John Matthews

9 hours ago, ND64 said:

This name screams "consumer". You just don't replace "pro" with "my" if you're targeting professional shooters. But nothing is impossible with Panasonic marketing team.

I understand. On the other hand, they could just call it Panasonic Pro Services and it would be completely seamless.

I can’t help but feel there’s something going on behind the scenes, though. You’re right — moving from Lumix Pro Services to My Panasonic just doesn’t make sense from a user’s perspective, at least in my opinion. I smell a rat — the whole thing feels a bit fishy.

7 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

I think it's the beginning of the end for Lumix.

I'm really not sure what to make of it. Apparently, the North American service is still up. In Europe, they're transitioning to "My Panasonic". Maybe, and this would be a good thing, they're getting rid of the Lumix name, suggesting more of a commitment from them. If not, they're either restructuring/streamlining (good?) or winding down operations on a service that wasn't profitable in the first place (maybe for all the manufacturers). From the perspective of pros, if they don't have a priority turn-around on a device, it could be a problem, but maybe it's just not a thing anymore. Maybe just have backups and go with the slower service?

I will say, all of this is confusing — Sean (of Lumix Live) spent about five minutes talking about Lumix Pro Services just today. Either he’s not aware of what’s going on, or I’ve completely misunderstood. But if he isn’t aware, it really doesn’t look good… and here he is still promoting it while their doors are apparently closing in 25 days. That's communication for you!

2 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

LOL. Why not just say that in the first place then?

Fair point.

4 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

Your post has way too little info for such a big claim.

Closing the services where? France?

How did you find out? on the phone? On Google? On instagram? On the back of some tea leaf?

You know the rules of the internet by now surely...

When you find an URL cut and paste the post into your post about the post.

Otherwise you keep people guessing what the fucking source is.

Google "Lumix closing pro services on November 30, 2025." and click "I'm feeling lucky".

Otherwise, https://www.lumixpro.panasonic.com/uk/

Also, everyone with a Lumix pro account received an email... and it wasn't the first. Actually, more than a month old news.

I was just wondering what it could mean for Lumix and Panasonic.

1 minute ago, TheJay said:

I had the LPS Red service included with my GH6 when I bought it new, and unfortunately had to use it the next year when my camera screen started glitching out and eventually died. 
Other than the fast turnaround it was a huge headache and the communication from Lumix Pro Services was terrible. I had to pay out of pocket for shipping both ways, an inspection fee, and then parts and labor. The third party repair facility was great, but there was a glitch in the LPS system showing on their end that my camera wasn't registered even though I had proof on my end. I could never communicate with anyone at LPS efficiently and the email tag back and forth was incredibly slow and nothing was ever resolved. Maybe I'm the only one that has had this issue with them, but then again maybe this is why it's going away.  
 

I've never had a Panasonic really break on me. It did happen to me with an Olympus E-P7. It had faulty IBIS. I sent it in and they eventually replaced it with an E-M5iii (an upgrade). I was super happy. Not it's the same service today. 

I did find a post that said it will still exist, but under the “My Panasonic” name. Maybe because no one was actually using it, they just decided to move the service under the Panasonic brand. Personally, I think they should just get rid of the Lumix name altogether and fully embrace Panasonic. That way, people would immediately know what it’s about and wouldn’t have to think about—or explain—that Lumix means Panasonic too.

I have a bad feeling about this, but does anyone actually use these services? What does this mean for Lumix?

For small M43 cameras like the GM5, prices have skyrocketed to the point where you’d actually make money if you bought one new when it came out, used it, and then sold it in 2025. This trend can’t last—I think it’s a bubble.

For anything larger, prices have been tanking for the most part. Cameras like the GH5 and GH5S were roughly double their current prices just two years ago. I suspect that’s because affordable full-frame bodies are now tempting many M43 users to finally make the switch, especially since OM System and Panasonic still haven’t released the camera that truly blows everyone away. Both companies seem to have missed the memo about the kind of very small, capable cameras people actually want in the M43 format. Instead, they keep trying to compete with full-frame—packing similar capabilities into ever-smaller bodies with ever-smaller lenses.

Eventually, M43 might only remain relevant for niche situations (like birding). Personally, I still love the format and keep my G7 with two AF lenses. I’m holding out hope. I just wish I could get the capability of the G9 II in an E-M5-sized body. You’d think that would be possible by now. Basically, I use M43 for fun outside and travel. FF is for anything inside.

I took it from the same site that @Andrew Reid mentioned: 

https://www.slashcam.de/artikel/Test/ARRI-ALEXA-35-Sensor-Bildqualitaet--Rolling-Shutter--Dynamik---Die-neue-Referenz---alles-.html

I looked for the Nikon ZR, but I couldn't find similar IQ tests regarding 120fps.

It's important to note these are super crops. Andrew thinks it was a bad performance for the Alexa. I don't think so. I don't see the same amount of aliasing as I do on the A1 and S1R ii (which line-skipped) shots.

19 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

SlashCam have the S1R II 8K at 22ms, but I think open gate brings that closer to 30ms?

Sony a1 is at 15ms for 8K, no crop.

The 4K/120p is also much better / cleaner on the a1:

I'm not sure of the practicality of sensor processing/detail tests at 120fps. Who watches much more than just a short clip? The only exceptions I can think of are in Clockwork Orange and Billy Elliot- both shot on film.

I had a look at the GH7 test at 100fps and 120fps. It looks better than both the Sony A1 and Lumix S1r ii.

For reference, here's the Alexa 35 at 120fps:

40 minutes ago, ND64 said:

Business wise, its way easier for them to make lower priced MF body than start a FF body from scratch and face 3 giants right out of the gate. Also it sends a wrong message to their customers: "both APSC and MF we pushed all these years, aren't best choices, either in image quality or practicality". 

That would make more sense than starting a whole new lens system IMO. Just make a body in the $2500 range and loads of people will come in. Add to it a fast f2 prime that isn't gigantic (I'm ok with in-camera software corrections) and I think it would be way cheaper than making and marketing a new system. There's already so much confusion for the limited number of consumers left buying cameras.

I would say a FF point and shoot would make more sense for them. It would also sell really well IMO.

17 minutes ago, MrSMW said:

Or just go buy the TT Artisan one at £159 and that's Lumix's loss in terms of lens sales at least.

I intend on doing this, but Sean's response rubbed me the wrong way. It's too bad Panasonic doesn't have the same spirit as it had with the GM1 (the camera referenced in the release of the S9). I wanted a 28mm and 40mm pancake. The TTArtisan isn't quite pancake status, but it's the best we've got.

18 minutes ago, MrSMW said:

didn't realise it was a limited edition and even if they gave away 1/2 of them, apparently still at least one available as it's listed as in stock on Panny's UK website at £1199 inc. matching Titty lens.

It seems like a decent price. 

2 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

”Maybe you can’t get this particular S9 but hey if you haven’t seen this camera before, you have now seen how good it is and you’ll be amazed at how cheap and available the non bling version is”

That’s definitely a shift in their marketing strategy—not one that really appeals to me. Owning the S9 (though not the painted gold version), I can’t help but feel Panasonic has done the camera-world equivalent of polishing a turd.

That said, I actually like the S9 for what it is—though not at the original price. At the discounted sub-1000 euro mark, it makes sense. My main issue is that it didn’t deserve the attention of a redesign because it’s a fiddly little camera that lacks proper lenses. I’m still waiting for a Panasonic-branded, real pancake lens with autofocus—the kind that should have been released alongside the S9.

I even mentioned this to Sean on his weekly livestream. I asked why Panasonic wouldn’t create a lens like the 40mm f/2 that TTArtisan just released, even if it cost twice as much. His response was that they wouldn’t, because everyone would hate on it—much like the 26mm joke of a lens. I disagree. I believe they’d sell plenty of copies of a 40mm f/2 with AF (even if plastic) at around 350 euros.

Sometimes, Panasonic just can’t see the obvious, IMO.

I cannot fathom why Panasonic is spending its resources on 200 copies of a camera and giving half of the copies away to YouTube scrubs. Rather, shouldn't they be looking more concerned with releasing a SH1ii- THE camera that 99% of us want to see be released? Perhaps, the pulled another S9 smokescreen on us as it was planned, but regrettably still not ready- only 3 years behind schedule! Then again, maybe it was never planned from the get-go.

Maybe it's me, but the ZR seems more like a S9 with a bigger LCD, internal RAW, and a slightly more functional hotshoe in a heavier body, worse IBIS, not as many tools, and roughly for $1200 more. Am I missing something? The ZR also has 4k 120 in S35, which could be a big deal for some.

Inspired by this post, I tried to make some flares with the Makinon.

Some were shot at f/16 and others f/3.5 with an ND filter. I shot in v-log and corrected for exposure and add the official Panasonic LUT.

1 hour ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

I'm looking forward to watching the video on the Makinon.  I've not heard of that one before - and if it's still $30ish on eBay, I guess there's not a reason not to buy it.

I have the AR mount version. It's a decent lens by my eye. My copy has a trashed front thread and the rubber missing from the zoom ring- neither are a problem for me. I've seen them in K-mount too, but I'm not sure if there any differences. The fact that it has been used to oblivion is a good sign to me- somebody loved this lens to use it that much. Judging from this video and the video he shot entirely on it, I'd say there aren't any differences.

I also have a Pentax 35-105 f/3.5 constant that belonged to my father, but it's almost impossible to use. There's just so much gear noise and you have to go into a full-macro mode to get somewhat close. Here's a video describing it:

On 8/15/2025 at 10:36 PM, QuickHitRecord said:

Same series of lens for consistency

Good luck. Manufacturers changed coatings every time they went to the bathroom. They were always getting tweaked. Granted, they often had similar looks. You can find some very unique f/3.5 constant zooms that will do the job. Some of them are sharp and cheap with magnificent and crazy flares.

Here are some that I found interesting. I have the Makinon zoom lens.

11 hours ago, Tulpa said:

I know that @Kye like the GH bodies... but notice no one here has said much about the GH7 as a work horse. It would be such a solid contender if they could get that low light up a bit. Correct?

I never used the GH7, only the GH6, but I found it to be great in low light; just not "no light" situations. Both of those cameras are mostly about 4k 120fps. The GH7 is about that and the AF in video and Hybrid Zoom. If the cost and size aren't the determining factors, the GH7 is the most fully-featured M43 camera for video today. Want the same features as the GH7? Go for the G9ii something smaller and cheaper, just no insanely long clips. In fact, the G9ii might be my last M43 camera as I don't see a point in anything more.

I'm going to revise my choice for this type of use. Camping and biking mean to me that one camera might not suffice if going Panasonic. I do not think that the OM-3 will give acceptable levels of noise inside a tent at night unless with a small light; nor do I believe the S9 by itself will give acceptable levels of weather resistance (by the way, I doubt the Panasonic 14-140 does either even though it's rated weather resistant).

Therefore, I would still go for the S9 with a 18mm f/1.8 lens for dark, inside a tent scenes and the 28-200. For bad weather, I'd get an action cam. This will eliminate bad-weather low light; maybe pick up a camera cover for the S9. At MPB, that setup will set you back 2500 euros.

The other option is the "do everything" set-up with the OM-3 with the Olympus 14-150 ii and the Panasonic 9mm for about the same amount of money, but you'll be spending more on the camera (double!) for less quality output (but still great).

If you are a disciplined shooter that usually uses a tripod and manual focus, there are options that will cost way less.

That OM-3 setup is about 950g and the S9 + action cam setup is 1300g. Note: Camera size doesn't have the Panasonic 18mm list, but it's the same size as the 24mm.

Again, this is for 10-bit with great IBIS and AF being the priority. I'd go with a much cheaper setup if it were me. I wouldn't want to take that expensive of gear out into the unknown. It's a close call though. There are so many good choices. It almost makes you say "screw it" and just use whatever you have with its limitations. If you're a creative, this is usually better.

Here's one of the issues with M43:

Granted, the OM-3 is quite possibly a more functional setup with a better build, but the S9 could be all you need and will beat the OM-3 in price, low-light, and video output. Personally, I'd rather go with the S9 even though I've bad-mouthed it quite a bit. 

4 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

I'd be apt to leave that to the micro 4/3 enthusiasts like @kye and @John Matthews. 

My guess, and please do take this with a huge grain of salt, as I haven't owned a real micro 4/3 camera in years, is that the camera body suggestion will look something like a GX85 or OM-3/OM-5 II for small/light/sealed, but I don't follow m43 enough to know off the top of my head which have 10 bit.  If the Panasonic 14/2.5 or 20/1.7 are weather sealed, they could be alright.  Otherwise, the humble Panasonic 14-42mm kit lens is not bad.  The Olympus equivalent might be alright too.  You'd probably want one of the primes for low light.

10-bit and weather sealing. There's the rub.

Panasonic: GH5, GH5 ii, GH5S, G9, G9ii, GH6, GH7

Olympus: OM-1, OM-1ii, OM-3

Anything smaller, you'll need to forgo 10-bit.

For lenses, there are many options from flagship zooms (all are great, new and old) to small primes. However with the latter, there aren't necessarily that many that are weather-sealed.

Panasonic: All the new versions of the Leica-branded primes, minus the Leica 15mm f/1.7

Olympus: All the Pro versions and the new versions of the 17mm and 25mm f/1.8.

For run and gun in 2025 (AF in video), I'd choose the G9ii (lighter) or the GH7.

For lenses, I'd go with two- one all-purpose, do everything lens like the 14-150 (Olympus), 14-140 (Panasonic), or 12-100 (Olympus, heavy!). After, I'd go for the Leica 25mm prime (new version) if weather-sealing is necessary; if not, the old version of the Leica 15mm f/1.7, Olympus 17mm f/1.8 or Panasonic 25mm f/1.7.

If 10-bit isn't the issue, I'd go for the smallest camera with the best output. I'd go go a GX85 and an audio recorder, the E-M5 iii, OM5, OM5ii (all of these have decent audio and AF).

It's sad that Panasonic cannot offer us anything under 500g with 10-bit, decent audio, and decent IBIS in MFT. For that, they can only offer the S9 in FF with NO pancake lenses- a CRAZY situation that is costing them dearly every single day!

1 hour ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

You might be talking me into reinstalling Parsec and trying this out, but for different reasons.  Usually I edit on my Macbook (The lower-end M2 Max) and it's totally fine, but when I'm at home, I prefer to edit off my basement NAS instead of from external drives and I use a postgres database on a server next to it.  But if I don't plug into the network (which means sitting at my desk where the dock with 10ge is), editing video is not great (and editing photos in Lightroom ain't great either).

But I have a windows gaming PC also set up near the desk which has a pretty decent setup with a nice GPU.  I suppose I could just parsec to that while on the couch or in bed and do my editing, with the main catch being that I need to use Windows shortcut keys.  That or I wait until there's a decent deal on an M4 Mini with 10ge (there have been some solid deals, but they're always for the base model with only 1ge)

With Parsec, the key is efficient H.265 (HEVC) encoding and decoding. On my 2020 Intel MacBook Air, I’m seeing decode times around 9ms at its native resolution. On the other end, the M2 Mac Mini encodes the HEVC stream in about 8.5ms. Over Wi-Fi (on the Air), network latency hovers around 4ms. Altogether, that gives me a total latency just under 25ms—well below the 42ms frame time of 24fps video. In practice, it’s totally usable and, to my eyes, indistinguishable from working directly on an M2 MacBook Air.

Most Intel Macs from 2017 onward support QuickSync, which provides solid hardware-accelerated decoding. The real game-changer, though, is the vastly improved encoding performance on Apple Silicon, which makes setups like this feel snappy and responsive.

When using Ethernet—even at modest speeds—latency drops further (often below 1ms). Parsec can stream H.265 video with variable bitrates up to 50 Mbps, which is trivial for gigabit Ethernet. It also supports 10-bit 4:2:2 streams, though honestly, I can’t see a difference on my aging eyes—especially when using high-DPI iMac displays.

For me, Parsec solves three major problems:

1. Reviving modest hardware — especially for tasks like video editing.
2. Enabling near-instant resource sharing — with Thunderbolt providing a pseudo-network connection up to 40Gbps between Mac Minis.
3. Letting me work remotely — from the kitchen table, for instance, while the main setup runs in the basement.

When you pair Parsec with BetterDisplay, the experience is nearly identical to working on the host machine—if not better. In my case, the iMac’s high-DPI Retina display actually gives me a superior viewing experience compared to using the M2 Mac Mini with a standard external monitor. Unless you're using an Apple Studio or Cinema Display, it’s hard to beat the visual quality of 4K, 4.5K, or 5K iMacs.

Interestingly, the 2017 iMac Pro isn’t the best choice as a Parsec thin client. It lacks both QuickSync and the T2 chip, which hurts performance. If you're going this route, a standard 5K iMac (2017 or later) is a much better option.

8 minutes ago, Anaconda_ said:

I'm curious about Parsec, but it seems to be a similar price for similar feature set.

I've been using the free version only. However, I did pay for BetterDisplay ($20)- for me, it's worth it and they did a hell of job that needs to be rewarded.

10 minutes ago, Anaconda_ said:

Splashtop Remote Desktop

I'll definitely have a look at this too. Thanks for that.