GH5 Panasonic camera, from anticipation to love or hate

inqb8tr

They announced a camera with great specifications, that will be available in one year. I am a donkey that they will tease with the carrot on a loooong stick for an entire year. Nice move.

Scot

Personally I'm glad they announced even if it will be awhile. Between knowing somethings coming and the soon to be available G85 any thoughts about jumping to another system are gone for now.

Walkaboutcamera

Gh5 sensor size speculation

the jvc ls300 sensor size is 23.46 x 15.64 mm, 3:2 aspect ratio. this tells us it is possible to put a sensor at least this large behind a m4/3 mount.
panasonic has told us we will get a 6k video photo mode from 18 mpix. the above is what we know
for 6k i am going to guess at uhd x 1.5 as being the sensor pixel width giving 3840x1.5=5760.
making the assumption that one of the 4k modes of the gh5 will have the same crop size and 1:1 sampling as the gh4 for backward compatability, gh5 needs to have the same pixel density as the gh4. assuming of course.
this gives us a physical sensor width of 17.3x5760/4608=21.625mm. doable as jvc has proven.
back to pixel width, 5760x9/16=3240, and 5760x3240 as the 6k video photo mode.
5760x3240=18,622,400 pixels.
lets assume a stills aspect ratio of 3:2, giving us 5760x2/3=3840 sensor pixel height, and 5760x3840=22,118,400 mpix. if you want a 4:3 aspect ratio do the math.

posted this on dvxuser, as well

So we have 22 mega pixel sensor, 21.625mm x 14.42mm. I think, if it turns out to be the case, this would be a good move for Panasonic to stay competitive with Sony. The heart of my assumptions is point 4 above.

Vitaliy_Kiselev

@Walkaboutcamera

It can be, but something tells me that GH5 will have serious issues on market.

inqb8tr

@Vitaliy

Why? Price, or what?

Vitaliy_Kiselev

@inqb8tr

Price, delays and big marketing mistakes.

Look how all EU marketing going rounds about how great they had been with GH4. It means that they do not want to openly tell us about their fuck ups.

inqb8tr

They are very cautious, seems like. Dropped specs of the camera and act like a startup company. Do they want to feel what's gonna happen over that period with everyone else, it is not like some Japanese old man is just about start forging the GH5 on the mount Fuji from dragons breath and it takes him exactly till august 2017...

davedv

If the sensor size is 21.625mm x 14.42mm, that would give a diagonal (image circle) of 26mm. Micro 4/3 lenses are designed for a diagonal of 21.63mm which means that you wouldn't be able to take full sensor 3:2 stills with native Micro 4/3 lenses.

A 16:9 crop of that sensor would give an effective sensor size of 21.625mm x 12.16mm. This gives a 24.8mm diagonal, again too large for Micro 4/3 lenses to have full coverage. So the 6K mode would only be usable with some kind of adapted APS-C or larger lenses.

It's hard to imagine Panasonic, which is one of the main companies that makes and sells Micro 4/3 lenses, releasing a Micro 4/3 mount camera where one of the main features/selling points does not work with the native lenses they sell.

For JVC (or others like Blackmagic, etc.) to release cameras intended for use with adapted 3rd party lenses makes sense, because they are just selling cameras. So it doesn't matter as much what lenses you use with it, as long as you buy their camera.

But Panasonic is also trying to sell people a lot of lenses. Especially because if you buy a lot of their lenses, not only does Panasonic make more money, but it also means that you are heavily invested in their system, are more likely to stay within that system, and more likely to buy more camera bodies and lenses within that system in the future.

Walkaboutcamera

your right davedv that pretty much crushes my speculation

sam_rides_a_mtb

And yet if they did take the same approach that JVC did with LS300's sensor size and active m4/3 mount - and offer that variable framing option - then you just crop in or out depending on your lens' coverage. 4k could be pixel to pixel at m4/3 image circle, and some sort of binning/averaging of more pixels when you extend out towards super 35mm. Cost between m4/3 sensor and super 35mm sensor is probably lower than ever - just a matter of having the space, cooling, LSI (if this even is sensor-size specific). Willing to bet that they would sell significantly more units by simply stuffing an over-sized sensor in there (super 35mm). Would be a pity if they didn't after JVC demonstrated just how easy it is. Leaked specs say "custom sensor"...

Vitaliy_Kiselev

More of the same

Vitaliy_Kiselev

Panasonic interview

http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/15839/panasonic-interview-photokina-2016#Item_1

Quite pointless, but anyway.

EspenB

Did you guys see that message from Veydra on their facebook page?

"We had to cancel the project due to new anamorphic sensor area specs on the GH5."

MikeLinn

@EspenB

Talks had been long about it.

Manu4Vendetta

http://www.mirrorlessons.com/2016/09/25/panasonic-lumix-gh5/

inqb8tr

I am a donkey that they will tease with the carrot on a loooong stick for an entire year.

http://www.43rumors.com/ft5-confirmed-via-trusted-sources-the-panasonic-gh5-has-5-axis-stabilization/

Vitaliy_Kiselev

@Manu4Vendetta

It is old article referenced here, btw.

@inqb8tr

Also old thing, it was leaked by Panasonic staff on Photokina before.

inqb8tr

Ok, thanks.

theSUBVERSIVE

Hello,

I'm not sure if I was supposed to create a new topic or not, but as it's GH5 speculation related so I will post here, if not, let me know and I move it.

I made a 4 articles series speculating over what we know and what could possibly be achieved. I wrote them because I want to discuss about it and so far, I have been doing more explanation on GH5 Facebook group than properly discussing and I wanted people more knowledgeable than me to help me understand the things I don't.

Part 1: Overheating and IBIS: https://goo.gl/1NcXv8
Part 2: Codecs and AF Improvements: https://goo.gl/vDya1v
Part 3: Photo 6K and GH5's sensor: https://goo.gl/4jZYJx
Part 4: Slow Motion and ProRes: https://goo.gl/jPW736

I don't think that the Part 1 is that much interesting since more rumors have been popping up stating that it will have IBIS, and I made an article just contesting fallacies and showing how having IBIS made more sense than not having it.

I tried to speculate about the codecs in Part 2 but I have some questions about it and it would be nice if someone could help me.

Is there major differences in file size between 10-bit and 8-bit? From my understanding, it increases from 256 to 1024 the possible "nuances" for each channel but if both are encoding in 422, unless it's a scene that demands high dynamic range, the difference in data shouldn't be that big, right? Is this assumption correct?
So far I would like an H.265 Intra codec but I don't know the parameters as for how much more processing intensive H.265 is when compared to H.264. I say that considering new CPU and GPU that already supports H.265 with compatible software as well. In my mind, if it's all compatible, being an Intra codec, a H.265 Intra codec should be better for transcoding or even editing than an H.264 Long GOP one. Does it make sense? My whole point is that I think an H.264 Long GOP codec is more likely to happen but I prefer an H.265 Intra because it should be better and more future proof. I think that both would be about the same file size, right?

In Part 3 I speculated about what Photo 6K really is and what the sensor can be. In summary Photo 6K is a full readout 30fps burst of a 2:1 area of the sensor, which I find pretty weird. From that I'm assuming it will be 4K without crop and downsampled from the full readout, otherwise why would they do Photo 6K if that can't turn into 4K without crop?

Assuming it's a multi-aspect sensor and trying to fit a DCI 4K aspect ratio within the Micro4/3 image circle the sensor would be pretty much a 3:2 sensor. From previous rumors we can either have a sensor with 20MP for the 4/3 area and 22MP total for about 5800x3900 or a 24MP total for 6000 x 4000 and 22MP in the 4/3 area.

I'm a bit skeptical about moving from 20MP in 4/3 area because there were rumors saying it was a 20MP and at the same time, I have my suspicions that Panasonic and Olympus are have been working together for the sensor tech. Since the E-M1 is a 20MP sensor, I would think that if true that they somehow worked together, the GH5 would try to keep the same 20MP in the 4/3 area. Well, more on that in the article.

In Part 4 I followed the idea of full sensor readout and wondered if 4K 60p without crop would be possible. The E-M1 can do 60 fps burst of RAW images from the full sensor readout so I would like to think it's possible. For me Photo 6K and 60fps RAW are similar, but one is derived from video for longer shootings and the other is more photo related, to a RAW burst but also from full sensor readout.

If 60fps full sensor readout is possible, then, in theory if you read skipping a line for 4x less resolution and downsample it to 1080p, you should be able to read 4x faster. So let's say it's a 6000 x 4000 sensor, instead of doing full read out it skips a line and read 3000 x 2000 and then downsample the 16:9 area of 3000 x 1500 to 1080p with 4x speed for 240 fps. Downsampling should keep a pretty good quality.

Or if it's not the same sensor tech as Olympus and it's only 30fps, then it could be 120fps and do a 1:1 pixel crop at 1080p and get the 240fps.

But Panasonic and Olympus have been sharing the same sensor so many times. GH3 and E-M5, E-M1 and GH4, GX8 and Pen-F, it would make sense if they are sharing something between E-M1 II and GH5.

Also the E-M1 II has 200mbps 1080p All-I, which is a bit of an odd addition since it's not as marketable as 4K, and it's interesting since Panasonic is the only one using that same option in the GH4 and FZ2000.

As for ProRes and DNxHR I just don't think it's worth it. Every scenario I tried it ended up simply too expensive and ultimately having an external recorder with SSD would be cheaper than internal ProRes/DNxHR with the fastest UHS-II cards.

Aside from that there are minor things I would like the GH5 to have:

improved AF tracking - hopefully Olympus helped Panasonic with PDAF
auto ISO in manual, min. shutter speed, etc. things that Panasonic is somehow still missing
set focus A and focus B and do focus pull
crop markings for other aspect-ratios
REC709 preview in V-log L

Some other things I can't remember from the top of my head. The articles are much more detailed, if someone reads it and wants to discuss or even explain things I don't know or correct some things, I will appreciate.

I know it's a big post, so if I it's better to create a new topic just for it, just let me know and I delete this one or an admin do it or something.

Thanks!

theSUBVERSIVE

I wrote another article focusing on the sensor, this time putting a few more pieces together and I think that multi-aspect sensor is what makes the most sense.

Panasonic GH5: the Sensor has to be multi-aspect!

My best guess is a 22+MP multi-aspect sensor, possibly based on DCI (1.8x crop) instead of 16:9 (1.85x crop*) for a bit more than 5760px wide and a Micro4/3 area of 20MP, possibly the same pixels size and count than Olympus E-M1 MK II.

*we usually say 1.86x crop but if you do the math, it's much closer to 1.85x, but let's not get lost in technicalities because that's not the point and nor that important

If Photo 4K has that name based on UHD at 3840 x 2160, then we could expect Photo 6K to be something around the 6K version of 16:9, so 5760 x 3240px.

On Panasonic's press release, it says that Photo 6K is 18MP (6000 x 3000px) still grabs from video footage - which is a generic way to say it will have a video-like aspect ratio. But they also mention that the source of the video can either be 4:3 or 3:2, which is quite weird. Why would Panasonic even mention 3:2 as the video source? This is a clearly indication of full sensor readout, but why 3:2?

The 16:9 multi-aspect sensor used in the GH1 and GH2 are almost 3:2 and a DCI based multi-aspect is 3:2, for me, this is another argument that it might be multi-aspect, otherwise, I don't understand why being a 4/3 sensor Panasonic would mention 3:2 aspect ratio as a full readout video source for Photo 6K.

But why did they mention 4:3 then? Simply because they didn't want to confirm multi-aspect sensor, wouldn't people start asking themselves why a video from a 3:2? There is a possibility of Panasonic using a 4:3 of 25MP to 28MP? Of course there is, it's just very unlikely.

More importantly, there were rumors saying it was going to be multi-aspect and also rumors saying 20MP. But why 20MP? Because the Micro4/3 portion of the sensor is 20MP, just like the GH2 was called a 16MP camera, when in fact it had more than that for the whole sensor. Plus, because part of the sensor is outside the image circle, the max resolution you get with the GH2 is indeed 16MP in 4:3, 15MP in 3:2, 14MP in 16:9 and 11MP in 1:1, therefore a 16MP camera.

I said that the 20MP portion could have exact same pixel count as Olympus because I suspect they were developed together, the same way the E-M5 and GH3 had the same sensor, E-M1 and GH4 and also GX8 and Pen-F. It makes sense for the E-M1 MK II and GH5 to be based on the same sensor tech, plus, there were also rumors about Panasonic and Olympus sharing technology and even LSI components. Having the same pixel count and size, it's possible to share the sensor wafer, micro lens, color filter, etc. it saves you production cost money because you can both use the same parts, just different sized sensors.

The greatest thing of multi-aspect sensors is that for lenses, nothing changes since it's all within the same image circle, so you can either use native lenses or focal reducers like Speed Booster without worrying about the extra FOV of the multi-aspect sensor. So yeah, when using the 0.64x Speed Booster, you could get less than 1.2x crop, even closer to 1.15x crop with the Speed Booster and multi-aspect sensor combo. I would still prefer less crop to use APS-C lenses like the Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 and 50-100mm f/1.8, even more with IBIS, but for those wanting the 1.33 extra stop of light and closer to FF, then the 0.64x will get you pretty close to FF.

Again, this is my best guess:

22+MP multi-aspect sensor
DCI based (approx. 1.8x crop) or 16:9 based (approx. 1.85x crop)
at least 5760px wide, probably a few pixels more to accommodate DCI 4K and Photo 6K
the Micro4/3 portion and max resolution of the camera will be 20+MP, so the GH5 will be a "20+MP camera"
20+MP will be possibly the same pixel count and size as the E-M1 II

I also wrote about other possibilities including other resolutions like 6114px or even the scenarios of not choosing a multi-aspect sensor. Just like I also countered the idea of Panasonic straight out deceiving consumers with nothing like 6K in Photo 6K but just 18MP, which I find kind of odd since there is no need to Panasonic to deceive consumers and they haven't done anything like that ever before. Photo 6K is not the main feat of the GH5, it's 10-bit 422 and 4K 60fps, why mention 6000 x 3000px if they were simply going for 30fps full sensor burst?

There is always that possibility, but logically speaking that has to be less likely than going back to the GH line up roots of multi-aspect sensor. I mean, this line up was developed with multi-aspect in mind from the get go. But sure, this is still just speculation, but I like the odds of a multi-aspect sensor.

It's worth noting that the E-M1 II full announcement is quite imminent and giving that the E-M1 II will have the same 200mbps Full HD All-I codec as Panasonic already use, the full specs of the E-M1 might gives a few hints about whether or not Panasonic and Olympus are really partnering up or how deep they are sharing and developing technology, and of course, hints about the GH5 as well.

Brig

All this GH5 rummors farse is just a bunch of Bollocks!

Quite a dissapointment....albeit not unexpected move :(

First of all, Good Luck to Mr. Powell in his new adventure (I hope he will be trying to bring in some logic and common sense into corporate heads) and THANK YOU LPowell again, for everything YOU and OTHERS did so far for us, the actual users and clients of panasonic!

Second, good job panasonic, for bringing mr. Powell on board! It seems that after all, somebody on your team finnaly took off their ND's from their optics and unplugged their ears.

Now, rummor has it that Panason is "closely watching" this thread. Well in that case, pleaseeeeee READ ME CAREFULLY:

Interesting joke you pulled with this announcement (of nonexisting camera with undefined and as such wrong specs one year before it needs to hit the shelves of the stores?!?!?!?! Wtf?!?!??) demonstrates that you are either completely lost your mind and ths you are uncreative and don't know what the heck you should be doing next or you are completely lost you mind you are uncreative and you are trying to make us, your customers, into idiots! Which is very wrong and mean:(

You have us here discussing sensor size, ibishtisandthat, titfortat on a camera that suppose to show up possibly never..?!?! Well braaaaavooooo!!!! You realy know how to sugercoat your carrot. You realy know how to make a fool of someone.

But be ALERT!!! We are not aline in this riddle...

First I have a question to G/GX/GH development teams: In which company and what positions are you going to apply for your next job in spring of 2018? Older ones among you, how's your 401 and other pension plans?

No, I am not malicious, but with the job you do right now with GH5 and other crippled products you are planing to put out on market, expect that due to bad sales, panasonic eliminates camera production alltogether (like samsung) and focuses exclusively on making air conditions, battery chargers and toasters and coffeemakers. Therefore, in a year and half you might be probably jobless if you don't pay attention.

Why? Well, let me put it mildly: Would you buy GH5 if camera is the way it is now? Exaclty...you wouldn't. So what makes you think that we will?

Good Luck! Get Smart! Best Wishes!

mrbill

@Brig - I'm sure that friendly, well crafted letter to Panny will have them glued to this thread from now on

Vitaliy_Kiselev

First of all, Good Luck to Mr. Powell in his new adventure (I hope he will be trying to bring in some logic and common sense into corporate heads) and THANK YOU LPowell again, for everything YOU and OTHERS did so far for us, the actual users and clients of panasonic!

Who brought @LPowell on board? Or you mean @ driftwood ?

No, I am not malicious, but with the job you do right now with GH5 and other crippled products you are planing to put out on market, expect that due to bad sales, panasonic eliminates camera production alltogether (like samsung) and focuses exclusively on making air conditions, battery chargers and toasters and coffeemakers. Therefore, in a year and half you might be probably jobless if you don't pay attention.

Just strike ahead to scare them, right? :-) Or just in the bad mood today?

endotoxic

@Brig , i assume you are in a bad mood.

Your post is malicious, but what get me thinking is the real purpose of that post.

Reactions for Panasonic. Shit maybe you are a Panasonic guy seeking for more data.

Don bring Mr Driftwood on your comments, he for sure is someone that i think represents the spirit of this forum and an example of how interesting this website is.

GH5 will be fine because we are Hypernaturalised, we will buy it if we like it, and we know Panasonic as other companies are big fuckers relaying on maximum profit to make businesses.

Excuse me but your post is maybe one of the lamest post i have ever seen in my life. Its just my personal view.

endotoxic

@theSUBVERSIVE

Hey, you should write tech books, you have a lot but lots of imagination and creativity. Investing so much time in a camera that is not even here is counterproductive. But you have free will and thats fair.

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