An adventure into the Panasonic GX85/80 begins - and a look at the Leica Nocticron for Micro Four Thirds

[Andrew Reid]

3 hours ago, TSV said:

According to the manual you only have 5axis if you use the Electronic IS. 5-Axis Hybrid.

It work at least like this one mine. Also this mode crop further the image (did not see sharpness loss)

The manual is a bit badly worded.

The in-body stabilisation is 5 axis.

You can also choose to use the hybrid electronic stabilisation in video mode. That's 5 axis too. You should not bother.

The Dual IS is 5 axis - 3 axis on the sensor and 2 axis on the lens.

Either way no matter what mode you're in... one will get full 5 axis stabilisation on the GX85, just like you do on an Olympus body.

[Brian Williams]

6 hours ago, viranikenya said:

No mention of dynamic range, a key selling point. Was Andrew being tied down not to mention that? 

He said he would do a follow up to cover image quality. The IQ is easily as good as the GH4.

[TSV]

56 minutes ago, Andrew Reid said:

The manual is a bit badly worded.

The in-body stabilisation is 5 axis.

You can also choose to use the hybrid electronic stabilisation in video mode. That's 5 axis too. You should not bother.

The Dual IS is 5 axis - 3 axis on the sensor and 2 axis on the lens.

Either way no matter what mode you're in... one will get full 5 axis stabilisation on the GX85, just like you do on an Olympus body.

Thanks!

[Michal Gajdoš]

10 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

Interesting about the A5100, never realised it could do a phase-detect AF focus pull off the touch screen. I thought the A6000 was the first Sony sensor to get onboard phase-detect AF, and even then it didn't work very well in video mode.

It uses the same 24mpgx sensor. even the predecessor Nex 5r (i have one) and  5t hasdphase detect focus pull of the touch screen. 

[Brellivids]

Here's me wondering does the Panasonic 35-100mm 2.8 work better now with GX80 than it does for video with GH4 (i have read about the stabilization problems).

[TSV]

3 hours ago, Brellivids said:

Here's me wondering does the Panasonic 35-100mm 2.8 work better now with GX80 than it does for video with GH4 (i have read about the stabilization problems).

Been using mine with the 35-100 since the 18 and no problens with IS. What did you read?

[Miklos Nemeth]

14 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

Interesting about the A5100, never realised it could do a phase-detect AF focus pull off the touch screen. I thought the A6000 was the first Sony sensor to get onboard phase-detect AF, and even then it didn't work very well in video mode.

The A5100 is absolutely not a mainstream camera; but, its touch-to-pull-focus implementation is brilliant; very smooth and accurate. Since the A5100 is the only touch-operable Sony camera (excluding dedicated video cameras (AX100, AX53, FS5,X70), of course), this feature is not available in any other Sony cameras. Whatever great Panasonic cameras are I had two major issues with all of them:

1. The terribly annoying shimmering when refocusing (the same thing you observed and mentioned in your article); totally unusable in every Panasonic cameras I have experimenting with (GX8, GH4, GH3, GX7).
2. No touch-to-magnify while/during recording. That is, when you start recording, magnification is disabled on Panasonic cameras. I think for manual focusing during video recording it is terribly important to punch-in to confirm focus accuracy. I simply don't understand why this important function is simply ignored by Panasonic/Olympus. On the other hand Sony, Canon, Samsung has very nice implementations in their cameras.

Can you, Andrew, confirm that magnification/punch-in is available during recording in GX80/85?

[sgreszcz]

12 hours ago, Márcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

I know that the EU version have the (stupid) 30 mins record limitation, but it is PAL locked (25/50 fps) or it could be switched to NTSC (24 / 30 / 60 fps)?

I will be in Barcelona next month and would like to get one, but if the region is locked, no game. :/

My UK camera has 4k/25p, 4k/24p, 1080p/50p, 1080p/25p.

I thought that this would bother me, but when I shoot video in Canada (NTSC), I just use 4k/24p like probably most people do there anyway (rather than 4k/30p).

6 hours ago, Brellivids said:

Here's me wondering does the Panasonic 35-100mm 2.8 work better now with GX80 than it does for video with GH4 (i have read about the stabilization problems).

It does (finally!)  Check out my test here.  

I still think that the E-M5II has a bit of a stabilisation edge with that lens, but the jitter is gone.  

You can see some of my hand-held testing with the Olympus 9-18, Panasonic 35-100/2.8 and 12-35/2.8 here.  The 35-100 was used for the duck pond up until the pier shots which is where I used the P12-35/2.8 (which is also solid).

https://vimeo.com/167339810

3 hours ago, TSV said:

Been using mine with the 35-100 since the 18 and no problens with IS. What did you read?

Mine was super-jittery when using OIS on a Panasonic body, but solid on my Olympus bodies with IBIS.  Here is an old test with my GX7 and you can see how it was bad on my G7 still (but fixed on the GX80) in my other video above.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1sNjEfD3GE

[7 Lakes]

Dear Andrew Reid, it is very interesting, how would Panasonic's GX80 footage compare to let's say Nikon's D5300 Flat footage and grading possibilities? Thank you.

[wolf33d]

Thank you. Great article.

"No, it isn’t a full frame lens. No, that doesn’t matter, because it has the same look as the Noctilux and when it doesn’t, it’s your fault"

Well it is a big statement and I don't see how a f2.4 aperture equivalent can look the same as a FF f1.2 in term of bokeh and subject isolation. That would deserve a comparison. 

The GX80 looks great but it is a non buy for me. We will have in 3 months the exact same camera the GH5 with better ergonomics, 4k60p, same stab, FHD120p, log... So why bother spending 500? It's not like the GH5 will cost 6000$ anyway  I am currently waiting with a D5500. 

For people with very low budget however it's a very nice option. 

Hopefully we get a decent video AF in the GH5 otherwise it will again be a non complete product..

[Andrew Reid]

4 hours ago, Miklos Nemeth said:

The A5100 is absolutely not a mainstream camera; but, its touch-to-pull-focus implementation is brilliant; very smooth and accurate. Since the A5100 is the only touch-operable Sony camera (excluding dedicated video cameras (AX100, AX53, FS5,X70), of course), this feature is not available in any other Sony cameras. Whatever great Panasonic cameras are I had two major issues with all of them:

1. The terribly annoying shimmering when refocusing (the same thing you observed and mentioned in your article); totally unusable in every Panasonic cameras I have experimenting with (GX8, GH4, GH3, GX7).
2. No touch-to-magnify while/during recording. That is, when you start recording, magnification is disabled on Panasonic cameras. I think for manual focusing during video recording it is terribly important to punch-in to confirm focus accuracy. I simply don't understand why this important function is simply ignored by Panasonic/Olympus. On the other hand Sony, Canon, Samsung has very nice implementations in their cameras.

Can you, Andrew, confirm that magnification/punch-in is available during recording in GX80/85?

A5100 is interesting. Seems like a better deal than the A6000 to me but was overlooked

I looked into the image quality and it seems identical to the popular A6000 but with that all important touchscreen for the phase-detect AF.

Sony are really silly not putting a touch screen on the A6000 and A6300, especially for the YouTube vlog crowd.

No magnification during recording on GX85 sadly. Hoping GH5 will have this.

[TheRenaissanceMan]

12 hours ago, Brian Williams said:

He said he would do a follow up to cover image quality. The IQ is easily as good as the GH4.

My guess is identical IQ to the (excellent) G7, but with stabilization and no mic jack. 

[The Chris]

2 hours ago, sgreszcz said:

You can see some of my hand-held testing with the Olympus 9-18, Panasonic 35-100/2.8 and 12-35/2.8 here.  The 35-100 was used for the duck pond up until the pier shots which is where I used the P12-35/2.8 (which is also solid).

https://vimeo.com/167339810

Was this all shot in 4k? Looks good. The jello in the walking down the stairs sequence starting at about :45, is that RS or stabilization?

[sgreszcz]

42 minutes ago, The Chris said:

Was this all shot in 4k? Looks good. The jello in the walking down the stairs sequence starting at about :45, is that RS or stabilization?

It was all shot in 4k and downscaled to 1080p (except for some of the duck shots where I was experimenting with Electronic Tele Converter 2x 1080p crop @50fps).  The wobble is the stabilisation which is more pronounced with the IBIS-only (compared to the dual-IS).  Well, it isn't a problem with the stabilisation which does a fantastic job on getting rid of hand shake and also allows some nice panning.  It is more a problem with me moving with the camera and making changes in direction or velocity or moving a little too sudden.  The stabilisation tries to "catch up" or compensate and you get the distortion.  

I haven't done any moving shot comparisons between my E-M5II and the GX80, but I might try to do so this weekend if I have some time.

[Brian Williams]

6 hours ago, wolf33d said:

Well it is a big statement and I don't see how a f2.4 aperture equivalent can look the same as a FF f1.2 in term of bokeh and subject isolation.

In terms of subject isolation, the lens would, in fact, still be a f1.2 FF equivalent, no?

6 hours ago, wolf33d said:

The GX80 looks great but it is a non buy for me. We will have in 3 months the exact same camera the GH5 with better ergonomics, 4k60p, same stab, FHD120p, log... So why bother spending 500? It's not like the GH5 will cost 6000$ anyway  I am currently waiting with a D5500. 

Well the GH4 was $1700 when it came out, so assuming the GH5 will be the same, it is significantly more. And if you're like me and could care less about 4k60, don't want something as big as the GH4, its definitely worth the savings. Thats like saying, "Why buy that Toyota? For a little more than double the money you could get the Lexus".

Having already bought the GX85, I'm not waiting (with my D750 in tow- another reason I can't spend $1700+ on a second camera).

6 hours ago, wolf33d said:

Hopefully we get a decent video AF in the GH5 otherwise it will again be a non complete product..

You should be shooting your video in manual. AF for video is for grandparents shooting clips of their grandkids on their iPhones.

[The Chris]

1 hour ago, Brian Williams said:

You should be shooting your video in manual. AF for video is for grandparents shooting clips of their grandkids on their iPhones.

Bullshit, especially since most modern ILC lenses are fly by wire and lack any precision at all. My a7rII can lock onto a face and track it while flying on a gimbal and I can tap the LCD of my a5100 to focus on anything I want with perfect precision. Have you seen the way Canon's dual pixel can track and rack focus? It's awfully nice to have the camera track someone during an interview or a walk and talk without trying to judge whether or not they're in focus, even when shooting something like the 50/1.2. My eyes have recently just started to degrade a bit with everything from arms length to right against my face getting a little fuzzy, AF has saved my bacon more than once. Who cares as long as you get the shot and payment is made? For a one man band like me, AF has been a gift from above. I'll never buy another camera that can't match my a7rII. 

YMMV

[Andrew Reid]

8 hours ago, wolf33d said:

Well it is a big statement and I don't see how a f2.4 aperture equivalent can look the same as a FF f1.2 in term of bokeh and subject isolation. That would deserve a comparison.

F1.2 is not F2.4 and never will be.

A large aperture has a distinctive look, especially F1.2 or faster.

This isn't about sensor size.

Also the lens is designed for the sensor size so you're not cropping into the middle of a full frame F1.2, you get to see the magic happen throughout the image circle right into the corners of it, just like with a very fast super 16mm on super 16

It's a shame people only seem to think of crops these days and multiply the aperture, it's just stupid, there's more to the LOOK of a lens than just shallow DOF!

[John Matthews]

Interesting preliminary review... Great work finding out about the live HDMI output in 4k 422. The information I had read said this was NOT the case. Wonderful surprise!

After playing with the GX80 for the last couple of days, I've noticed some things:

1) Having a stabilised, sharp manual focus preview REALLY helps getting a lock-on quickly with older lenses.

2) It's a shame I can't keep the magnified view during focus AFTER half-pressing the shutter or starting a video recording.

3) The back wheel for adjusting shutter speed/aperture is too stiff and has a protrusion just under it, making it difficult to turn and press.

4) Personally, I haven't seen any moiré, but I didn't do any technical tests. My GX7 would have had in the same situations.

5) Audio sounds like there's a faucet running in the distance whenever IBIS is on. Really, it's only good for syncing in post, I imagine.

So far, I'm enjoying it and the GX80/85 seems to be a great camera for both stills and video.

5 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

It's a shame people only seem to think of crops these days and multiply the aperture, it's just stupid, there's more to the LOOK of a lens than just shallow DOF!

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I've been looking into this over the past few weeks. Terms get thrown around all the time and there's quite a bit of confusion regarding lenses and sensor size. Here are my notes:

Focal length = angle of view, Perspective = camera to subject distance, F-stop = depth of field, T-stop = light coming into the lens and hitting the sensor

What makes a lens great = high micro-contrast, high sharpness across the field, low distortion, round bokeh balls, low chromatic aberration, no vignetting, and maintains colors, easy-to-use, durable. Seemingly mathematical, but if you like the look, you like the look. It's more subjective than people think.

[Mattias Burling]

A cropped sensor doesn't affect exposure or dof, so the conversion is pointless imo.

[John Matthews]

18 minutes ago, Mattias Burling said:

A cropped sensor doesn't affect exposure or dof, so the conversion is pointless imo.

Agreed. When judging different cameras, it should more be about results, usability, and size of the camera and lens combination... not about sensor size. Recently, Sony's G-master lenses seem rather silly to me. It's a small camera, but now you have to carry around a flange on EVERY lens... size benefit? MFT seems to hit a very nice balance (for me, at least).