Al Dolega

If this cam does replace S1R and S1H, I bet the next "surprising" camera that has been hinted at will be almost completely video-leaning, with internal NDs, maybe a more conventional video shape/layout. So then probably bulkier too, S1H size or bigger. Might be a smart strategy, if the price and performance are competitive I think there are probably a lot of people who want/need something that is small-ish like a mirrorless/hybrid, but with internal NDs. I know there are a lot of Sony shooters who want something between the FX3 and FX6, for example.

No, because neither of those give you a larger sensor, just different aspects (via cropping from the full image circle). With an oversized sensor you can do different aspects without cropping out any of the image circle. I think it was the GH2 that had a slight version of this, not as large as full APS-C but it was a few mm bigger than a typical m4/3 sensor. I wouldn't read that far into it. Panasonic has always used sensors from a few different suppliers. The S1R sensor and the newest m4/3 sensor (GH6, GH7, G9ii) are supposedly not from Sony.

I always wanted Panasonic to do an APS-C m4/3 camera, like the JVC LS300 but in photo form factor. Let us get wacky with those crop options! Squeeze every drop out of your m4/3 lenses! Similarly, they could do a "FF GX9" or "S9 deluxe", market it as an APS-C camera with bonus sensor area! It has reverse crop factor! Can your Canonykonujympuseica do that?!? Would just need some compact lenses, pancake or zoom. They could even be APS-C designs, just with an L-mount. Some APS-C zooms cover FF at certain focal lengths anyways.

Merging the S1R and S1 into a single high-ish MP body could make sense, if you assume the S5ii/X are already kinda covering that part of the market, and then there'd be room for the new camera to come in at a little more reasonable price. Maybe $3K? Might be a kind of sweet spot since Z8 A7RV R5II are all up at $4K or so.

Yes it is mostly about cost, and weight/bulk. I'm no longer shooting for money and my financial position is not nearly good enough to justify keeping ~$6-7K of kit for personal shooting, when I think I could probably be happy or at least satisfied with ~$3K worth, and put the rest into savings/retirement. A good chunk of my shooting is also in fairly risky scenarios, and I guess as I get older the idea of a ~$3-4K body with $500-1,000 of lens and rigging on it getting smashed or stolen is increasingly less appealing than risking a $1200 body with $50-500 on it. I'll definitely be happy about heading out the door with a 20lb backpack on instead of dragging a 35lb Pelican! We'll see. I've started buying the m4/3 setup, and am going to sell off the L-mount stuff I haven't really used as much first. Maybe the GAS/shiny new toy instinct will take back over, but I like to think I'll be able to continue being an adult about this 😄

I think I'm out. If Panny had brought out or at least announced an S1Hii late last year I probably would have sprung for it, but recently my willingness to drop 3-4K on a new body, and to schlep around 15lbs/$8k of FF gear has mostly dried up. Gonna sell off my S5iiX and L-mount lenses and fall back to ol' reliable m4/3. The DR and ISO performance on the G9ii look to be good enough for my needs, I'll be gaining 4K120, and I'll be able to move from a Pelican to a medium-sized backpack.

I considered it briefly, as an option for days when I want a smaller kit but still want a large-sensor cam alongside my zoomy camcorder. The lack of EVF would mean the S9 would be relegated to just fisheye shots (which is about a third of my shooting); maybe a few lower-priority "pretty" shots with a single fast prime, when I have time to wrestle with shooting from the screen (outside of fisheye I shoot mostly from the EVF). Within those constraints the S9 would have some advantages. The lack of EVF would let me rig the top handle I use for fisheye a bit closer to the optical axis, which is more stable. The weight saving sounds attractive but really I'd probably be rigging with a counterweight anyways so weight savings isn't as big of a deal. Especially when it's only about 100g as has been said. Size savings would be more attractive as I could run a smaller fisheye (Rokinon 7.5mm meant for m4/3 instead of Canon EF 8-15 + adapter), which would allow me to pack into a smaller bag. Not really enough to motivate a purchase even at current discount. My S5iiX is already paid for, not that much bigger, and has an EVF. An S9 might be more tempting in a year or two when used prices get closer to $500, but by then I'll probably be a snob about its performance compared to the S2H I would hopefully have by then. Right now I would really like Panasonic to bring the slightly-better AF and processing from the S9 to the S5ii/X.

As I understand it, Blackmagics have such a high power draw because of their processors- they use programmable FPGAs instead of ASICs, which are much more efficient. If a cell phone with an almost-identical screen can be just as bright and have hours and hours of battery life (while also doing processing, transmitting, GPS etc), I don't think a bigger screen would have a big impact on battery life for a camera.

A tilting EVF would address a lot of these concerns. Sure you can rig an external EVF but they're always huge and expensive. The built-in EVFs in mirrorless are already pretty great, and compact, they just need to articulate. I always wondered if it would work to have a 5-5.5" or even 6" screen, that is basically the size of the entire back of a mirrorless body; on a fairly typical tilt mechanism, with most of the buttons meant for your right thumb hidden under the screen. So you pull the screen away from the body (or even just tilt it up), and your thumb fits under the screen to use the controls. You could have touchscreen controls that pop up when the screen is pushed flat against the body. You could also have the screen slide an inch or two to the left, to reveal the buttons. I'd also love to see grips rotate. Like a C100/200, FS5 etc- but without the grip being huge and stood off from the body. The Canon XC10 has this done pretty well. This combined with a tilting EVF (again like the C100ii or C200, not the stupid loupe the XC10 has) makes handheld shooting so much more comfortable.

Resolve Studio licenses and panels are 20% off- $235 for Studio, $395 for the Micro Color panel (the newer littler one) and the older Micro panel is $665 (and still includes a Studio license I believe).

Has waveform too! Looks like Nikon isn't reserving the video goodies for the FF/higher-end bodies.

OTA is actually generally better quality than streaming, at when comparing HD to HD.

Mmmmmno it didn't. I'm 44 and only have vague memories of smog in Detroit from my childhood in the 80's. And that is not a few years ago. Sure, to a white, male, boomer, in America.

Agreed that it seems this will be the last round of IMX410-sensored cameras, in a year or two the rolling shutter and framerate performance will just be so far behind the competition that it seems it wouldn't be worth it. Maybe on some super-budget model. BMCC6K and Pyxis have an OLPF don't they? That was the only tempting aspect of those cams for me. When the S5ii/X was teased I hoped that they would have figured out a way to get a FF 60fps, >1080p mode out of the IMX410. We know it can't do 4K/UHD at 60p but I think a 2.5K or 2.8K or 3K mode would have made the camera much more competitive, even if it had to use some binning and wasn't absolutely pristine quality. I wouldn't expect any of the other Japanese companies to consider this as it would be a "weird" resolution, but Panasonic already does open gate, 5.8K, 6K, etc so I don't think they'd have any of those reservations. Hopefully they did try and it's just a hardware restriction.

I really hope so. I think it would be a big mistake to not port everything from the S9 to the S5ii/X as soon as possible.

If L-mount's flange distance had been made just .75mm shorter, it would be the same as m4/3. Then they could have avoided the whole which-system-for-a-compact-camera debate, and the S9 could have just come with an adapter for m4/3 lenses. But then we'd have nothing to complain about!

That's true, I have definitely noticed the different processing in my S5iiX. But model/lineup-wise, the S5iiX is the intermediate model you mentioned. I just hope the new camera isn't super expensive, or if it is, they do an S1 successor that meets my wants and is $2500-ish.

That's exactly what the S5iiX is. The formats/capabilities from the S1H, same sensor, plus PDAF. Different body style of course but the large body style of the S1H was not super popular so it made sense to stay with the S5 body. Personally I love the S1/S1R/S1H bodies' handling, I understand they are a bit unwieldy for those with smaller hands though. I think a midpoint between them and the S5 would be perfect for the new high-end cameras, plus if they could make the combo tilt/flip screen mechanism a bit lower-profile like it is on the Sonys.

Yes that could definitely be an issue. Sony isn't the only option, for instance the 47MP S1R sensor was from someone else I believe; but it seems Sony is the most realistic choice. Their pricing is probably better than other suppliers because they do so much volume, but if they aren't allowing the existing 24MP Z6iii sensor or whatever will be in the A7v to be sold to anyone else yet, and the old rusty-trusty IMX410 is the only other thing they have available, Panasonic might be in a very tough spot. I dunno, when you narrow the scope a bit to lenses that mortals need and can afford (no superteles, no exotic zooms, no super-high-end primes, etc), the RF mount has a fairly limited selection too, and that doesn't seem to hurt Canon much. I think it's mostly name recognition (as a camera brand, not for toasters) and familiarity that hurts Panasonic. We spend a lot of money on this stuff and for many people that makes them less logical and more conservative in their evaluation of the non-big-3 brands.

The S5 must have continued to sell well enough past the S5ii/X release that they want to keep it in the lineup, I imagine the new model name has more to do with part availability. If it's only an EVF upgrade, the original EVF panel is probably out of production now, remember the S5 came out 4 years ago, who knows how old that EVF already was at that point. You can't just make the new EVF a running change to the S5 model, you'd have people bothering dealers to check serial numbers to figure out which stock has the new EVF, and there are certainly code differences for running the new panel so you need a separate firmware. So you're stuck with making the update technically a different model number and SKU just to keep things straight. Sony did the same thing with the A7RIIIa, it was an older model at the time and just had an updated LCD screen, I don't recall anyone getting as upset over that as they seem over the S5D. Which is of course just due to frustration with the wait for the S1Hii. Firmware update is probably just the app/LUT stuff from the S9 for the S5ii/X. Hopefully more, maybe more AF tweaks. The pancake zoom should have been out at the same time as the S9, not sure how Panny got that whole release so wrong.

The rumor lists all of those modes as FF, though, not a crop.

I wonder what "dot-to-dot" in that Weibu rumor means. Pixel binned? Lineskipped? It can't be pixel-to-pixel, the math is way off for a 61mp sensor.

Looking forward to USB-C becoming the standard for connecting monitors/EVFs etc.

Res can stay right at 24MP IMO, it is the perfect goldilocks resolution. The Z6III has sub-10ms rolling shutter, if Panasonic can do similar without sacrificing DR or getting the weird flashing shadow effect I think it would be a big seller.

They are definitely the juggernaut in the room, at least the L-mount room. When DJI does something it seems to usually be leagues past competitors, in the tech itself and the execution and usability; or at least they get to that point very quickly, within a product generation or two. Maybe that hamstrings them though? Many of their products have no real competitors, perhaps they would shy away from making a "normal" camera and having to compete directly. I had forgotten about their buying Hasselblad, not sure how much that would really add to an L-mount product but it's good marketing at least. Having Hasselblad and Leica in L-mount would certainly up the prestige factor. Although I wonder if Leica would object to Hasselblad joining? As they are more of a rival to Leica in the rich-boy/dentist cam space.