What is Lumix thinking?!

[mercer]

You can get a brand new S5 for $995. This seems like Panasonic using old stock.

It's a shame what happened to m4/3. I was so floored to get the G7 back in 2015 for $500 and then the GX85 a little less than a year later for a little bit more and eventually a G85.

Other than a few Blackmagic cameras, I've also had a GH6 and used a friend's GH5 a bunch of times. I wish I had kept the GH6. The current deal on the GH7 at B&H is pretty amazing... $140 coupon and a free XLR handle (32bit float internal) but it's still overpriced for m4/3 when you consider you can get the S5iiX for less and also with a free XLR handle.

The pricing of Panasonic cameras are all over the place. I guess m4/3 sensor may cost more now? Or the cost of the sensor is one of the lowest costs of production and Panasonic is basing their pricing on features alone, adding X amount of dollars for every feature they add to the checklist.

To be fair to Panasonic, I think most manufacturers are all over the place. 

[Davide DB]

2 hours ago, MrSMW said:

Well I’m not one to throw the baby out with the bath water as they say, but it’s certainly looking that my time with L Mount peaked and will stop at some point with the S5ii.

That point will probably be when the ability to burn a lut into N-log happens.

Prior to that happening…and assuming it will, then it doesn’t stop my S5ii working.

Pretty sad if it’s the end of the road for full-frame. 

If…

 

For my jobs underwater I'm totally on M43. 

My focus on new Panasonic releases is generic in understanding how much this company invests and how well it holds up in the future. I had a chance to try out the GH7. Mine is a specific interest in autofocus but I must say I was not thrilled with it. How it works depends so much on the lens used and in the M43 system many standard lenses are very old and never updated except in firmware.
I would like to change but I am staying in the window at the moment. Accessories for underwater video cost much more than camera and lens.

[Davide DB]

1 hour ago, mercer said:

To be fair to Panasonic, I think most manufacturers are all over the place. 

market shrinks > costs shared among users > higher prices

[mercer]

8 minutes ago, Davide DB said:

market shrinks > costs shared among users > higher prices

I was referring more to the companies cannibalizing their own models. The pricing is out of control within their own camera lines.

Look at Canon... the R8 full frame camera is cheaper than the R7 aps-c. In this instance, the main feature difference seems to be FF vs IBIS... I'm sure there may be other differences as well but that seems to be the biggest.

Panasonic... S5iiX ($1999) vs GH7 ($2199). Full frame vs M4/3. The only other main difference is that the GH7 has internal ProRes Raw and 32bit float audio with the XLR handle and CF Express cards. That's not nothing but does it justify the GH7 costing $200 more? I guess you could argue that the GH7 is the flagship and the iix is not and I suppose the iix has been out for about a year longer. But even still? Maybe it's time that they consolidate their camera lines a little. Does Panasonic really need an S5ii and an S5iiX... released at the same time?

But I guess they know what they're doing... nickel and diming their sub-$2500 enthusiast customers generates a bunch of profits with the upsells.

[John Matthews]

14 hours ago, ArashM said:

Needless to say, like everyone else here I was hoping for an S1 or S1H replacement.

I heard that was for February.

[John Matthews]

6 minutes ago, mercer said:

Does Panasonic really need an S5ii and an S5iiX... released at the same time?

They weren't released at the same time. The S5iiX followed months after.

[Thpriest]

Lumix really need to get the S1 and S1H replacement right, specs and price. I feel it could be the last roll of the dice for a great brand. If they get is right they can build on the S5mk2's success, if not...💩

Still, they should get me through the next 2-3 years.

[Davide DB]

13 minutes ago, mercer said:

I was referring more to the companies cannibalizing their own models. The pricing is out of control within their own camera lines.

Look at Canon... the R8 full frame camera is cheaper than the R7 aps-c. In this instance, the main feature difference seems to be FF vs IBIS... I'm sure there may be other differences as well but that seems to be the biggest.

Panasonic... S5iiX ($1999) vs GH7 ($2199). Full frame vs M4/3. The only other main difference is that the GH7 has internal ProRes Raw and 32bit float audio with the XLR handle and CF Express cards. That's not nothing but does it justify the GH7 costing $200 more? I guess you could argue that the GH7 is the flagship and the iix is not and I suppose the iix has been out for about a year longer. But even still? Maybe it's time that they consolidate their camera lines a little. Does Panasonic really need an S5ii and an S5iiX... released at the same time?

But I guess they know what they're doing... nickel and diming their sub-$2500 enthusiast customers generates a bunch of profits with the upsells.

 

Yes you are right. 
I don't have a clear idea of why. It occurs to me that the basis is always the number of pieces produced. I don't have the numbers to state that, mine is just speculation.
Off the top of my head, S5XIIs sell more than a GH7, so the initial investment is spread out over more pieces. Perhaps the same is true between the Canon R7 and R8. 
 

[mercer]

20 minutes ago, John Matthews said:

They weren't released at the same time. The S5iiX followed months after.

I'm pretty sure they were announced at the same time and their release dates were pretty close to one another... about 4 months or so. 

[John Matthews]

24 minutes ago, mercer said:

I'm pretty sure they were announced at the same time and their release dates were pretty close to one another... about 4 months or so. 

Yes. That's right. Announced, not released.

[John Matthews]

The newly announced G97 could be understood as there will not be another sub $1000 camera for another 2 years. At least, I understand it as that. It sounds just like the G100D, a camera that won't be replaced anytime soon IMO, probably another year, if ever.

[KnightsFan]

I don't think Panasonic will release another ~24MP FF flagship until they have a new sensor, which they probably do not have access to for a price that makes sense at this time. This "release" is simply continuing an existing product under new regulations.

Lots of companies are in the same spot. Nikon did something sort of unique with partial stacking in the Z6III, but there really haven't been any new, affordable FF sensors recently. Obviously, for people who need the better autofocus and dislike the S5II size/weight/whatever, it kinda sucks not to have a slight update to the S1, but that's got to be a tiny, tiny slice of users.

Personally, I won't complain about Panasonic cameras until Sony, Nikon, and Canon all have real next-gen FF sensors in $2500 bodies.

Lenses, on the other hand... I wish L mount was a little more expansive and creative! But it's okay, I'm still 100% EF mount, and my adapter works fine.

[Andrew Reid]

4 hours ago, KnightsFan said:

Personally, I won't complain about Panasonic cameras until Sony, Nikon, and Canon all have real next-gen FF sensors in $2500 bodies.

Z6 III is next gen sensor and under $2500. If you count second hand market, so is EOS R5!

Current generation of sensor is so good, it's hard to see where they go next.

I mean, a Sony a1 II is not exactly going to go obsolete any time soon.

There is simply no reason for Panasonic to wait. Hell, buy the old stacked sensor from 2017 (Sony a9) and get to work.

[Andrew Reid]

I've always been a big Panasonic supporter but I'm going to say it...

Panasonic need a kick up the arse, they are going to lose even their most loyal customers.

It is simply not good enough what they are doing and the total lack of vision.

I still can't get over that Panasonic made this BIG play of going full frame, the death knell of their only successful mirrorless mount (M43), only to leave the first gen models standing around on shelves for nearly SIX YEARS leading their most loyal and early adopting customers wondering if they've given up.

The camera market has barrelled ahead with higher and higher prices, the top-end Sony flagship cameras have doubled (from A7r II $3k to a1 $6k) in the space of 8 years. The margins in cameras and lenses seems to me to be enormous, especially compared to most consumer electronics... and you look at the build quality of today's stuff and it's quite frankly shit. Look at the Nikon Z6 III... Great camera, but it's not a D500 is it? It's not even equivalent to what Nikon were doing at the close of the DSLR era for mid-range enthusiasts. Then you look at some of the lenses for £250... And they have plastic mounts. It's a fucking joke. They are scrimping on a fucking aluminium ring. There are no aperture rings, let alone full metal and glass builds like in the Ai-S days and haven't been for a long, long time.

It's descending into a Japanese racket and if it wasn't for Sony's sensor division, the camera industry would be Canon, and Blackmagic, and probably fuck all else.

It is high time they showed some business acumen and respect for customers, and dealers.

Panasonic is a mess.

Look at the opportunity of the LX100... Better than Fuji X100 in several ways, a miraculously small camera with GH4 sensor, Leica F1.7 zoom lens on the front for 700 smackers... And they still fuck it up. No version with a prime lens. No attempt to develop the form factor, with the nice retro dial. No M/43 version, also retro styled like the original LX100 was. Why? An entire market gone up in smoke as they didn't try.

S series... Entire market gone, as they didn't try. First gen cameras unevolved, unloved, sat on shelves for half a decade.

S5 II and S9 are badly marketed... And cannibalise Micro Four Thirds like hell.

They have always tried to give us decent value for money. It seems they had no choice to me. They didn't have a successful mount... as in EF successful. They didn't have a competitive range of full frame primes. They don't seem to have their own sensors. No spec-leading cameras to rival Canon, Nikon and Sony - at least not for any length of time after initial launches had been and gone.

In all sorts of ways, their products have been badly planned and badly marketed. Even the good stuff... GH2, GH4, S1H... It was all superseded within months by Sony or came just after a major Sony release with some sort of better spec.

In the case of the GH4, just as Panasonic had given us a 4K mirrorless, out came Sony with the full frame 4K bunch... A7r II and A7S II. With the S1H... everyone was invested in the A7S II and E-mount lenses, and then Sony made a Mark III for good measure. With the S5 II... It's basically just an a7 III competitor about 4 years too late.

And the less we say about contrast detect autofocus the better.

Panasonic can either get a development announcement out of some seriously impressive flagship tech, or they can leave the market. There's not a middle way. It's do or die for them now in 2025.

[KnightsFan]

1 hour ago, Andrew Reid said:

Z6 III is next gen sensor and under $2500. If you count second hand market, so is EOS R5!

Which is why I mentioned Z6 III. For the R5, if you're comparing used prices, then I'll revise to "I won't complain about Panasonic cameras until Sony, Nikon, and Canon all have real next-gen FF sensors in $900 used bodies"

The Nikon Z6 came out in 2018, and the S1 in 2019. Z6 III released this year, so if a Panasonic camera comes out with a similar sensor, then next year will have the same latency in terms of time-to-new-sensor.

[newfoundmass]

Since the GH5 it certainly has been a rollercoaster for Panasonic. It feels like when they move forward they always end up taking a few steps back, too. That's what I find most frustrating about them.

I've warmed up to the S9. I think the S5II and the S5II X are fantastic. I'd argue they are the best value out there right now, aside from a used S5. I think the GH7 and the G9II are both great entries for M43 users. These are all recent cameras that show that Panasonic is still cable of putting out quality and competitive cameras.

But we literally have no clue what the future holds. There are reasons, both good and bad, as to why you might want to keep things tight to the chest, but they need to realize that their position in the market doesn't afford them that luxury. If they want to maintain their loyal users, let alone grow the user base, they need to be more aggressive.

I'm not ready to jump ship and I am not freaking out yet about their full frame cameras. I can run these S5 and S5II bodies for years to come, I'm not going to buy a S2H or whatever anyway. But it would be nice to know that Panasonic sees a future for users like me so that I can make informed plans a few years down the road without wondering if Panasonic is committed to their camera business or not.

Sony or Canon users don't even have to worry about this stuff; as a 10+ year user of Pansonic dating back to the GH3 it'd be nice to not to have to worry about it either.

---

This camera, though, doesn't need to exist. I don't think there was much of a demand for a G95 let alone a slightly updated model that lacks the one feature a significant part of the market wants out of any camera: PDAF. I can't recommend this to my nephew who is getting interested in vlogging (goodness help me!) I can't really recommend it to anyone I know who is looking to take the step up from their phone either because even though it is a step up I can't really say this is a better value than what Canon, Sony, Fuji, or Nikon are offering in this entry level market. I don't want to recommend a Canon or Sony camera, but I would over this.

If Panasonic is going to keep m43 around, they should've just blown up any plans they had for the G97, phased out the G95, and put resources in developing a camera the size of the G100 that has IBIS, PDAF, no crop, and can at least record 30 minutes without overheating and use that for an entry level/vlogging camera. At least you could look at a camera like that and think "hey, they are actually trying something different and building on the promise of m43!" And it could actually have an appeal in getting new users who don't wanna carry around bigger cameras.

[IronFilm]

15 hours ago, mercer said:

Does Panasonic really need an S5ii and an S5iiX

They want to hit two different price points, while still using essentially the same hardware inside. 

Let's say there is a "widget" you wish to sell. You could sell this fully featured widget for say $1.2K or for $1K

Am sure you're well aware of the laws of supply vs demand? 

So as prices go up, there is less demand. 

If you sell a product at say $1K you'll get perhaps let's say 10,000 buyers. But if you increase it to $1.1K it's perhaps 7,500 buyers while at $1.2K it's perhaps 5,000 buyers and so on and on. 

Thus you might conclude $1K is the optimal price to sell at. 

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/consumer_surplus.asp

Now there is also a concept of consumer surplus, which is the gap between the price a consumer pays for a good vs what they would have paid for it. 

From the perspective of the company, this is a missed opportunity! Ideally they'll fully capture this consumer surplus for themselves buy charging exactly what the consumer would have paid at the maximum for a product. 

That's called "First-degree price discrimination" (perfect price discrimination). Which is when you're charging each buyer the maximum they are willing to pay.

However everyone has different price preferences, so no matter what price the company chooses, you'll end up having two groups: some who can't afford it, and others who'd have happily paid even more. 

Thus why there is also:

Second-degree price discrimination: Offering bulk discounts or different pricing tiers based on quantity or quality.

(there is also third-degree price discrimination, but I think my comment is already getting too long, and won't discuss that. There is even 4th-degree price discrimination, but we don't have universally agreed definitions of that, so it's more an informal term used, for instance for dynamic pricing) 

You'll see an example of 2nd-degree price discrimination if you ring up your local seller and ask for fifty Sanken COS-11D mics and ask them if they can give you a bulk order discount. 

While another example is when the manufacturer engages in product differentiation, so they can offer a product at multiple price points. 

Such as this example of selling a widget at both $1K and $1.2K (of course we see this product differentiation all the time, such as with microphones such as the DPA 2017 vs 4017, it's also why we saw the Lectro LMb and SMQV at two different price points, or the Sound Devices 633 vs the 688)

Thus they're hopefully still capturing all the sales for people who'd pay $1K or more, they're also capturing at least a good sized chunk of those who'd pay $1.2K or more. (of course they're missing out on the opportunity to say sell at $1.5K to those who'd pay that. And I'm sure they're missing out on some higher value buyers who then change their mind and settle for the cheaper $1K widget. But presumably, overall it's a winning move to offer it at $1K and $1.2K vs just $1K, otherwise they wouldn't do it) 

Thus the company could have run the numbers and thus designed they're always going to be offering the product at two different price points. (or more... Sound Devices for instance offers theirs at three different price points: 833, 888, and Scorpio. Even though on the inside they're essentially "the same product", with 3 FPGAs)

Another way of looking at this problem:

You're going to have the cheaper $1K option and the more expensive $1.2K option, and together you'll be selling 10,000 of them. (because your entry point here is $1K, and from the earlier on supply vs demand curve we know that means you'll be selling 10,000 in this example)

You've got various fixed costs, let's say $2M 

Thus each widget sale has $200 going towards covering that fixed cost. (plus of course various other costs such as the cut the retailer gets, or the manufacturing cost, etc... but we can assume those scale according to the number of units sold) 

If you were to drop the cheaper $1K option, and only be selling the $1.2K option (which we know  will only sell 5,000 units) that means we now need $400 per widget sale to go towards the fixed costs!

That means we'll have to increase the widget price to $1.4K to still maintain the profit margin as you had before without the extra $200/unit costs that have to be recovered. (of course increasing to $1.4K means even less sales! So in reality the optimal price to sell just one product line would be somewhere in between $1.2K and $1.4K, and thus you'll be losing out and never ever be able to fully recover the lost profits. But you hopefully have got my point already, and we don't need to go deeper into those hypothetical calculations)

So once we've determined that we need to offer two different products, the question becomes how do we make them?

It's likely a lot easier to both design and produce two products that have absolutely identical hardware on the inside, and only differentiated by software.  (as a person who has worked professionally both in the software and hardware space, that's certainly my rule of thumb preference)

Rather than having two different sets of hardware (likely forcing very different software for each as well! Due to the different hardware base)

 

[hoodlum]

Panasonic's biggest mistake was not introducing PDAF with FF from the very beginning in 2019.  Then they could have rolled out PDAF to updated m43 bodies.  Instead we still had the GH6 introduced in 2022 without PDAF and other missteps, which required the GH7 to fix just 2 years later.  The GH6 had one of the shortest shelf life for a GH body.

The last 5 years was a great missed opportunity for Panasonic from a marketing perspective.

[Thpriest]

Whilst I think many points about Panasonic's marketing and missed opportunities are true I think the bottom line is that they are the best value all rounders combining competitive pricing, excellent ergonomics and features. For years I've been using Lumix cameras for all sorts of work, high end fashion videos, corporate videos, long form recording (hours of conferences and they've never over heated), events (photo and video), weddings (photo and video)...they just work. In the past they had one major compromise, DFD, but even then they had the best EVFs (S1H and S1) and LCDs and other tools that made MF easier than on most cameras. I can have 2 Lumix bodies and lenses for the same price as a Sony and one lens equivalent and then camera is more enjoyable to use (other than AF possibly). That is Lumix's key strength. It's what they should focus and build on.

[John Matthews]

10 hours ago, newfoundmass said:

I'm not ready to jump ship and I am not freaking out yet about their full frame cameras. I can run these S5 and S5II bodies for years to come, I'm not going to buy a S2H or whatever anyway. But it would be nice to know that Panasonic sees a future for users like me so that I can make informed plans a few years down the road without wondering if Panasonic is committed to their camera business or not.

I'm in the same boat. Not changing. I don't see any reason to.

10 hours ago, newfoundmass said:

If Panasonic is going to keep m43 around, they should've just blown up any plans they had for the G97, phased out the G95, and put resources in developing a camera the size of the G100 that has IBIS, PDAF, no crop, and can at least record 30 minutes without overheating and use that for an entry level/vlogging camera. At least you could look at a camera like that and think "hey, they are actually trying something different and building on the promise of m43!" And it could actually have an appeal in getting new users who don't wanna carry around bigger cameras.

As I said earlier, I believe the release of the G97 basically puts a nail in the coffin of a mid-ranged M43 camera for at least 2 years. They've just spent their time coming out with a G97; they aren't going to get people to buy that only to come out immediately after with an upgrade.

2 hours ago, hoodlum said:

The GH6 had one of the shortest shelf life for a GH body.

I don't think it had in that they've been releasing a GH line camera every 1 to 2 years since 2009, if you count the GH5s as a "real" GH camera.

After reading all of what people are complaining about, I guess Panasonic should just focus on hardware, not firmware. Release it and forget it, right (à la Sony)? Rather, Panasonic has made meaningful efforts in firmware fixes. The S5ii when it was released is not the same camera as the current one. Not many of us are talking about that. Really, people have their ass chapped because there's no high-end production camera (something I don't care about). Still, I'd love to know exactly how you think the features will be that much better than the current models for pros. Better build? 12k, 8k? 4k 120fps? 32bit float? Internal RAW? Arri log? Which will most disappoint if it's not there? I get the feeling people just want GH7-level features in a FF body? I think we can agree that Arri-anything won't be in it.