get an idea of how it focuses and how well the auto exposure performs.

Overall, it is pretty amazing.

The next round of tests will be under more professional conditions. Rack focus, manual focus and exposure.

If anyone has certain conditions they would like me to reproduce, leave a comment and I will see if I can reproduce it for you.

As with the first test, all shots were hand-held and set to auto focus. Nothing was done to the video from an effects standpoint. With the focus set to auto, I wanted to see how the camera handled panning from foreground to subjects 20 feet away. You can clearly see the camera trying to find focus. With low light, the camera struggles a bit which is to be expected. The FZ1000 finds focus on it’s own and gives pretty cool modern cinematic / TV effect. Not bad, actually.

All clips were shot with the camera settings of AVCHD – FHD30p, set to Auto focus and AWB. Clips were then imported into Adobe Premiere CC, trimmed, audio imported and the entire video exported using 23.976fps, VBR, 2 pass, 5.0 mbps, AAC 320 kbps 48 kHz Stereo. H.264. Then uploaded to YouTube.

NOTE: After uploading the video to Youtube, there is a clear degradation of the video in overall exposure. Probably a .7 – 1 FStop of brightness. I will upload an additional video in an attempt to provide you the closest representation of what I see in Premiere.

Below is the 1st video I uploaded. You can see how YouTube degraded the video. Much darker than what the camera produces.

 

 

About Glenn Brooks

Glenn Brooks is the founder of WebWize, Inc. WebWize has provided web design, development, hosting, SEO and email services since 1994. Glenn graduated from SWTSU with a degree in Commercial Art and worked in the advertising, marketing, and printing industries for 18 years before starting WebWize.