Ninpo33

Awesome. I think I will have fun with the Mamiya 645 set and the Kipon 0.8x adapter. I’ve been shopping for the 80mm f/1.9 because my copy is a little hazzy. Kind of a built in cinebloom filter though… lol These vintage MF lenses were cheap the last couple of years but now the rehousing companies have gotten ahold of them. Very versatile though being able to speedboost to full frame and GFX though. The Arsat 30mm fisheye should be interesting, I have yet to try it. I found one with a rare Mamiya mount so it fits right into the speedbooster.

Not sure I follow? The regular modes are all 4k FF and it even does 4k 60p with no crop which was rare at the time. Why are you highlighting one of the super 35 crops?

You recommend the Fringer adapter for EF lenses? I only have the 24mm 1.4 mk1 for now but would like to get the 50mm and 85mm 1.2 to add to my Minolta A mount set.

Yeah I've lusted after the 100 since day one. I just saw one sell for below $2k. The 100s is in my budget and size and for travel I could really use the savings in weight and extra space in the bag. Ideally I would save up for the 100ii and at around $5,000 I could make that work. For now a 100s for $2,000 would be a nice intro into the system and allow me to start playing with all this vintage glass. Yeah, maybe not the same build quality as the original with better design and EVF. I'll keep an eye out for a deal. Bidding on an S1R for below $1,000 at the moment, Talking to a local chap for an SL2 at $2,000 and keeping an eye out for a steal on a GFX 100/s. Fun Times...!!! At least one of these high MP monsters will be under the tree soon.

Thanks. I’m leaning that way. If only they would give us a nice little firmware update on the 100s to add some crop modes like the 100 II or anamorphic support… $2k is crazy for that 100mp sensor though and I can live with just leaving it on 24p 10bit 4KDCI all the time. I’ve already been building a collection of medium format lenses for a few years knowing things would eventually go this way Mamiya 645 and Russian glass mostly. So nice to be able to adapt for full frame while waiting on the GFX prices to come down. And with the Kipon focal reducers it’s really opened things up. Looking forward to playing with the Fringer adapter. If only they would make one for my Minolta A mount stuff… the Sony AF adapter is loud and slow and only works in stills mode. If I pick up a cheap X-H2s for the high frame rate stuff and then a little X-M5 for pocket 6.2k open gate I will be sorted for a while. Very impressive video I found from this guy testing the X-M5 on holiday alongside the X-H2s.

Yeah Sony is weird. They could learn from LUMIX and Fuji and give people more but they can’t seem to be bothered. I guess when you’re at the top you can throw down some scraps here and there and the people will gobble them up and sing your praises. Anamorphic crop modes, X-Pan crop, shutter angle, LUT previews… these were all things LUMIX gave as extras but trying to get Sony to update or add basic features has always been like pulling teeth. That fast, sticky autofocus, ease of use and clean UHD image is still winning the hearts and minds.

Thank you for taking the time to show these examples, much appreciated. I’m always curious about the APS-C modes on all these cameras and wondering if anyone even uses them much. Some of them look quite nice.

Have you played with any of the video on the A7R5? I would love to know how the 6.2k subsampled footage looks compared to the regular FF 4k. I’m torn between a couple options right now for my high res photo hybrid camera. I need good video but would love to jump up to the 61mp sensor. Might have to stick with the SL2 or S1R for now if I don’t end up going GFX 100s. A7CR is probably also an option staying around $2k

While waiting for new Lumix stuff I’ve decided to enjoy how cheap 2020 technology is getting… My $535 original S5 arrived from The Yahoo Japan Auction this week and I’m finally getting to put my Minolta AF set of lenses to good use with a new adapter. These lenses are still under most people’s radar because of the autofocus but they are a steal for the optics. The end days of Minolta and A mount so right before Sony bought them and used a lot of their lens designs on the first Alpha bodies. The set of 20 f/2.8, 28 f/2, 35 f/1.4, 50 f/1.4, 85 f/1.4 and 100 f/2 rival the Canon FD’s for a fraction of the cost. The 35mm actually gets sold up to $1,500 these days because the rehoused FD’s had no 1.4 option. You can find it for under $500 if you are patient however. so $535 for the camera and $250 for a Ninja V and I’ve got 5.89k ProRes raw, 3.5k Anamorphic and the original S5 processor and nice organic sensor unlike the newer S5ii Not bad… Now to find an S1R for under $1k that’s not a scam…

News of the new Leica SL3-S on the horizon but still no news from Panasonic about the sister cameras the S1R2 and S1H2. And worse, lots of poor reviews about the new SL3 from Leica users. For a $7k camera I’m surprised to read about the poor build quality and its shortcomings. Was 2020 peak year for 4k cameras? Maybe a good time to pick up the SL2 and S1R before prices go back up? Have Leica and LUMIX changed their partnership/relationship? It would be a real bummer to wait all this time for lackluster specs. I find it hard to believe Leica would put out the worse camera so it makes me fearful the S1R2 (if it comes out) is going to be a dud. With Fujifilm GFX 100s hitting $2k right now I think I may have to abandon my plan to stay L mount. I have a trip to Tokyo in January so I have to make some decisions for the high mp focused stills/video body. GFX 100s or Sony A7CR looks like the possible options for me now. Bidding on a cheap S1R this week so that may still hold me over for a little longer but I’m getting restless. I know I’m not the only one. I hope I’m wrong but the review below of the SL3 from Reddit is a downer for our Leica/Lumix future. From User: syrcular I had an SL3 for about 3 months and recently sold it. The camera was fantastic in a lot of ways, but also fell short in many others. The image quality and colors out of this camera are absolutely stunning! There's very little editing to be done, if you nail exposure. The colors are gorgeous and the high resolution renders images beautifully! Additionally it matches really well with the M11 and Q3, when it comes to sharing the same resolution, so one of the main purposes for me of getting this camera was to have it complete my already 60mp sensor cameras; the Q3 and the M11-P. But in order for me to justify spending the money, that meant I had to let go of my professional Sony body. So I managed to convince myself to let the Sony kit go and go all in Leica SL! In the beginning I was very excited about the migration, but I also ignored red flags that didn't fit me or my style, partly because I had leaped frogged to the new system and didn't want to look back! But the honey moon phase started fading away by the end of month 2 and into month three. It is true, the build quality doesn't quite feel the same as the SL2 or SL2-S. I believe this is because they wanted to reduce the overall weight of the camera, so it makes sense, but it definitely felt different and in some ways cheaper. The shutter slap on this camera, felt like an old medium format Pentax film camera. It's loud and proud. As a street and documentary photographer intending on using this to capture candida moments and activity behind the scenes, the shutter noise was way too loud for my taste, and often distracted or alerted people I was shooting the camera. For alot of people that's not a big deal, but for me, trying to be unoticed, it was a problem. Most note-ably because the shutter sound was completely different than the SL2 or SL2-S, which was quieter and more discreet in my opinion. Knowing that this camera was going to be slow, I think I underestimated how slow this camera was going to be. The justification from Leica is that the camera his high resolution therefore it had to comprimise in areas like burst speed, flash sync and IBIS. But when you compare cameras like the Sony A7rV, which can handle 10fps Compressed and 7 frames Uncompressed burts rates, you wonder why Leica could not achieve the same. The fact that the camera could only do 5fps in Continuous AF, and that any burst above that were only in AF-S mode seemed like a step back from most cameras, and especially high res cameras of today, like the Sony A7rV, Canon R5 and the Nikon Z8. The combination of the slow burst rate and loud clunky shutter mechanism, definitely made the camera feel a little big cheaper. Which is not what you want to feel when you just spent $7000 The SL system has historically had an amazing EVF. And this was no different at first look with the SL3. However, when you shoot with continuous AF, the EVF brings down the resolution and the quality of the EVF takes a hit, the moment you half press the shutter to begin continuous autofocus. This is common in other camera brands, like Sony, but I hadn't seen it this bad. The Q3 has a similar issue as well. The quality bumps down so bad, that you really have to rely on the camera catching focus, because it's impossible to see outright. If you should in AF-S, this is not as prevelant, however, if you magnify the EVF quality does take a hit again, which is something I never noticed with my SL2-S. This constant quality change in the EVF affected my enjoyment of the camera and although I tolerated it at times, it started really bugging me. I would occasionally experience the camera freezing up, which made you question the overall reliability of the camera system. I could quickly fix this by popping the battery in and out, but it happened a few times, and definitely made me feel uneasy. Battery life was not good on this camera at all. I did end up having to buy a bunch of the updated SL batteries, which were expensive but necessary for my work. But I typically had to take about 3-4 batteries with me. That's at $200 a battery. So after really thinking about it, I decided, to sell the camera. My main issue was that for the price of $7000, the camera shouldn't be running into the issues described above or exhibit some of these short comings, when I could use the equivelant money, and have a camera and a few lenses performing reliably and with significant speed, whether I need it or not. With my M, I expect to slow down and shoot differently but that's because the experience is vastly different. But with the SL, you would expect it to come close to the performance of modern cameras, and it couldn't quite keep up with my pace, even when I tried. This camera is perfect as a studio portrait camera, and married with M or SL glass, it's an amazing imaging machine for professional work, but I realized I needed more versatility and the SL3 doesn't quite give you that. I could get into my gripes with the L Mount Alliance lenses, but thats for another discussion

https://leicarumors.com/2024/10/03/new-leica-sl3-s-camera-rumored-to-be-announced-in-a-few-months.aspx/amp/ New SL3-S rumored. This better not be a rebadged S5ii. Really strange that we haven’t heard about any of the Lumix equivalents.

The extra features on the S5iiX are awesome. Recording to SSD is a breeze and ProRes without needing an external recorder is really nice. Not everyone needs that so it’s nice that it’s a slight upgrade for a nominal fee. I wouldn’t call it nickel and diming though. If anything it probably just covers the licensing fees LOL.

I’m torn as well between both of these as a little third camera for travel, street and interviews. Found a black X-M5 on a Japanese open box model for $800 with a 10% off coupon last week but decided to wait a bit. X-M5 Rigged up with a Ninja V that 6.2k open gate prores raw would be great for music videos and short films. Once rigged up the IBIS would be less of an issue. S9 does have the better IBIS and AF but no external raw if that matters to you. 422 10 bit might be enough for you. Also few to no speedboosters for Panasonic L mount but most just deal with the 1.5x crop on 60p. There’s a couple options for the Fuji X mount for speedboosters so that could be fun.

The S9 was marketed as a “creator camera” big difference. That’s going to be 80% short video clips and photos for social media. If you understand the S9 in that regard it makes perfect sense. Gen Z are the target audience stepping up from a mobile device like an iPhone. Mobile devices don’t have mechanical shutters, sync flash, hot shoes etc… The f8 lens was wide and sharp like a mobile phone camera and everything is in focus, perfect for your video reels and vlogging. LUMIX obviously blew the marketing and the release and maybe misunderstood the desire for so many of us waiting for a new GX85 or new powerful rangefinder. However if you look at the S9 advertising you can see it wasn’t made for us filmmakers or pro photographers. In true Panasonic fashion, they gave us almost everything anyway and that confuses us. We see the things it’s missing as opposed to the generous offering it is. I just found one for $930 on eBay so the market is adjusting and at sub $1k it’s a steal.

Absolutely. Agree 100%. I guess they’ve made a choice to be the “Porsche” of the camera world and appeal to the high end market only. Leica has the heritage, history and craftsmanship but so much has changed in the camera space over the years. What I would have liked to have seen over the years with the Panasonic partnership is for the Leica models to have really been the best of everything on offer. LUMIX could have been the workhorse models with a decent flagship but the SL series should have had all the best features with the kinks worked out. The SL2-S should have been the S1H but with even more if possible. 4k 60p uncropped or whatever could have given it a slight edge at the time. As it is, the SL2 has a lot of issues which @Andrew Reidhas tirelessly researched and pointed out and the SL2-S can’t even output the raw signal without a Super 35 crop. So it’s actually gimped compared to the S1H but Leica fanbois still picked it over the S1H. The S1R was like the red headed stepchild everyone forgot about up in the attic but hopefully will find some new life now that prices have reached bargain basement levels.