Doing something very wrong with Mark II video :(

What exactly are you trying to achieve? What do you mean by "sharp, critical focus"?

My hunch is that you are trying to achieve the shallow depth of field that so many people want out of DSLRs. Do some research on f-stop and how it relates to depth of field. You are not going to achieve a shallow depth of field with your f-stop at 16 or even f-8.

John

Yeah I think you were trying to focus on "air" that was too far away....keep the camera in the same spot pick something like the stop sign, focus on that, keep your aperture at F8 or higher and you should get a deep depth of field....you need a physical object to focus on, at least I can't focus "between" things only "on" things :-) Raise your ISO one click too....remember too that the Phiillip Bloom settings have you turn the sharpness all the way down to zero so don't expect huge sharpness, besides sharp video is well....video, not film, a little softness is actually good!

Steve Crow
Crow Digital Media
http://www.CrowDigitalMedia.com

Also, you describe your image as "muddy/not clear". Could also be a result of your image having a lot of bright highlights and a lot of dark shadows and not much in between. You could try shooting in more even light and then evaluating your image.

http://www.johnathanyoung.com

Peter, I experience the same thing as you (started my own thread here). I think the picture in the introduction in this article visualize my problem well.
I've tried numerous settings without getting a sharper image (even played around with the bitrate (Magic Lantern) but no luck). The only time I've gotten a better image is when I had massive light to play with and zoomed in a bit while stepping back.
Apparently a faster shutterspeed will give a sharper video but not that I noticed.

Another reason for the blurry image could be the lens. You have an L lens but looking at the MTF score over at Photozone.de it's not very impressive.

This guy gets amazing quality. Look at the pores in the guys face at 01:51. Amazing.
Now, he's using a really good lens and...the GH2.
Check this article that compares quality of the GH2 with a Sony and a Canon.

Finally, if you shot alot of stills then do not expect the same quality. :-)

I soo hope for usererror too. Keeping an eye on this thread. :-)

For best results your shutter speed should be kept at 2x the frame rate so in my case since I always film at 24p I keep my shutter speed at 1/50th and I consider it locked there and never change it. Going to faster shutter speeds will begin to make your video look a little jerky like the old fashioned hand-cranked film cameras from the 1920's. People try higher shutter speeds as a way to cut down light so that their pictures are blown out but a better solution is to use ND filters to cut down the light...I do this all the time in order to get a shallow depth of field look to my video but I know the original poster wanted DEEP depth of field

Steve Crow
Crow Digital Media
http://www.CrowDigitalMedia.com

1.circle of confusion is f/8 or higher for fuzzyness.
2.try to get hyperfocus distance on near and far objects.
3.ND filter is def better.
4. wide angle lenses shot far away have the same depth of field as telephoto lenses which is also why your stuff could be fuzzy.




you should read about how depth of field works. It's extremely complicated and if you don't know what you're doing, you won't get what you want from your camera.

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/depth-of-field.htm
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/hyperfocal-distance.htm
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/wide-angle-lenses.htm