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I see so much negativity towards Lumix right now, but the S5ii X is my favorite camera I've ever used despite my criticisms of it, I was very impressed with the S1Rii when I used it for a day, and I think the S9 is a very compelling option especially if Lumix creates smaller lenses like they've said. I've even seen more YouTubers switching to Lumix cameras; while that isn't important to me, it's a sign that they are making some headway. I'm not saying people's criticisms aren't valid. If they aren't the right tool for you then they aren't the right tool, but people are writing off cameras based on specs instead of actually using them. Maybe these S1 successors will suck. It's very possible. But as of now, no one who has actually used them has said anything, nor have they made their way into the paying public's hands who can give an unbiased review.

I'm saying this respectfully to everyone else's opinion here, but there is a lot of difference between spec and actual usage. The S1Rii has been a dream so far in use, sure the body is not as elevated feeling as the OG, but in actual use it's probably one of my all time fav overall. The sensor output is fantastic, See below, this was a random snap and just for fun I decided to see if it could be salvaged (excuse the messy house/ I have 2 little kids), Results are better than anything I've ever shot with except for maybe the GFX series, (but very close) As well the sensor for my liking just sings with my vintage glass, the portrait is with a 58 Hellios from a commercial shoot. I know they may be lack lustre on the spec page, but in actual use, they just deliver.... hence I have more Lumix's in my bag along with a canon and fuji!

Just passed through this, and my 2 cents: - If you work professionally, go Mac (and yeah, I'm a windows guy). Even a M1, for video editing, run circles around any price comparable WIndows machine. - If you are not a professional and/or Apple costs 2,5x more in your country than in US (my case are both), Windows is still good. But there is a VERY important point the narrowed a lot my choices, and a lot of people doeas not realize it until is very late - codecs and chroma subsampling support. If you want to edit without proxies, is a must have feature. What H.264 and H.265 Hardware Decoding is Supported in DaVinci Resolve Studio? If you work with h.264, bad luck: only 8-but 4:2:0, except if you get an RTX 5xxx series. If you use H.265, you have better support, but pay attention to the subsampling - the 4070 (and all the RTX 4xxx) does not decode 10 bit 4:2:2. This was my case, and that narrowed my choices (when I did the upgrade, the RTX 5xxx were not launched). I had to buy a Intel non-f CPU (as you) to use the internal GPU enabled just to use Quicksync for decode. For encoding, I did not found a comparable table like this, but since almost all reviews test the encoding (rendering) part, is just to look for the desired card. Ryzens are much more performant (and chepear to build, specially motherboards) but have almost nothing decode support in the iGpus. But a Ryzen with a RTX5xxx card, or an Intel ARC Card would be a choice for me nowadays. In my case, since the money was short, went for a i5-12600k (for good decoding for editing) and a RTX 3060 with 12gb (was better than the 4060 for because of 12gb instead of 8gb - and since I have not hurries for rendering, top performance in rendering was not a problem). Works with Fuji open gate 6.2k in 10-bit 4:2:2 as champ, albeit I only do minor corrections - with a lot of effects it could not be the case. But I saw a guy that made a system with a top i9 processor anda a 4090, but when tried to edit 4:2:2 10-bit, it was slow as hell. But probably was the last PC that I put together - I built all my computer since the 286 days. The new Mac Mini is a steal - for video, is better than a PC costing double the price of the Mac Mini.

So the rumoured pricing: S1 II: 3500 euros. Similar or same sensor as Z6 III (partially stacked) and similar spec? S1 IIe: 2800 euros for the OLD sensor, same spec as S5 II but updated processor 2800 euros for a 2017 sensor that debuted in the a7 III. The kit lens is 1000 euros. 24-60 F2.8 Panasonic have taken leave of their senses.

Agreed. I don't know the overall health of the Lumix line. Maybe it's even as bad as people are saying. There have been some big whiffs for sure, like the LX100, the G100, and the G95, but I feel like a big part of people's criticism is that Lumix is "late to the party" on certain things and when they finally do release a camera that matches the competition, it's "too late" even though they enter a market at an extremely competitive price. I get that it is an adjustment, given that Lumix for so long lead the way when it came to progressing what mirrorless cameras are capable of, so it can be a disappointment in that regard, but I think overall we've hit a wall when it comes to advances. No one is really progressing much, outside of higher resolution. But Lumix is adding little quality of life improvements that the larger companies still haven't added, but they don't really get credit for them. I don't think it's unfair to say that 7 years is a long time to release a successor, but at the same time, would people be giving them the same grief if they were releasing a new model every two years for what is essentially a big firmware update like Sony does? Should they do that instead of supporting their cameras for years with new features via free firmware updates like they have? Would they have been better off if they flooded the market with so many different models? There needs to be some middle ground, and it'd be nice if Lumix found it. I agree with this, but also think it was inevitable. I don't know that they are regressing backwards creatively, as much as they hit the same wall most everyone else has. I do think the design criticism is the most valid, but I also think that too was inevitable. It makes sense that they'd try to unify the camera body designs like Sony has, as I'm sure it's much more profitable for them, especially as they try to enter the market at a more competitive price point. I've never had a problem with the S5ii X's body; I don't necessarily love it it, but I'm pretty indifferent. Where it matters most to me I find it to be pretty good; the buttons are where I'd naturally want them, and I have quick access to pretty much every setting I'd want to have quick access to. It really boils down to personal preference, so if you don't like it then I can see why it'd bother you that they are using it for most of their cameras now. That was a big reason why I didn't like Sony cameras, so I understand it.

The GH2 and the hacking community seemingly launched the GH3 before Panasonic knew which end was up. Times have definitely changed. There's no reason to hack anything on current cameras as they're all great. The urgency has become story, composition, lighting and the edit.

Maybe try and understand the negativity, after all we're just doing as you just described... buying and using the cameras and giving our opinion. I have bought every major Panasonic release for 15 years. I stopped at the S1R II and gave my opinion. There's no creative or practical and financial reason to buy another L-mount camera from Panasonic. My next will be the Sigma BF and I'll probably get the Sony a1 again at some point, as I regret selling it. There's no room in the bag for a £2500 Sony a7 replica with L-mount. Had Panasonic used the same strategy in the M43 days, they'd have been bringing out 2x crop DSLRs with moire.

Agree. Mostly... It's that they 'appear' to be going backwards creatively as in terms of features compared with others (or others are catching up) and especially in design. I have never really cared for the Lumix f1.8 primes but have always respected them...and now own and use 3 of them! I'm one of those who is not bothered whether they make anything smaller or not because on an S9, realistically, unless they make them slower, how much smaller could they be and they are hardly big or heavy in the first place. Mostly the el cheapo 50mm f1.8 for 90% of the time.

The 14-140mm allows you pretty much to shoot whatever compositions you can see. There were a few shots that required longer than 140mm, but by the time I add the in-camera zoom to get a 1:1 crop in C4K it's at 179mm, then stabilising in post makes it more, and then I can crop in post further, so that pretty much covers it. I only swapped to the 7.5mm lens once, which was an absolute PITA by comparison. In terms of the screen vs EVF, it's really a toss-up. The EVF can be more stable because it adds a third point-of-contact, but it really makes people aware you're shooting at them, even from far away, and it forces you to shoot from eye-level too. Shooting using the screen (tilted up) allows for shooting from chest-height, which I find much more pleasing for people shots, and is less noticeable too. The added complication is that the EVF can be adjusted so I don't need my reading glasses, and can read all the information on the screen. In practice I'm still figuring this out, but it created a few combinations that seemed to work. If it was bright out, I'd wear sunglasses, and shoot people from chest height just using the histogram and zebras to expose and peaking to confirm the AF was good. Then I'd use the EVF when I was zoomed in far away or shooting up at buildings etc which benefitted from the extra stabilisation. If it wasn't bright then I'd use the EVF for the same zoomed shots, and when I wanted to shoot people from chest height I'd put on my reading glasses and be able to see the screen just fine. If I quickly wanted a chest-height shot I could grab it without putting my reading glasses on first, as the AF and on-screen tools are so intuitive.

Thanks for the kind words @John Matthews and @ac6000cw .. I welcome the change of talking about the creative possibilities that the equipment affords us in using it, rather than just discussing it in theoretical terms. I'm now back home and starting to reflect on the trip, and one theme is that the more I use the 14-140mm the more I like it. For travel, where moving fast and having the flexibility are important it really shines. The length really seems to be an asset and I mentioned before that I ended up using the long end more than I thought I would, but let me expand a little on that. They say that painting is the art of addition, and photography is the art of subtraction. In painting, you have full control of the canvas and therefore getting nice frames is about starting with a blank canvas and deliberately adding the things you want it to contain. Whereas photography starts with the entire world, which for most purposes normally contains far too many things, which means either you physically remove those things from the composition you're photographing, or you change your location and focal length to exclude the items you don't wish to include. Obviously you can't just take a scene line the below, ask everyone to leave, remove all the signs on the buildings, remove the trees you don't like, etc, just to get a nice composition... So the answer is to find the elements you like, position yourself so that they are lined up, and then zoom in to get the composition you like most, like the below for example... I don't normally post shots of my travel companions because they're not keen on being posted on the open internet, but here's a good example shot of what a zoom is great for - seeing something and quickly capturing it. Yes, you can do this with primes, but very few people are going to travel with a 135mm MFT prime or 300mm FF lens, and even if they did they likely wouldn't be able to change to it fast enough to grab a composition like the below, and even if they could the likelihood that the FOV would end up containing all the right elements in the right proportions is very very low.. This also gives a small insight into for far behind my wife I will get while stopping to shoot this and that, so speed matters in the sense that she might walk so far ahead I might never find her again! I also find that in the edit the variety of focal lengths gives the footage an element of variation that I really like. For years I shot with a 35mm equivalent as my main lens, only swapping to other lenses when there was a good reason and time to do so, and I found that after a while I started to dislike the "one perspective" feeling the footage had. It's a valid creative choice, and if that's the feeling you want for your videos then that's great, but it's not the feeling I want on all my videos.

I will. Yes, the low-light issue can't be denied. I already have a bunch of lighting, so I'm not too worried about that. These new 1 inchers do seem quite nice and just as in photography the ISO and noise algorithms have advanced in the videocamera world. There are workarounds for bokeh, as you say. When I used those old Mini DV cams we managed to produce some nice images by playing with length of the zoom and judicious placement of our subjects. I 100% agree with you that the video cam world has advanced at a snail's pace compared to the photo world. Advancements have been few and far between. Curiously enough, Panasonic really did innovate with the DVX200 but the competition from the DSLR world and the new MILC challengers proved too fierce. Heck, even their own internal competition was brutal with the GF7, GX80, G9, FZ-2000, GH5, GH5 and GH5s coming around near the launch of the DVX200. Those guys in Japan were on a roll back then. As Andrew has said, their photo demise in near. IMO their fatal flaw was launching their own L mount and trying to compete with much more well established players but with 1/100 of their marketing resources and distribution channels. They should have stuck with videocameras and, from time to time, integrate their innovations to the M43 line. Bleh. Right now they much interested selling batteries to Tesla and Toyota.

I have no idea how marketing really works or what effective marketing looks like (sales, of course, but I have no insights there). But in theory, leaks get people all psyched to watch the release video. It gets them free airtime on dozens of podcasts, discussions on tons of message boards, etc. The real problem comes when the hype has been cranked up to ... well, a solid 7.3 (it is Panasonic, after all) and the release is a 4. If people are hoping that Panasonic is about to drop an S1H II and they come out with the S9, there's instead unhappiness and backlash and almost all of the release day coverage is people complaining about the camera. And then, like the S9, people start to come around and say "Oh, that's actually a nice camera." If Panasonic just teed up "we have a new ultra-small camera for creators coming," the day 1 reception might be delight instead of dismay!

I agree. They are, but I think some other things are much more significant e.g. the huge improvements in image stabilization performance are game changing if (like me) you prefer to shoot handheld (I own a couple of tripods and monopods, but they don't get used very often).

Yes, I hear you, but I look at my countless videos that I've made with Panasonic cameras (GX7, GX85, GH6, G100, VX980, GX800, GM1, GX880, S5ii and GH2) and I think they look great. All the things people say about getting nth degree AF, IQ, and resolution are really just small potatoes in the grand scope of thing. The thing is I get MORE satisfaction out of a camera that is a slight challenge to make intentional choices rather than a camera filled with AI choosing for me. I feel like spring cleaning is on the horizon, getting rid of crap I don't need and trying to back to the essentials. I want more in-focus, not less. I want more tripod shots, not less. I want easier in post, not harder. I want less megapixels, not more (BTW, as those around me get older, more megapixels is not doing them justice). Finally, I want fewer variables, not more. I'm so impressed with what @kye has been doing. He's really capturing some nice compositions and looks.

Yes, having been a happy user of the 14-140mm F3.5-5.6 for over a decade (I'm on my 2nd copy after my 10 year old original got too much dust inside), it's a great travel/everyday lens. Problem is that Panasonic don't make a modern equivalent of the GX85/GX9 to create the perfect travel combo for video with Dual-IS and no-crop 4K...

There are so many fine shots here. On the point of the 14-140mm, I've just picked one up with a G7 (yes, getting back into M43 because it's so much fun). I've seen so many great shots with it, not so much because it's a super high IQ but simply it's such a nice lens for composition, especially for travel. Here's another set of clips from James Morrissey with his GH2 (I still have mine too):

As long as colours look shitty enough, everbody seems to be happy.😊 A lot of youtube footage from the current 10bit and raw cameras makes CineD on the Gh4 look like from a grand era of color science. I really loved the colors from your Bmmcc footage and I liked them better than GH7. @kye I've only liked the color from half a hand full of GH6/7 videos, one of them with high production values by Olan Collardy. It seems to me like it's harder for a lot of people to treat log footage shot in natural light, coming from these modern hybrid cameras of the last five years. I like my og bmpcc much better than my Lumix S in that regard, same with stuff available on youtube.

Nice shots. With the telephoto modules on the 14 Ultra they benefit from 3 things: - Computational side - Fast apertures - Very close minimum focus distances As a result, especially at the closer focus distances the small sensor look disappears. The apertures are fast at F1.8 and F2.4 which for long lenses is impressive especially as they are the size of postage stamps in your pocket. The computation side has also taken a huge leap. On the main sensor there's so much more depth information and a shallower DOF to begin with which helps the bokeh simulation to be much more convincing. On this shot of the car it has just embellished a bit the background separation which was already there at 1", F1.63. It really is an extraordinary shot getter in every way. Fast, tiny, wide range of Leica modes and you can create so many different styles of shot in a couple of seconds with a few swipes. It is the moment for me when I realise that traditional mirrorless cameras and especially the lenses aren't long for this world.

1+8 pro with Helios 58mm on a steady tripod, 226mm FF equivalent.