Just Went Over 100,000 Page Views - Thank You!

Dear Friends,

After not looking at the blog for a couple of days, I just opened the Dashboard and noticed that, sometime yesterday, the page view counter had clicked over 100,000.

I wanted to write this post to say "thank you" to everyone who has stopped by.  I hope that you have enjoyed, or been informed by, some of what has been written here.  I also hope, that in some small way, HCR has provided you with useful information as we seek together to become better photographers, videographers and cinematographers - or at least smarter consumers of camera equipment.

Your support over the past couple of years, as you have read the blog and supported our sponsors, has made what we do possible.  We look forward to many more years of providing you with news and information you can use to turn your still or video vision into reality. Thank you again.

Great GH4 Product Demo with Panasonic UK's Mark Baber

Hat tip to videographers.co.uk for staying off camera and letting Mark tell us about the camera without interrupting him.

We learn a few things here that go beyond the specs, e.g.:

- There are only 8 pre-production models of the GH4 in all of Eurasia, outside of Japan

- "Face Detection" autofocus now includes "Eye Detection"

- Panasonic seems to have fixed the GH3's SD card door problem

- There is a new 15mm f1.8 in the pipeline and a new, smaller 35-100 constant f2.8 in development

It's a little long, but worth watching all the way through.

If you'd like to have your 4K-capable SD card in hand before your camera arrives, you can get a Kingston 64GB UHS-I Speed Class 3 for $110 or a Panasonic 64GB microP2 Card for $372.

You would only spend the extra money for a microP2 card if you planned to make the GH4 a "B" camera to a Panasonic VariCam or other camera that records to even more expensive full-sized P2 cards. I may invest in microP2 because I'd like to rent the new Panasonic Super 35 VariCam someday - but shooters who plan to stick with the GH4 should get the Kingston (or the new Panasonic Gold Series SDUC when it is released).

Panasonic Posts Autofocus Shootout Between GH3 and GH4

Here is an interesting marketing video on the GH4 's new autofocus system. Google Translate calls the video title "Spatial Awareness AF" when translated from Japanese. Panasonic's English language marketing folks, on the other hand, call it "Depth from Defocus" or DFD.

As I understand it, with DFD, the camera knows which Panasonic system lens is mounted, and compares a database of that lens' "blur" (or defocus) characteristics to the scene that it "sees" through the glass. It uses that comparison to calculate the distance to the subject and set the focus of the lens. With the GH4 's quad core processor, this process is almost instantaneous - advertised at 0.07 sec.

As the video demonstrates, this is noticeably faster than the GH3 - and may rival the awesome autfocus performance of the Canon 70D.



It will be interesting to see which lenses have their defocus characteristics programmed into the camera at rollout. It's almost certain that Panasonic micro 4/3 system lenses will be programmed in. How about Oly m.Zuiko lenses? Sigma micro 4/3 lenses? Classic 4/3 lenses with the MA1 adapter? If non-Panasonic lenses aren't in the database at the start, Panasonic should get them in as soon as possible. It would be a shame to limit this capability to Panasonic OEM lenses only.

Two More Panasonic GH4 4K Videos!

One with actual people in it. The first, posted by Panasonic in the Netherlands, is another nature scene:



The second, is a wedding film shot at 4K, but displayed at 1080p on Vimeo. The sky is overcast, but looks a little blown out to me:



Thanks, Panasonic, for getting this camera into more shooters' hands. But, of course, we need more - more downloadable 4K - and more cameras in the hands of narrative filmmakers, please.

Panasonic GH4 "Hands On" Videos

I don't usually post these, but there have been so few people with test cameras in their hands that we are reduced to noisy camera show (and camera store) "hands on" videos in order to see images of the camera outside of a display case.

From John Arnold of Photo Walkthough at the Photography Show 2014 in Birmingham, UK:



From Matt Granger at Photography News and Reviews:



In addition to the dearth of real hands-on videos, I have been a little surprised by the types of sample videos that Panasonic is using to promote the GH4.  For the GH3, they hired Bruce Logan A.S.C. and Philip Bloom to shoot Genesis, a terrific little narrative with near-Hollywood level production values.  This time, the only official sample videos I can find are travel and nature pieces.

Although these subjects are great opportunities to showcase the camera's amazing resolution, a sample film with actors and motion and a variety of day/night/outdoor/indoor shooting conditions is going to sell more cameras, in my view.

Panasonic - if you're listening - please lend a camera to Bruce Logan or Shane Hurlbut or Philip Bloom - or someone else with "ASC", "BSC" and/or "DGA" after their name - and pay them to shoot a Genesis-style short with the GH4 in full 4K.

If you can't afford to do that, or the timing isn't right, at least get a few more pre-production cameras into the hands of shooters and bloggers.  Eduardo Angel has posted some great 1080p samples - but with 4K footage from Sony and Blackmagic already on the street, potential GH4 shooters need more full-resolution examples of what this camera can do.

Even though it looks like pricing and pre-ordering is already available in Europe, we here in the States are still anxiously awaiting official pricing and the opportunity to pull the trigger on this camera.

If anything here has helped you to make a buying or pre-ordering decision - please click on the links above or the display ads below. And please support the sponsors who advertise in the margins of the blog. It won't cost you anything extra and it will help to keep these posts coming. Thank you for your support over the years.

Fuji X-T1 - A Second Look

After slamming this camera in an earlier post, I have become interested in it again for two reasons. First, after seeing the stunning RAW still photos that David Taylor-Hughes is getting out of it over on Soundimageplus, I thought - there is something special about this camera. And second, a lot of people around the 'net wondered whether this camera was worth buying - and I was curious too. Is this a still camera that is so good that it can overcome its video challenges - especially for casual video shooters? I had to find out.

So I went online and rented the camera body from lensrentals.com in Memphis and an 18-55mm f2.8-4.0 lens from borrowlenses.com in San Carlos, California. I've done business with borrowlenses a number of times and have had great experiences every time, but they didn't have the X-T1 yet, so I rented the body from lensrentals. Both companies are great, and I can recommend them without reservation.

I didn't intend to do a formal review - I just wanted to satisfy my own curiosity and answer a few questions from the community - but the X-T1 surprised me in several ways, both positive and negative, and I thought it deserved a blog post.  And yes, there are sponsored links and ads here to recoup the costs and time spent on these reviews - but nobody pays me to promote their cameras, and I do my best to point out both the pros and cons of every camera I write about.  Okay - enough of that, let's talk cameras.

LOOK AND FEEL

Of course, this is a matter of taste, but this camera is a joy to look at and to hold. My first SLR was a 1974 Minolta SR-T 101. It was all-metal, had physical knobs on top and zero hand grip (besides the pebbled finish on the body). I learned photography with this camera and it will always hold a special place in my heart.



I think Fuji psychoanalyzed people like me and designed the X-T1 to hypnotize us into pulling out our wallets.  It has easy to understand physical controls with the weight and balance of a real camera, not a plastic toy.  There are manual settings if you want them - and easy to understand automatic settings if you don't.  There are no pictures of flowers or children on the mode dial - in fact, there is no PASM mode dial at all  (not a big loss - my Minolta didn't have one either).  Instead, there's a big, locking ASA, er...ISO dial on the left of the viewfinder, a big, locking shutter speed dial on the right of the viewfinder and a big +/- 3EV exposure compensation wheel on the far right.  Rental cameras don't include manuals, but I didn't need one. For anyone who considers him or herself a photographer, this camera is very easy to use, straight out of the box, without drilling down into a bunch of menus.  There were a couple of challenges over the course of the test - but they were easily resolved by looking up the answers on the Fuji site - which brings us to...

SHOOTING WITH THE FUJI X-T1

Once I had charged the battery and inserted the SD card (formatted on the Sony RX10 I tested a few weeks ago - that review is still in the works) I powered the camera up and was immediately impressed by the clarity of the LCD.  Very nice.  It was indoors after dark, and both the LCD and the EVF did a good job in my lamplit room.  There was a little grain, especially when I used the focus assist (magnification) feature - but it was not bad.  The big problem wasn't the EVF/LCD's brightness - it was its flickering in response to video screens.  I happened to have the TV on, and the effect was not confined to the screen - it was reflected across one whole side of the room.

I pulled out my trusty Panasonic GH2 for a comparison of the same scene, and there was no flickering on the LCD/EVF at all. Turning the TV off solved the Fuji's problem - but it was an annoyance when trying to compose still photos.  I was concerned that this would affect the quality of video recorded indoors when there were screens around, so I recorded a few seconds of video at 1080/60p.  Thankfully, the flickering stopped as soon as I hit record.  Still - this is something Fuji needs to address.

That said, I shot a quick JPEG that first evening with the camera indoors in low light, all neutral settings, and here's what I came up with right off the bat:

Fujifilm X-T1 w 18-55, ISO1600, f2.8 1/20th sec, +0EV w flash

Here is what I got from the GH2 with the Olympus 11-22mm f2.8-3.5:

Panasonic GH2 w Oly 11-22, ISO1600, f2.8, 1/13th sec, +0.66EV

I have been shooting JPEGs with the Panasonic for a couple of years, and have made a couple of custom color adjustments to compensate for the camera's weaknesses.  Without these adjustments, the GH2's color reproduction is horrible. The X-T1, on the other hand, produces very accurate color reproduction straight out of the box.

The next morning, I changed lenses on the Panasonic.  The rest of these comparisons are between the Fuji X-T1 with the 18-55 kit lens, and the Panasonic GH2 with the 14-140 video-optimized kit lens (I would have shot this comparison with the GH3, but it has been at the Panasonic Service Center for a month(!) - more on this later).

When I tried to shoot a few pictures, however, I ran into my second challenge with the X-T1.  The numbering system on the Sony-formatted card started in the 900s - so the Fuji quickly ran out of file numbers and displayed a "Fuji Frame No. Full" message across the LCD.  A quick search of the Fuji support and contact center came up with this method for resetting the file numbers, so the problem was solved in 5 minutes.

This was completely my fault for not reformatting the card, not the camera's - but it was good to know that problems like this are fairly easy to solve.

For the rest of the weekend, I carried both cameras everywhere I went and found the X-T1 to be a joy to use. I didn't exercise every feature (e.g., burst shoting, wi-fi), but I did shoot both stills and video (I'll post the video samples later). Here are a few more comparisons of its still image quality with the Panasonic.

One of the landmines my son puts on the carpet to keep me from walking around barefoot in the dark:

Fujifilm X-T1 w 18-55, ISO800, f4.0, 1/5th sec, +0EV

Panasonic GH2 w 14-140, ISO1600, f5, 1/10th sec, +0.67EV

Conspicuous consumption at the local plaza:

Fujifilm X-T1 w 18-55, ISO800, f3.2, 1/45th sec, +0.67EV

Panasonic GH2 w 14-140, ISO800, f4.5, 1/25th sec, +0.67EV

Fujifilm X-T1 w 18-55, ISO800, f3.6, 1/50th sec, +0.67EV

Panasonic GH2 w 14-140, ISO800, f4.5, 1/30th sec, +0.33EV

Ducks trying to stay warm:

Fujifilm X-T1 w 18-55, ISO200, f4.5, 1/125th sec, +0.33EV

Panasonic GH2 w 14-140, ISO200, f5.6, 1/100th sec, +0.33EV

Ready to shoot video with "still" cameras:

Fujifilm X-T1 w 18-55, ISO800, f3.2, 1/50th sec, +0EV w flash

Panasonic GH2 w 14-140, ISO800, f4.5, 1/50th sec, +0.33EV w flash

BOTTOM LINE

In full auto mode, this camera is a fast shooter that produces great color and image quality. For manual shooters, it is very easy to customize - and, although I didn't use them much, the menus are well-organized and straightforward.

But lots of other cameras have fast autofocus, good lenses and great color. Some even have well-organized menus. What makes this camera different? Well, for me, it's the great APS-C X-Trans sensor in a conveniently-sized, solid body with a great viewfinder, a tilt-screen and "real photographer's" controls. If I were a still-only shooter, this would easily be my favorite modern camera.

But, sadly, I'm a hybrid still/video shooter, and, for video, this camera leaves a lot to be desired. Although the 1080/60 progressive frame rate is nice, it is limited to 14 minutes of continuous recording. Other limitations: there's no audio meter on screen while recording, there's no 1080/24p option and, in 2014, there's no excuse for this camera's non-standard 2.5mm mic jack. Good thing I had a couple of Hosa GMP-467 3.5mm to 2.5mm right angle adapters left over from when Panasonic cameras were saddled with this same foolish design decision.

Overall, this camera is a 9+ for stills and a 7 for video - fantastic for still shooters who want X-Trans color straight out of the box - and who want to control their cameras without drilling down through a bunch of menus.

But still/video hybrid shooters should probably wait for the GH4 . That's what I'm going to do (although it was a little sad to pack the X-T1 up for shipment back to Memphis). So long, little buddy, it was fun while it lasted. I'm going to miss you.

If you're primarily a still shooter, and this review has helped you to make a buying decision, please click on one of the links above or the display ad below.  It won't cost you anything extra, and it will help to keep these blog posts coming.  Thanks!

New Panasonic GH4 Footage!

We're starting to see footage - some at 4K, some at 1080p - from the new Panasonic GH4.

Here is some nice 4K nature footage from Panasonic Sweden:




And a couple of 1080p clips from Eduardo Angel (from his post, "Panasonic Lumix DMC GH4 Sample Video - Behind the Scenes Fashion Week New York":







The resolution in the 4K clip is impressive (at least as impressive as can be seen on a 720p screen) - and the dynamic range in the 1080p clips seems decent (hard to tell without knowing how much light there was indoors).

Nothing here that would keep me from buying the camera - but anxious to see more footage.

In my view, Panasonic needs to get test cameras into the hands of more hybrid still/video camera bloggers!