Micro four thirds - hype or hip?

[beneos]

Reading a bit on the origin of MFT and found this quote from the people who invented the format.

"The Micro Four Thirds System is a new standard based on combining Live View shooting with the Four Thirds System, freeing users from the viewfinder and moving closer to an optimum [b][u]balance between picture quality and compact size[/u][/b]."
[url="http://www.four-thirds.org/en/microft/index.html"]http://www.four-thirds.org/en/microft/index.html[/url]

And I wish they'd rethink the viewfinder.

[kirk]

You should really spend a day shooting with a Canon/Niko and a GH2... perhaps rent or borrow one of each? A good prime on both... Then compare the feel, and not least the footage. Would make your final choice much easier!

Concerning the small size and weight of MFT, I think low weight is a great bonus (even though my most used lens is heavy as hell). I vividly remember the pain of a couple of Nikon F2's with motor drive and a brace of lenses on your shoulder... When I was out shooting sunday I had a small photo backpack with two GH2's, a GF2 and a gang of lenses slung on one shoulder, my Cartoni with slider on the other, and still could move in the terrain with ease (and I'm an old fart ;o) And the resulting footage was spectacular :P

[Xiong]

Well it seems like you've kinda made up your mind already. If you want stills, then go the DSLR route, but for video? GH2 seems to hold up better with resolution wise. Color, canon seems to be good in that department. As for shallow depth of feel, you wont beat a full frame. The GH2's build quality is not great, you wouldnt want to shoot in harsh weather unlike say a 7D. Looks like you might want canon.

I like detail, very fine detail. With no visible moire. I like resolution, to capture the fine details in scenery or from a person's clothes. The GH2 is more for me. I can get past the build quality and the color rendition.

Either wait for the GH3 or get a canon, since you seems to have an issue with build quality.

At the end of the day its up to you and your vision.

[sanveer]

Well, lets just say, that the MFT is at a strange stage, in its life. It is Definitely an improvement on the whole SLR bit, where the vibration and noise, downscaling of image for video and not to mention the movement of the mirror, poses some serious limitations. At the same time, due to many reasons (including floods, the economic slump, competition with higher segment cameras manufactured by Sony and Panasonic, the multi-million dollar scam(s) @ Olympus, no agreement between standards in the MFT and FT manufacturers i.e. Olympus and Panasonic etc), the MFT movement, has been slowed down, strangely, and inconsistently.
Having said that, the MFT/ mirrorless camera, is the future of camera technology, especially, considering, that, it can overcome many restrictions (including shutter speed, noise, vibrations, etc etc). The fact is, obviously, that these haven't been explored too much by the Mirrorless camera manufacturers. Also, sensor technology and codec, has to really develop, and right now, the whole bayer pattern codec thing, has to improve. It is a 70s thing, and it has a lot of scope, for improvement (like the 4 colours that Kodak and Sony, recently, introduced in its Viewfinders, to make them brighter). Also,sensor technology really has to improve too, and Sony and Panasonic, and on the right path, especially, with the back-illuminated sensors (Sony has started making many versions of these). Panasonic, right now is struggling to position technology, both hardware and software, between the consumer, pro-sumer and very-highend consumer levels. Once it decides on that, and once it and Sony decide on the perfect codec, the mirrorless movement will gain full throttle.
The GH2 and other MFT cameras feel plastiky, because they are meant to (they weren't meant to be weather sealed). That is something Panasonic is, rumoured to have worked on, for the GH3. Photokina, should, hopefully, put a lot of things, to rest.

[Chriss]

I definitely think that MFT is here to stay. And i consider that to be a good thing. The facts speak for themselves- the format can bring high- end technology to a consumer level (imagine if Kubrick could have shot movies at iso 1600, F0.95, with a budget of 2000$). And yes it is currently expensive, but at the core it is rather overpriced than inherently expensive, and in free-market economy, that is bound to change.
While we're on the subject- it also kind of pisses me off that every manufacturer needs to have a new mount for every new camera system they release, but cameras come and go, but the glass stays and every lens made has a character, and MFT is the only way all of these lenses will still be usable when, inevitably, some of the current mounts go obsolete. Plus, with circuit manufacturing costs constantly lowering, with the next batch of dslrs, in 3 years, the crop sensor dslrs could as well be abolished completely, as it wouldn't make sense to put all this expensive technology around a cheap piece of silicon. So it would make sense that the sensor sizes would converge to MFT and FF (probably also E-mount and mirrorless aps-c s).