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Well having mulled it around in my noggin for a few months, plus based on actually owning one and shooting a wedding with it...and then selling it for another S5II for a couple of reasons, I have decided I will get an S9 again. Why? I'm pretty sure I am welded to LUMIX/L Mount (for video at least) for what remains of my career and I have gone backwards and forwards over whether I am best served by having 2 units or 3 and come to the conclusion, 3 is the magic number. If I had not recently sold my third S5II, I'd have been running with 3 of the things in 2025, but as I did sell it last month, I'm going to take the opportunity to pick up an S9 again. Why an S9 over another S5II? I have an S5II with battery grip on a heavyweight tripod with 70-200 pulling static duty. I have an S5II in a cage on a lightweight tripod with 28-70 pulling static and quick to move about duty. I need/want a roaming in hand/lightweight monopod unit I can keep on me that is super lightweight. Lack of a second card slot and no built in fan were and still are slight negatives, but the rest of the what are for me, features over the S5II make sense. Ideally I'd like those multiple frame markers and the video zoom function will make shooting prime lenses more practical and along with some other very minor stuff, makes up a compelling package for me. I've gone around the houses also regarding what lens to pair it with and initially it was going to be a used S Pro 50mm f1.4 but then for the same money, I could get a smaller and lighter Sigma 50mm f1.2, but then for less than one third of the cost, an even smaller and lighter Lumix 50mm f1.8. So that's what I am going to pair it with. Already have the Smallrig cage I saved from last time. And it's available in my corporate logo red colour so it would be rude not to also have a camera with a red body 😋

Yep. So many good things are now just useless. It's almost like it was planned all along. Or it might have started with good intentions but then shareholders or agent provocateurs from competitors get on the board and make it less useful. I remember this video art piece that was aired on broadcast TV. They bought air time to show it. We (the viewers) are the product and sold to the advertisers. The content is just a way to bring in the products.

My 2 cents about Panasonic (which still is the more familiar brand to me - left m43 some years ago for Fuji, but when I got a FZ1000 used and saw the interface, just feels like HOME): It's imaging division is on the guillotine for some time now - probably the bean counters are pushing it to divest, and only their history is holding it. It is not exclusive to Panasonic - every company that not have a camera division as its principal one could pull a Samsung anytime. Panasonic, Fujifilm, even Sony someday. I only see Canon and Nikon staying in cameras until the last breath. In M43, it happens exactly what I tought when left the system - Panasonic and OM would turn it to a niche. Video for Panasonic (the G9 II was released because they had the body already developed for the S5II and the electronics developed for the GH7), wildlife for OM. My bets are that 2025 it the testing year - if they don't get traction, will just dump a lot of people and mantain the minimum ones to keep releasing models for Leica. In the X100 craze, re-releasing the LX100 II as a Leica, for me, is a strong alert. Leica margins could keep the division alive as a OEM for Leica. And L mount needs cheap and SMALL lenses. In a word - bring Viltrox to L-Mount. Panasonic releasing a 26mm f/8 manual lens with the S9 for $199 and Viltrox releasing a 28mm f/4.5 SMALLER and WITH AF for $99 was one of the most shameless moments of the year. One last mystery: who makes the GH7 / G9 II 25mp sensor? OM needs it badly.

Wtf! Not only that you cannot search for videos anymore, they also killed browsing other accounts.You cannot browse through other peoples videos anymore! If you click on someones user account, nothing happens. So nobody can find my videos nor browse through my uploaded videos. What did I just pay 70 EUR for again, on a side note? Total rip off and theft. Oh yeah, they deleted groups and collections too. No love for film, no respect for people. They just disfunctioned an entire community with a blink of an eye, without any warning. That's like a warning about other tech companies into which we put our trust, faith and fate. That means for the internet of things, if someone pulls the plug, no sandwiches for you tonight or any night, buddy.