Dave Maze

My experience with Panasonic USA hasn't been the same as his experience. I have been told explicitly that they want our honest feedback and opinions and they have never had any say or sway in the content. The only "fear" certain creators have is not getting invited to the next event, which is all in their mind. If you make a positive or negative video... just simply honest, I don't think that will ruin your chance at "going to the next event". IDK. I'm moving on from this. Taking a step away from the industry in general. Already have almost both my feet out the door.

Yeah I love this. Nailed it

Hopefully we remained as true as can be here. We tried to share our honest thoughts. Neither one of us would buy this camera with our own money at the moment either. It's too expensive for a fun camera for us. But for some people it may be worth it

Of course! I'm stoked this conversation is happening. We need to all be aware of how it all works and the creators should always be upfront and honest about their involvement with whatever company they are talking about. Which is why I have been patient on making my personal video and we just posted a podcast sharing our thoughts. I don't think YouTubers should race to get a video out and not be thoughtful about their content. A first look video is fine and I certainly played that game for years, but now I feel finding an interesting angle or an interesting idea about a camera or piece of tech is way more creative and ultimately more authentic. But if a creator can truly be honest about the trips, free loaner gear etc... and is still able to be objective somehow... is that good? Is there a way you can watch a video about a camera that was given to someone as a loaner and take away any value at all? If not, then some creators should consider taking one for the team and denying the free trips and free loaners. A hard ask when the day to day life of a YouTuber is extremely grinding, late nights, ups and downs financially, and then a company says "hey you wanna go on a trip with all your friends for free?"

great questions! let me ask you this hypothetical, if you got an email that said "we'd like to fly you out to Japan all expenses paid and let you play with a new unreleased camera with a bunch of your friends for a week" would you accept? i even told LUMIX i am not in the niche like i used to be when i did Kinotika and Indy Mogul and they still wanted me there! As for making money off views, I actually made a video that got more views than most the other people who were at the S5 II release last year. I made $100. I didn't make the video to even make money. I made it for fun. Because I thought it was an interesting story to tell about Panasonic finally adding phase detect to their cameras.

i love being a youtuber. which is why i left Indy Mogul. i have no desire to make movies. i love YouTube and have a passion for cameras and tech

I went to Japan and have the loaner S9 from Panasonic. I told them I am not in the camera review space like I used to be, and they still were kind enough to invite me. I plan on making a few videos with it, but haven't posted anything since the embargo because I am so unsure what to say. It seems everyone has already made a "First Look" video and many others have tried to apologize for accepting the free trip and camera. I don't feel bad for accepting the trip as I'm sure anyone else here would do also. I think all the conversation around this is generally healthy for our industry and why I personally took a step back from it all over the last two years after quitting Indy Mogul. Feel free to ask me anything you want. I promise to be honest.

Thanks man! Appreciate it!

my vid is up! outside of the review aspect, i would love your feedback on my edit/ tone of this video.

I must say... I do really love this camera. Disclaimer being Panasonic is loaning me the camera and lenses and paid for an entire Tokyo trip. I'm trying to be as objective as possible, but the AF performance has been surprisingly good. I love the IBIS and the color science is great. It doesn't feel as premium as my OM-1 or even an R5... but this isn't in that price bracket. The fact that this camera is this good, all while being under $2k is actually a big deal. Makes me excited for an S2H... or other flagships. I still love micro 4/3 and think the 10-25 panny/leica is one of the best lenses ever. I can't wait for a GH version of this camera with phase detect!

Ok great question. I'll check on that. I'm on the current firmware!

Hey guys! Still finishing up my full review. Do you guys have any questions about it?

Interesting... Ya i have sold every hybrid camera recently and am rocking just the OM-1 for photos and C70 for video. Pretty happy with the setup... but it hurts my brain sometimes having two completely different setups. I just don't like any of the canon hybrid cameras right now and the lenses are freakin huge. Been pretty pleased overall with the image quality coming off of the OM1 taking pictures of my kids and stuff. Autofocus finally works a treat. Color science is good too... it's the low light that kills me though. Even when shooting with decent light and good exposures, you can't really go past ISO 400 or you're going to get noise. The new sensor on the OM-1 is nice though. Pleased with the dynamic range and the new EVF alone is worth the upgrade. Been having some really weird flickering in the EVF though with certain lighting. Never seen that much flicker before with any other camera. Just depends on the lighting but it's annoying for sure.

I owned the R7 for about two months and used it with my C70. Was a nice b roll camera but on a gimbal in the 7k to 4k downres the rolling shutter was too much for me. Looked like jello everywhere. Also, the footage didn't have that wow factor I've gotten used to with the C70. It was a joy to use, but not worth keeping in my opinion. Honestly, I am hoping for a proper C200 upgrade with the DGO sensor in it... prefer that more traditional Canon cine body and miss not having an EVF. May just shoot all my YouTube videos on C70's from now on though. They do look truly great when exposed properly in Clog 2

@Andrew Reid did you return your OM-1? Just keeping the EM1X?