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

[jase]

Thanks! While you are here i got another question: does the manual override while being in AFS mode work with those canon lenses? E.g. can i set the camera to AFS and still turn the focus ring to be able to do manual adjustments?

[John Matthews]

I'm not sure when (a few pages back on this thread), but I think @Dean was talking about the GX80 not displaying its ISO when using AUTO ISO in video mode. I found out that it DOES display ISO when in photo mode and using 4k photo. Put it in M, S, A mode and use start-stop 4K. It will adjust the ISO automatically. I can't believe I didn't know that feature before (or the lack of that feature in video mode). Strange. Does anyone know if there is any technical difference between 4k photo mode and regular 4k video mode? I'm already aware of not being able to shoot 24p anymore, but is that it?

[Dean]

7 hours ago, John Matthews said:

I'm not sure when (a few pages back on this thread), but I think @Dean was talking about the GX80 not displaying its ISO when using AUTO ISO in video mode. I found out that it DOES display ISO when in photo mode and using 4k photo. Put it in M, S, A mode and use start-stop 4K. It will adjust the ISO automatically. I can't believe I didn't know that feature before (or the lack of that feature in video mode). Strange. Does anyone know if there is any technical difference between 4k photo mode and regular 4k video mode? I'm already aware of not being able to shoot 24p anymore, but is that it?

I noticed that too but it seems like a series of stills it's taking when reviewing footage on the cam. I haven't had a proper look though all the 4k photo modes though. 

[John Matthews]

4 hours ago, Dean said:

I noticed that too but it seems like a series of stills it's taking when reviewing footage on the cam. I haven't had a proper look though all the 4k photo modes though. 

Looking at the ffprobe information, I'm seeing that the GX80 is at 29.97 fps and it has "yuvj420p", not "yuv420p". I believe yuvj420p will show 255 different color [0-255] values whereas yuv420p will show 219 color [16-235] values. Is that correct? I know that many other cameras use yuvj420p (5DM3, GOpro, etc.), but is there any real difference if you were to shoot a whole project this way?

Another benefit of shooting video in stills mode is the ability to shoot in 16:9, 4:3, 3:2, and 1:1 aspect ratios. Could be good for some projects... 1:1 is offering 2880 horizontal and VERTICAL lines of resolution. The widest aspect is still going to be 16:9.

I find it interesting that the GX80, specifically, is essentially a pseudo world camera, having the possibility to shoot 24p, 25p, and 30p video (in stills mode). It's only lacking the unlimited max recording time of the GX85, which can be removed by putting it into service mode.

[Dean]

9 hours ago, John Matthews said:

Looking at the ffprobe information, I'm seeing that the GX80 is at 29.97 fps and it has "yuvj420p", not "yuv420p". I believe yuvj420p will show 255 different color [0-255] values whereas yuv420p will show 219 color [16-235] values. Is that correct? I know that many other cameras use yuvj420p (5DM3, GOpro, etc.), but is there any real difference if you were to shoot a whole project this way?

John, all of that is over my head ... I have no idea  

I do know it's hard to frame in still mode though (crop happens as soon as you press record if I'm remembering correctly) the times I tried but yeah, definitely has some advantages. Also remember you can't use the shutter to start recording but not a big deal.

I've taken your previous advise and gone with the variable ND and shooting  in manual in movie mode. Working really well ... even for faced paced street stuff.

[John Matthews]

1 hour ago, Dean said:

John, all of that is over my head ... I have no idea  

I do know it's hard to frame in still mode though (crop happens as soon as you press record if I'm remembering correctly) the times I tried but yeah, definitely has some advantages. Also remember you can't use the shutter to start recording but not a big deal.

I've taken your previous advise and gone with the variable ND and shooting  in manual in movie mode. Working really well ... even for faced paced street stuff.

You need to use 4k Photo mode and set it to Burst Start/Stop. Press the shutter to start, and press it again to stop- you'll record 30p for up to 30 minutes with sound. The ND method is also a great way. By the way, the crop is visible before starting the recording (as soon as you put it in 4k Photo mode). It might have been the opposite with the LX100.

[nac]

17 hours ago, Dean said:

I do know it's hard to frame in still mode though (crop happens as soon as you press record if I'm remembering correctly) the times I tried but yeah, definitely has some advantages. Also remember you can't use the shutter to start recording but not a big deal.

You can set the aspect ratio in the menu to 16:9, so that it always stays the same.

 

I'm very interested to find out if 4k photo mode produces better video than using normal video modes.

[John Matthews]

4 minutes ago, nac said:

I'm very interested to find out if 4k photo mode produces better video than using normal video modes.

It probably won't be "better," but it might be easier or simply an alternative, especially if you want to slow down a 4k image to a 24fps timeline with the GX80... it's slight, but noticeable.   I started a topic concerning yuvj420, but I doubt it's better than yuv420. Hopefully, someone will respond.

[IronFilm]

On 9/24/2016 at 3:50 PM, Hanriverprod said:

Nope, I'm in South Korea. I'd like to shoot in New Zealand though. How's the indie scene there? Any of that Tolkien money trickle down to smaller productions?

Ha! No. That is all down in Wellington, while Auckland has the tv production scene. 

I'm not at quite that level yet, soon!

[IronFilm]

@conurus , when will metabones be supporting Nikon VR?

[nac]

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

It probably won't be "better," but it might be easier or simply an alternative, especially if you want to slow down a 4k image to a 24fps timeline with the GX80... it's slight, but noticeable.   I started a topic concerning yuvj420, but I doubt it's better than yuv420. Hopefully, someone will respond.

I guess if the quality is at least the same, i do like having fixed frame rate plus aperture and having auto iso.

[John Matthews]

1 minute ago, nac said:

I guess if the quality is at least the same, i do like having fixed frame rate plus aperture and having auto iso.

The frame rates should be fixed in stills mode (at 30fps) and you'd be right in fixing the aperture because if you don't, you'll see aperture "clicks" in the output, unless you have a lens with a stepless aperture. To make better use of stills mode, I think one should shoot in either A (for fixed aperture) or M (for fixed aperture and shutter) mode with the Auto ISO.

[Dennycranekirk]

Hi,

I am an avid reader of this forum. Signed up because I faced an issue with my gx85 and would appreciate you guys helping me with this. I just got a pix e5 for external recording but the gx85 always insists on down-scaling 4K to 1080p (confirmed by both the notification on the gx85 whenever I connect the recorder via hdmi and the recorder states the input is 1080p). I use to own a gh4 and disabling the down-scaling was a trivial affair. However, I have tried but failed to find a menu setting that allows me to do just that on the gx85. "TV connection" seems like the ticket but it does not contain a disable downscale option. Even went as far as checking to ensure all tele modes and filters are off but to no avail. Thing is when I engage playback on the gx85, the input magically turns to 4k and I can record the 4K playback of an internally shot 4K footage. This confirms that the HDMI cable is working. Firmware version: 1.1

@Andrew Reid perhaps you can fill me in on how you got yours to work with the BM 4K VA? 

All advice is welcome and much appreciated.

[mercer]

5 hours ago, Dennycranekirk said:

Hi,

I am an avid reader of this forum. Signed up because I faced an issue with my gx85 and would appreciate you guys helping me with this. I just got a pix e5 for external recording but the gx85 always insists on down-scaling 4K to 1080p (confirmed by both the notification on the gx85 whenever I connect the recorder via hdmi and the recorder states the input is 1080p). I use to own a gh4 and disabling the down-scaling was a trivial affair. However, I have tried but failed to find a menu setting that allows me to do just that on the gx85. "TV connection" seems like the ticket but it does not contain a disable downscale option. Even went as far as checking to ensure all tele modes and filters are off but to no avail. Thing is when I engage playback on the gx85, the input magically turns to 4k and I can record the 4K playback of an internally shot 4K footage. This confirms that the HDMI cable is working. Firmware version: 1.1

@Andrew Reid perhaps you can fill me in on how you got yours to work with the BM 4K VA? 

All advice is welcome and much appreciated.

Hmm... One man's junk is another man's treasure. If what you say is true, then one could downscale the 4K to 1080p to a Ninja Star and record 220mbps ProRes... With audio input via the Ninja Star... Now that's interesting.

I know you want the 4K, but have you tested the quality of the downscaled 1080p... Or is it possible that the camera is forcing 1080p out and not downscaling at all?

[Dennycranekirk]

8 hours ago, Dennycranekirk said:

Hi,

I am an avid reader of this forum. Signed up because I faced an issue with my gx85 and would appreciate you guys helping me with this. I just got a pix e5 for external recording but the gx85 always insists on down-scaling 4K to 1080p (confirmed by both the notification on the gx85 whenever I connect the recorder via hdmi and the recorder states the input is 1080p). I use to own a gh4 and disabling the down-scaling was a trivial affair. However, I have tried but failed to find a menu setting that allows me to do just that on the gx85. "TV connection" seems like the ticket but it does not contain a disable downscale option. Even went as far as checking to ensure all tele modes and filters are off but to no avail. Thing is when I engage playback on the gx85, the input magically turns to 4k and I can record the 4K playback of an internally shot 4K footage. This confirms that the HDMI cable is working. Firmware version: 1.1

@Andrew Reid perhaps you can fill me in on how you got yours to work with the BM 4K VA? 

All advice is welcome and much appreciated.

 

Minor update to this issue: I have since verified that independently, the GX85 and the Pix E5 work with 4K just fine. I connected the recorder to the output of my Intensity Pro 4K and recorded 3840x2160 footage from one of my Resolve projects without issue (10bit 422 Prores HQ rushes). Then connected the GX85 to the input of the Intensity Pro and recorded 3840x2160 feed using Media Express. Afterwhich I used the same 5M HDMI cable to connect the camera and the recorder only to see the GX85 downscale the feed to 1080p once again.

Blimey. This is driving me nuts but I'll hang in there for a while. Again thanks in advance for whatever advice.

[Dennycranekirk]

2 hours ago, Dennycranekirk said:

Minor update to this issue: I have since verified that independently, the GX85 and the Pix E5 work with 4K just fine. I connected the recorder to the output of my Intensity Pro 4K and recorded 3840x2160 footage from one of my Resolve projects without issue (10bit 422 Prores HQ rushes). Then connected the GX85 to the input of the Intensity Pro and recorded 3840x2160 feed using Media Express. Afterwhich I used the same 5M HDMI cable to connect the camera and the recorder only to see the GX85 downscale the feed to 1080p once again.

Blimey. This is driving me nuts but I'll hang in there for a while. Again thanks in advance for whatever advice.

 

 

Hi guys,

After randomly prodding around the menu system, I finally found the source of my agony. Setting the Rec Trigger to anything other than HDMI Flag enabled 4K recording. My foolish mistake into thinking the GX85 would behave like the GH4 in using timecode for record trigger. Thanks for allowing me to air my problems here nonetheless. Beats letting the frustration fester inside. But now I have gotta find a way to remotely trigger recording.

 

[Georgios]

On 10/1/2016 at 4:04 PM, conurus said:

I am in charge of firmware at Metabones and I would like to give an official response with regard to GX80/GX85.

We do not expect any EF mount to be able to take advantage of Dual I.S. in the foreseeable future. Either OIS or IBIS should be used, but not both. Andrew reported that "They seem to both operate and ignore each other, leading to problems." We could confirm that it is indeed the case when we downgrade to 1.4 or before. This was fixed in 1.5 a long time ago (Feb 2015). It is easy to tell one way or another: if both OIS and IBIS are active simultaneously, vibration will be overcorrected by twice as much and there will be just as much jitter as no IS, which is indeed what we see with adapter firmware 1.4 or earlier. If you are seeing just occasional slow jitter, it is likely you are observing the result of the vibration exceeding OIS' capabilities of that particular lens.

We have a 50-100/1.8 on order, but before that arrives, the most likely hypothesis drawn from Andrew's and our own observations is that adapter firmware 1.5 and after breaks the 50-100/1.8 and the old firmware 1.4 and before breaks all IS lenses (no AF and double correction). If this hypothesis is correct, you are okay with the current adapter firmware except for the 50-100/1.8 and except for the fact that you will be always using OIS but never IBIS.

A new adapter firmware will be around the corner with which we expect the 50-100/1.8 to be fixed as well. There will be a new option to choose between IBIS and OIS on Panasonic in the next firmware, something that is just natural for Olympus but not yet possible for Panasonic. (On Olympus if you turn off lens IS, IBIS comes on, but on Panasonic the lens IS switch turns off both OIS and IBIS.) The procedure to turn off OIS and turn on IBIS on Panasonic is not going to be pretty, but it will be doable.

I enjoy reading Andrew Reid's very informative review and tests, we greatly appreciate his work and we are always listening to customer reports of any issue which might arise. However, we would like to advise our customers that writing to support@metabones.com is the only way to ensure a problem is looked into in a timely manner. I do read eoshd often, but it is not a reasonable expectation that just because something is reported or discussed on eoshd we must be working on it. We appreciate you informing us of any issue via the official support channel in advance. That would greatly expedite the fix.

I've also sent an email (couple days before your post here) regarding OIS IBIS with 2.3 firmware but never got a response..

 

Good to hear that it will be fixed for 50-100/1.8 and we'll have an option to select IBIS or OIS on panasonic body...Although DUAL IS would be awesome :-)

[John Matthews]

Hot off the A6500 announcement, the GX80 seems like a better deal than ever. Thanks to Sony to validating my choice.

Let's look at the numbers:

GX80: 599 Euros

A6500: 1699 Euros

Granted, the A6500 will probably offer everything the A6300 offered with slightly better IQ (to be confirmed), better autofocus (to be confirmed), no overheating (to be confirmed), a touch screen, 5 axis IBIS. However, I question if it's 1100 Euros better than the GX80. That would be a lot left over for lenses and stuff.

[sanveer]

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

Hot off the A6500 announcement, the GX80 seems like a better deal than ever. Thanks to Sony to validating my choice.

Let's look at the numbers:

GX80: 599 Euros

A6500: 1699 Euros

Granted, the A6500 will probably offer everything the A6300 offered with slightly better IQ (to be confirmed), better autofocus (to be confirmed), no overheating (to be confirmed), a touch screen, 5 axis IBIS. However, I question if it's 1100 Euros better than the GX80. That would be a lot left over for lenses and stuff.

The difference can be used for Sound and Lighting Equipment. 

[fuzzynormal]

2 hours ago, John Matthews said:

GX80: 599 Euros

A6500: 1699 Euros

The GX85 seems like the best value on the market if you're a shooter desiring 5-axis stabilization.  It's a cheap cam with good IQ and the 5-axis works quite well.

Who can argue with that?

Would I say it's a great camera overall?  No.  But it's an AWESOME camera if you're buying it to do what it's strengths allow you to do --'kuz you get more for less.