Leaderboard

People might laugh at me, but I don't care. I've been doing some walk-around filming with my G7 and 9mm Leica versus my S5ii and the kit lens. I'm absolutely dumbfounded how little the differences are. Here are my settings: Panasonic Lumix G7 - 4k 25fps (EOSHD ProColor Settings, with minor tweaks), super-fast stabilization in Final Cut (InertiaCam- smoothing (.1), continuous video AF on with it's small box in the center (yes, that's right and it didn't really hunt), A Mode, Auto ISO, handheld only, AWB Panasonic Lumix S5II - 4k 25fps (Stadard profile), no stabilization in post (but had IBIS on), continuous AF (mode 2), small box in the center, A Mode, Auto ISO, handheld only, AWB I kid you not, the images were very similar, minus the color which seemed better on the G7 to my eye. After stabilization, there was little difference. Here are some stills: It would appear the 2015 G7 is still the little engine that could. It weighs a whopping 540g less than the S5II and kit lens. I could add the 14-140, the 25 f/1.4 and perhaps a recorder or mini tripod for that difference. This is where M43 needs to go in the future: small, excellent value, with great features like 4k, PDAF, IBIS, 10 bit h.265, with a proper shutter and hot shoe. Even the previous generation(s) from 2015-2018 have so much to offer.

EOSHD ProColor looking great 😉 Much nicer than the Panasonic profile on the S5 II

A few interesting quotes from the BCN web page where the chart orrginates from (my bold): Nikon is basically going for a 'pile it high and sell it cheap' strategy in the full-frame MILCs - but as the last to enter that market, they probably don't have much choice when up against Canon and Sony (Panasonic is almost a niche player but could easily suffer collateral damage from the battle).

Sure, and if they aren't releasing any new cameras, then that's unlikely to change. The pros and cons will remain constant! 😅

I have now imported my iPhone footage and put it through the same FLC pipeline as my GH7 footage. As you may recall, I shot the "home video" parts of the trip with my iPhone 12 Mini, and part of the goals of the new FLC pipeline is to be able to improve the iPhone footage and match it better with the GH7 footage. Overall, I am pleasantly surprised with both the images and the user experience. With my phone in my left-front pocket and GH7 in my right-hand, I could extend the pop-socket out, pull my phone out, shoot with it, then put it back, all with my left hand and not having to even turn off the GH7. Having the ability to swap from shooting with the GH7 and 14-140mm to an ultra-wide in seconds is great when you want to capture the action in real-time: It has surprisingly good handling of real-world DR: It allows for quick and unobtrusive shooting in restaurants and cafes: which also gives some background defocus which is nice. ...and it is great for shooting in very cramped or crowded situations: I struggled shooting in the Myongdong night-markets just because the GH7 was so conspicuous and just not well designed for such things, however the iPhone worked quite well for those chaos-and-people-everywhere shots, and was great for shooting situations at point-blank range: In retrospect I wish I had shot more whimsical footage with it throughout the trip, but that's a note for next time. In order to see how the FLC is contributing to these images, let's compare some of the above shots to how they would have looked with a simple CST workflow (I did a CST to DWG, matched exposure, then CST to 709-A). FLC: 709-A: FLC: 709-A: FLC: 709-A: I find that it takes the digititis out of the images quite a bit. Another thing it does is hide some of the limitations of the iPhone too. Here's a shot I took from out the train window. It's obviously a very low-light shot and the iPhone NR was probably set to "armageddon". 709-A: FLC (with a touch of sharpening): Anything in post that applies across all your shots will help to unify them, and so having a slight softening applied to all the footage, as well as similar colour treatment, can really help to smooth things around any rough shots. I created my own powergrade using FLC I called "50mm" because I took the grain and softening settings from the 35mm and 65mm presets and set things to the mid-point between the two, effectively emulating a 50mm film process. I have more work to do, including working out what settings give what results once the footage has gone through the YT compression, but it's a start.

Like I said these idiotic tariffs are causing the market to act as a cartel. Capitalism is all about competition so if one company faces higher costs, and the others don't, then that company suffers and the rest can keep their prices low. If all companies are forced to up-their prices, it sets a new expectation for the entire market for costs, and nobody loses as the consumer can't simply turn to a company with lower prices when they are all subject to the same market forces. So even if the prices go up in the US, that gives the camera companies the perfect excuse to do the dirty on the UK and Europe as well.

I'm not really seeing any difference between any of them; S5, S1H, S5ii. Yes there are some very subtle differences such as that from the S1H is a teeny weeny bit softer due to the OLPF, but otherwise, nothing for me. There's some chatter about over-sharpening. I don't see it. There's some chatter about moire. I'm not seeing that either. Highlight roll off and blah di blah, - what are we shooting here with these things? Are we really comparing the results from our humble mirrorless cameras with Hollywood lighting, productions, lenses and budgets? I'm not, - to be even remotely in the ball park is hilariously ridiculous. Here's a screen grab from my S9 which is my principal run & gun unit, from last weekends wedding I am currently editing. A pretty dark hole of a room for bride prep and unless anywhere near that window, then screwed. It's SOOC and not touched it in any way; exposure, WB...nuffink. 6k 30p shot at 1/50th, 4000 iso, 5000 WB, Freewell ND 2-5, exposure otherwise eyeballed on the rear LCD with the wave form I rarely look at.

Counterpoint: Did Gerald ever make one? And didn't Panasonic quite literally just invite Andrew to review a camera, but he turned them down? It's a weird time to make that accusation. 😃

Honestly the color science from Lumix recently is one of the more underrated things they have going on. It might actually be my favorite currently, but people don't really talk about it much.