Saturday, January 14 afternoon hike along the North Fork of the Saline River (off trail). There is an old road that runs along the river and is still relatively clear and walkable without bushwhacking. The road crosses the river several times, so depending on water levels, following the river may require bushwhacking along the bank or the hill above. It’s a beautiful place, not far from the Wildcat Mountain Bike Trail trailhead.
On this particular day I was learning/experimenting with settings for slow-motion video on my camera and decided that the flowing river would be a good subject. Here is a 3 minute sample of the results.
Filmed on a Panasonic GH2 (44Mbit patch), mostly hand held in the late afternoon-evening using a very slow Olympus 9-18 f/4-5.6 at high ISO’s. Considering how dark it was, late in the afternoon and early evening, the quality is better than I expected. The high ISO’s turned out to be a problem in combination with in-camera NR, which was set to default. For the slow motion, it was shot in Cinema mode at 720p 60fps, then conformed to 23.976fps and slowed to 66% in Premiere.
I learned a lesson about using high ISO’s for video and leaving noise reduction on… it introduces pulsating artifacts as the NR tries to reduce the ISO noise. The solution, of course, is to use a faster lens in such lighting conditions. OK… next time. The great music is by Chris Zabriskie, who very generously lets us use his music under a Creative Commons license. Thanks Chris.
This section of the North Fork Saline River is generally flowing as shown in the film, or less. If you come out here after heavy rains, its a raging torrent. I hiked out here after days of heavy rain a few months ago and it was difficult getting around due to all of the overflowing streams and the river being out of its banks. In summer there is always some water, although by August it may not be flowing. Great place for off-trail hiking.
