Marcio Kabke Pinheiro

Back to the day job

Probably the Panasonic version of the "new" Leica camera.

Probably the Panasonic version of the "new" Leica camera.

I think it’s going to be the S35 Gerald1 tribute cam.

The discover that Pansonic used stock photos (even one from a Nikon Ambassador) in the S9 brochures is not helping either.

Tie this PR disaster with the Asahi reports that Panasonic camera division could be axed...

Had the two 14-42 kits from Panasonic - the first and bigger one, that was the kit zoom on the GH2, and the second smaller one. The older was not grat, but the smaller was very ok. Using in f/5.6 (where I used all my m43 lenses when travelling with sun), plenty good indeed.

In the last trip with m43), used the "little gem", the pancake 12-32. Was one of the m43 lenses that I did not sold, very good, sharper than the 14-42. Is exactly what Panasonic should do in FF.

I asked for a small f/4.5 zoom lens for FF because in terms of DOF, is like a "f/2.9ish" in APS-C - and I'm using the Sigma 18-50 f/2.8 and in most cases the DOF is ok for general use.

The manufacturer that makes a FF small body with a small 24-60 or 24-70 f/4.5 (collapsible, if possible) with good (don't need to be very top) image quality, probably will get me in the future.

Had the two 14-42 kits from Panasonic - the first and bigger one, that was the kit zoom on the GH2, and the second smaller one. The older was not grat, but the smaller was very ok. Using in f/5.6 (where I used all my m43 lenses when travelling with sun), plenty good indeed.

In the last trip with m43), used the "little gem", the pancake 12-32. Was one of the m43 lenses that I did not sold, very good, sharper than the 14-42. Is exactly what Panasonic should do in FF.

I asked for a small f/4.5 zoom lens for FF because in terms of DOF, is like a "f/2.9ish" in APS-C - and I'm using the Sigma 18-50 f/2.8 and in most cases the DOF is ok for general use.

The manufacturer that makes a FF small body with a small 24-60 or 24-70 f/4.5 (collapsible, if possible) with good (don't need to be very top) image quality, probably will get me in the future.

Had the two 14-42 kits from Panasonic - the first and bigger one, that was the kit zoom on the GH2, and the second smaller one. The older was not grat, but the smaller was very ok. Using in f/5.6 (where I used all my m43 lenses when travelling with sun), plenty good indeed.

In the last trip with m43), used the "little gem", the pancake 12-32. Was one of the m43 lenses that I did not sold, very good, sharper than the 14-42. Is exactly what Panasonic should do in FF.

I asked for a small f/4.5 zoom lens for FF because in terms of DOF, is like a "f/2.9ish" in APS-C - and I'm using the Sigma 18-50 f/2.8 and in most cases the DOF is ok for general use.

The manufacturer that makes a FF small body with a small 24-60 or 24-70 f/4.5 (collapsible, if possible) with good (don't need to be very top) image quality, probably will get me in the future.

Just saw the Gerald piece. Some good points. About his rant to Lumix, his 1st point is very strong (being put out just for use STRANGE in a title) but the 2nd one...not invinting he because it was not a camera for him could be or not a bad point.

They could honestly thought that is like (in a exaggeration) invite a smartphone shooter to a Arri Alexa launch. The S9 is for smaller creators / travel camera, not long run videos. But...they invited some people that are even farther from this crowd like Hugh Browstone and he made very good points about the use cases for the camera. For me was an error, intentional or not.

The Lumix message for the camera was all over the place, their marketing team is probably on drugs (even using stock photos - don't go to Shutterstock when high 🙂). First the rumors sites (that, of course, are feeded by internal "leaks" - irony alert) cemented the idea that it was a X100VI competitor, and is VERY far from that. It is a ZV-E10 / ZV-E1 competitor that is much better for stills than both - which, for me, is a interesting proposition. But their screwed it up all over the place.

And grab a buckle of popcorn and read the comment section of the Gerald post. 🙂 There are a lot of people much more pissed than Panasonic there. 

Don't know, never had a Lumix FF on hands. About the S9 I've just mentioned because I saw it on one of the reviews, and because Fuji have for some time this option to make the stills go directly to the phone - but is not for me either, I've got the photo manually on the phone if I need it. (never tried the new Frame.io integration on Fujis because I'm out of the Adobe ecosystem)

This is S9 versus some similar size MILC alternatives that you can buy new (from the left, ZV-E1, A7C ii, S9, OM-5, X-S20). Paired with what I think are the most compact mid-range zooms currently available from each camera manufacturer.


The small size of the 28-60mm f4-5.6 lens on the ZV-E1 and A7C ii does rather make the point that the S9 really needs the upcoming 18-40mm lens (and maybe a compact 28-70mm or 35-100mm). 

Nope, I think that it is not the intended use - probably is another reviewer who don't read the manual.

If the user wants to post the image / video ASAP, it should put the app on the mode that it automatically downloads from the camera every still /video that was taken. It is not a novelty, my X-S20 have this option, and I think that other manufacturers have this option in their apps to.

Panasonic just thought a bit more about the process - hence a optimized use of 5ghz wifi (the download times looks faster than usual) and the new 50mbps codec for a fast transfer to the phone.

You leave the phone on your pocket, take you shots, and when you finish the pcitures / video are already on you phone (on almost completed), you upload it to social media in the app, applying (or not) some of the luts with an optimized editor. I'm not this kind of user, but looks like a much better workflow than usual.

Nope, I think that it is not the intended use - probably is another reviewer who don't read the manual.

If the user wants to post the image / video ASAP, it should put the app on the mode that it automatically downloads from the camera every still /video that was taken. It is not a novelty, my X-S20 have this option, and I think that other manufacturers have this option in their apps to.

Panasonic just thought a bit more about the process - hence a optimized use of 5ghz wifi (the download times looks faster than usual) and the new 50mbps codec for a fast transfer to the phone.

You leave the phone on your pocket, take you shots, and when you finish the pcitures / video are already on you phone (on almost completed), you upload it to social media in the app, applying (or not) some of the luts with an optimized editor. I'm not this kind of user, but looks like a much better workflow than usual.

Nope, I think that it is not the intended use - probably is another reviewer who don't read the manual.

If the user wants to post the image / video ASAP, it should put the app on the mode that it automatically downloads from the camera every still /video that was taken. It is not a novelty, my X-S20 have this option, and I think that other manufacturers have this option in their apps to.

Panasonic just thought a bit more about the process - hence a optimized use of 5ghz wifi (the download times looks faster than usual) and the new 50mbps codec for a fast transfer to the phone.

You leave the phone on your pocket, take you shots, and when you finish the pcitures / video are already on you phone (on almost completed), you upload it to social media in the app, applying (or not) some of the luts with an optimized editor. I'm not this kind of user, but looks like a much better workflow than usual.

Nope, I think that it is not the intended use - probably is another reviewer who don't read the manual.

If the user wants to post the image / video ASAP, it should put the app on the mode that it automatically downloads from the camera every still /video that was taken. It is not a novelty, my X-S20 have this option, and I think that other manufacturers have this option in their apps to.

Panasonic just thought a bit more about the process - hence a optimized use of 5ghz wifi (the download times looks faster than usual) and the new 50mbps codec for a fast transfer to the phone.

You leave the phone on your pocket, take you shots, and when you finish the pcitures / video are already on you phone (on almost completed), you upload it to social media in the app, applying (or not) some of the luts with an optimized editor. I'm not this kind of user, but looks like a much better workflow than usual.

My two cents:

Sitll not saw the Gerald's video, but it not surprised me. The writing was on the wall that he was kinda pivoting - much less gear reviews, trying to make a talk show vibe, and making a series going to Youtuber's studios and talking about their locations and processes. Looks like he wants to be kind of the Rick Beato of video recording (in fact, he even gone to Rick's studio 🙂)

All this state of Youtube reviewers was clear for everyone that have a little bit of intelligence (looks like a minority, unfortunately). The signs were mounting each year. 

First, now all the reviews are "with a pre-production unit", hence "you can't go in deeper detail, but we will review it when a full production unit is available". In 70% of the cases, the full prouction unit test never appears, and the deeper test never occurs. In fact, a lot of reviewers never test the camera again after huge firmware updates - baffles my that camera companies did not see that as a problem, since most of the reviews stayed shown forever with problems that were solved after the release...

The secons sign that I noted was in the X-S20 launch (a camera that I own and like, that it is not anti-Fuji fanboy here) - some of the most noted Fuji reviewers had not received loan units, and a LOT of smaller channels that I've never heard before received it. When a Fuji channel it 170k subscribers do not got an unit, but a channel with 1k got it (yes, this was the case), you know that something is strange.

Same feeling was with the S9 - was the 1st camera that EVERY channel that I follow was invited, with no exceptions, even some very small ones that I like that were NEVER invited for anything. And for these (as I suspect also in the X-S20) the desire to stay on the loop probably makes them to do not be much critical. And I kinda understand - people trying to make a living on Youtube (not a much good choice nowadays) got a chance and wants to grab it.

This is the state now, and everyone is entitled to an opinon. Could be much worse - a lot of big Youtubers raves about that piece of scam that is Luminar, for instance.

I enjoyed his pivot to ghosts

Nice of him to spill the beans after only 10 years of benefiting personally from such beans.
What's next...
A pivot to reviewing Macs?

You’d have to question the business wisdom of such a trip that took out at least 7-8 days out of working time when you factor in prep, travel and jet lag recovery.
Yes the travel, accommodation and likely some sort of PD was involved but without an actual fee, how is the loss of earnings for those days covered ?
Even if you factored in the “long term” loan of the camera being so long term that they allow you to sell it then a $1000 spread over 7 days isn’t much of a day rate.
I don’t think the argument of exposure and views compensating holds up either.
The gold rush era of making YouTube camera videos and becoming relatively rich is in the rear view mirror now.
Thats why so many of them are pivoting to other areas.
The days of these get rich quick Beverley Shillbillies will hopefully be a thing of the past pretty soon.

Of course...  duh!  *slaps own forehead* 🙂 
Interesting about the cage manufacturers doing the leaking.  I guess they'd be the ones with the most detailed knowledge of the cameras too - considering that they'd be required to receive accurate dimensions and potentially would also get the size requirements of the lenses too so they'd be able to figure out the lens configuration and sensor size.
I think it's a straight up content creators camera.
Gerald said he thinks that it was Panasonic trying to get some of that Fuji money after the success of the X100 selling out, and that the inclusion of all the more advanced features was simply a case of taking the S5ii package and not paying engineers to disable features when they can just release the new camera with those features and not pay anyone to remove them.
Millennials and GenZ are running around with vintage point-and-shoot cameras and want film presets now, despite their smartphone being technically better in practically every way.  The fact that us crotchety old camera nerds don't know what the hell they want isn't surprising, especially considering I'm pretty sure they don't know what they want either!
Anyone who has ever looked at the fashion industry will know that nothing makes sense, lots of things look completely stupid, yet there is a rabid market for it and you can make squillions of dollars if you can get it right.

You're right. He always tries to be "the guy" for camera reviews, the one who's going to tell how things really are and "should you get it". I'd probably agree that many of his conclusions are valid, but it cannot be understated he NEVER actually shares ANY footage as a creator. It's almost like he can talk forever about a language, but never really speaks it. As a language teacher myself, I know there are many teachers who are guilty of this (if that makes sense).

I've got one for me (personal use, remember).

I'm not travelling (and probably stay on this way for a long time), but I'm in a quest for years on how to quickly change my camera from "stills, in a neck strap" to "in a gimbal for movies with an ND" in the shortest amount of time during a trip.

The last solution was:
- Using the Falcam magnetic anchor links on the strap (much faster than the Peak Degin ones);
- Put the ND filter on the lens from a belt pouch using magnetic rings;
- Get the gimbal (since I use the X-S20 + Sigma 18-50 f/2.8, both very light, now is a Scorp Mini ginmal), which already have a quick release, all already calibrated for the combo;
- Mount and shoot.

All very quick, except getting the gimbal from the back and unlocking it. But much better than previous attempts.

Then I saw that 80% of the shots that I use the gimbal during trips are wide-angle ones. And then the Pocket came to mind.

Never was interested before because of the smaller sensors (albeit when researching the 3, saw a lot of examples from the 2 and the image quality was better than I expected), but with the 1 inch sensor of the 3, I was interested.

Got one, and will sell my gimbal. Wide shots, will use it - tighter shots, will use the X-S20 handeld, with IBIS and maybe extra stab in Resolve. Much less fussy, much faster to change "modes".

Did not use the Pocket 3 a lot, but already impressed. Yes, the image of the X-S20 is better, but the difference is much closer than expected. And in a concert that I went recently, the image was good enough (just using D-Log with a Rec709 lut appllied 50%), and the internal mics TROUNCED the Andycine little shotgun that was using on the X-S20.

(my play was to get the Creative combo to use the DJI Mic 2 as a standalone 32bit recorder on the X-S20 hotshoe, but the comb was sold out).

This guy have a series of videos about the Pocket 3 - and use it in a very interesting ways:
 
 

I've got one for me (personal use, remember).

I'm not travelling (and probably stay on this way for a long time), but I'm in a quest for years on how to quickly change my camera from "stills, in a neck strap" to "in a gimbal for movies with an ND" in the shortest amount of time during a trip.

The last solution was:
- Using the Falcam magnetic anchor links on the strap (much faster than the Peak Degin ones);
- Put the ND filter on the lens from a belt pouch using magnetic rings;
- Get the gimbal (since I use the X-S20 + Sigma 18-50 f/2.8, both very light, now is a Scorp Mini ginmal), which already have a quick release, all already calibrated for the combo;
- Mount and shoot.

All very quick, except getting the gimbal from the back and unlocking it. But much better than previous attempts.

Then I saw that 80% of the shots that I use the gimbal during trips are wide-angle ones. And then the Pocket came to mind.

Never was interested before because of the smaller sensors (albeit when researching the 3, saw a lot of examples from the 2 and the image quality was better than I expected), but with the 1 inch sensor of the 3, I was interested.

Got one, and will sell my gimbal. Wide shots, will use it - tighter shots, will use the X-S20 handeld, with IBIS and maybe extra stab in Resolve. Much less fussy, much faster to change "modes".

Did not use the Pocket 3 a lot, but already impressed. Yes, the image of the X-S20 is better, but the difference is much closer than expected. And in a concert that I went recently, the image was good enough (just using D-Log with a Rec709 lut appllied 50%), and the internal mics TROUNCED the Andycine little shotgun that was using on the X-S20.

(my play was to get the Creative combo to use the DJI Mic 2 as a standalone 32bit recorder on the X-S20 hotshoe, but the comb was sold out).

This guy have a series of videos about the Pocket 3 - and use it in a very interesting ways:
 
 

The major problem is that a lot of people thinks that ths is a X100VI contender. It is not. It is a competitor to ZV-E10 / ZV-E1.

A very video-vlogger centric camera, that could also take photos, where the user wants the content to be online ASAP. Never intended for serious stills or video work - hence the absence of more controles or even a grip.

We are all crappy old dudes / cinema-quality crazy people here, the opposite of the targeted group of this camera. There is some style / nostalgia think ocurring with (some) young people, the X100V / VI mania was just a part of it.

Saw a post from a photographer in Tokyo that noted another parts of this trend - he was looking around in streets and subways and saw a lot (and he meant, A LOT) of young people carrying point&shoots. Old Powershots and Cybershots everywhere, and very few taking photos with phones. Hetalked to some of them and they said that is a new stylish trend between them, that they are tired of the same pictures that every phone take, and that the P&S photos have more character. Prices of used P&S CCD cameras are skyrocketing.

And I guess that this was the targeted crowd of the S9. They made a P&Sish full frame camera. With a stylish exterior, few controls, geared towards video - but MUCH more stills capable than a ZV-E10 / ZV-E1 (the latter have only 12mp, remember). And for the "character", there is the LUT ecosystem.

Which, for me, is BRILLIANT. They made what I was telling Fuji to do - embrace custom film simulations, instead of making it hard to work. Using "film recipes" in Fuji is a pain in the ass - you have to assign it to a custom setting position, but if you want to use the shooting parameters of the custom position (like a Portrait setting, with shutter speed, of setting, etc) and want to change the film recipe - no way. 

Yes, there will be some WB balance problems with the LUTs in the S9 - and a lot of confusion when people put a V-Log lut and the ISO don't go down from 640. But the easy of use, and the promise from the newer Lumix Lab app, makes kind of a interesting ecosystem.

They made a new MP4 codec with a 50mb/s bitrate. Looks crap? In a computer, is not bad, but the quality drop is visible. In a smartphone screen? Looks almost the same a pro codec - but since the file is much lighter, you could take a short clip, that the new app is already transferring on the background (yes, the new app could do it), when you end and store the camera the video is already on the app, you could apply the LUT if is already not applied (even with tranparency % of the LUT!) and send the file (which is lighter since the beginning) to social media. Still not perfect, but looks (and some reviewers, as Manny Ortiz said) that is the best camera->app->social media implementation to date.

Will not buy it, but looking how I use my X-S20 nowadays (remembering, I'm an amateur), almost only the EVF and two more buttons would be dealbreakers. 

Sigma have a set of small Contemporary primes - the 35mm f/2 have almost the same size of a Fuji 23mm f/2...

https://camerasize.com/compact/#825.951,869.596,ha,t

But yeah, the pancake is a joke. If Fuji could do a 27mm f/2.7 APS-C pancake, Panasonic could easily do a 35mm f/4.5 one.