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I'm not very techy, but I guess that is what they mean/are working on? Or at least exploring... Indeed who says PDAF has to be the epitomy of AF. Like with so many new things, new tech comes along... I don't care what it is, as long as it works...

Sony has their Sony Catalyst Production Suite, and with their gyro sensors as well then they can get very good stabilization indeed. And Sony's color science in their latest generation cinema cameras are a massive leaps and bounds ahead of what their early generation a7S cameras were like.

Why not both Lidar and DFD? A simple Lidar system built into the camera to get general ballpark focus then DFD to subtly fine tune it. As DFD is worst when it does those drastic big leaps backwards and forwards, if Lidar could eliminate that then it is a big improvement.

How often do you need your backup files? If rarely ever, then I'd say keep your originals for a month after delivery, then once that date has elapsed have a batch script you run to convert the originals to teeny 1080 h265 8bit files to then store forever ("just in case" in an emergency) and delete the originals.

I think the cable does matter. I have had no issues with my T5 setup, which I used on the last feature I did. I just did a little vacation and used the Dark Power option as it is just more compact. Internal recording was part of the reason I went with the FP, but using a cable kind of kills that. I do have the cable clamped on both ends when I use it. The drive I have in the Dark Power setup is an NVMe PM991a 512gb ssd. No issues so far with it in 4k 12bit. I might get more drives for it if I hold onto it long enough.

Oh and from what I have read...and it's all a bit sketchy TBH, but it 'sounds like' Panasonic are looking at both Lidar and PDAF and possibly have not quite made up their minds as to which. But that would be concerning over any new S series in the Spring as they would have had to have made that decision a loooong time back such is the development of these things. At least as I understand them. I would suspect...and it's purely a best guess/instinct, they not already know, but have as above, long since made whatever the decision is and maybe we'll get some leaks sooner rather than later. My money is on them bringing something out in the Spring and I suspect it will be some kind of amalgamation of the S5 and S1 in terms of size and hopefully in 3 different flavours; S2, S2R and S2H. At least that's what I'd like to see... If they did do that and the spec was to my preferred requirements in my previous post, it would then simply be a case of trade in my current bodies as soon as, or see out the next season and then do it over the Winter break. The prices of 'old' units will probably drop quite a bit I imagine but if I'm mid season, until I have any new kit, I can't offload any old. We'll see but I do think it would be pure suicide to launch anything now that does not have up to scratch AF.

Yes, I would very much like to know 'if' closely followed by 'when?'. Surely they could not realistically release another camera without some form of 'on par' AF? I think they'd bomb 100% if they did not. And other than perhaps a size & weight concern for some, it's not just their weakness, but their Achilles Heel. For some dedicated hardcore filmmaking purists, maybe not, but to the other 99% of the market, decent AF is a must. I've wrestled with it for the last 2 years now. OK, it's ONLY been an issue for less than 5% of my work where I need decent forward or backward tracking and there IS a workaround (it's called f8), but it's not ideal and I came sooooooo close to flipping to another brand to counter this. That 5% need may be small, but it's a very important 5%. But ultimately I decided against switching at this point in time and will go at least all of 2023 before making any changes for the simple reason that the cost to change is not worth it for the workaround. Basically, it's a ballpark figure of 10k to make the move and it would be Sony because despite having zero desire to go with them, currently the package I'd be looking at with them works better than the package with anyone else. But as above, I am sticking with L Mount for at least 2023. In the process of having 2 bodies repaired from '22 battle damage, dumped a whole load of lenses (still have an EF Meike 50mm T2.1 cine if anyone is interested?!) and purchasing a few faster f1.4 primes and one new zoom. All Pannyboy need to do to NOT cock it up for me with their next FF camera is: A. Reliable AF at least close to if not better than current Canon/Sony. B. Ideally, S5 size, but with the S1H style screen. C. Ideally no crop 6k 50p / 4k 100p, 10 bit, internal. Job done. I'll buy 3.

And the cp2s look ugly on mft bidies compared to the elegant meikes or veydras. @PPNS Btw, how is your short doing, which you did with your bmpcc4k meike combo?

probably some of the nicest lenses to use for video on mft. what might also be interesting is that i had the chance to compare them to Zeiss CP2s. while i dont want to take away the advantages of the zeiss (PL/swappable mount, the majority of the set covers FF, some lenses are faster), they really dont look better than the meikes. the general look is very similar, but the zeiss set has more unpleasant aberrations wide open when pointed towards a light source. the focus breathing is way more apparent on the CP2s as well (cropped to mft, on FF theyre almost unusable due to the breathing imo). pretty crazy for a set thats easily about 1/10th the price.

Online stores have essentially become like auctions. Computer sees what all customers and competing online stores are doing in real time and adjusts it's price according to fancy algorithms trying to maximize profits. Most shops have the decency to only adjust prices during the night but Amazon and decency... In physical stores they are gradually switching over to digital price tags. It is only a matter of time until these start to adjust automatically as well during the day if local laws will allow for it. If only it was legal to set the price based on user profile data...

It seems like Panasonic does a couple of fantastic deals per year. This time, Panasonic France got that deal, but you had to see it at the right time and not everyone participated. In France, FNAC and Darty (for some reason) have the best deals on Panasonic cameras in general. I picked up the GH6 for the 1579 euros deal (-400 euro, 3-year warranty, and an extra 1tb SanDisk SSD). This deal clearly (although no communicated) had a quota. I got lucky as it's sitting here in front of me and I've put in for the promotional deal, but it could take awhile (I let the community know when it comes through). The moral of the story is that you have to move fast on ANY Black Friday day/week/month/year deal. No, I seriously doubt it's sign that the GH6 is a huge failure or that Panasonic is getting out of M43, or Panasonic is failing completely as a company... just a company that needs more buzz in a crowded market where the A7S3, OM-1, XH2/s are competing hard with the GH6 for various reasons. Panasonic could have been pressured by distributors in this case due to too many cameras on shelves, a more likely scenario. On a side note, I think I might have to reevaluate my workflow. I can no longer keep original files forever as if I choose the best quality in prores 422HQ at a rediculous 5.7/5.8k, I think I'll have enough space for a week. Instead, I think I'll need a more streamlined approach, correcting footage on the fly to make make reasonably-sized 150Mbps files that would still be good for making final small edits. I'm almost considering to just shoot 1080p on the camera as it looks so good and no one I know will probably see a difference anyway. Any Suggestions?