@endotoxic

My rant is about to much years for so little improvement in DR, come on!

Well, if you understand how sensors work, why you ask so much from sensor of same size?

The only was to rise DR in normal brightly lit situation is to lower noise as your well capacity is more or less fixed.

And in GH5 we have so much asked sensor stabilization, and it means thermal noise rise.

As we'll get GH5 we make sure to make thermal videos of sensor after long shooting session and compare it to GH4 and GH3.

cos for my understanding we dont need so much back prossesing at 480fps. so why so much noise then, i dont undestand why so many improvements but no DR from that sensor, well capaciti can be improved by lowering resolution.

Minimum resolution they could have is 4K, but as 90% of buyers still shoot videos only from time to time it means big reduction in sales. Proper scaling actually is within few percent of lower native resolution.

We have FAQ item on this - http://www.personal-view.com/faqs/camera-usage/general-camera-usage-faq#more-megapixels-is-worse-isn-t

@caveport - on the GH4 you can enable Syncro scan when using VFR so would assume you could just as well on the GH5 (another example of why Panasonic needs to get the GH5 in the hands of people who know what they're doing to avoid terrible footage like this!)- My C2 setting on my GH4 has synchro-scan enabled w/ shutter at 1/119.99 sec (closest I can get to 1/120) and 1080 96fps conforming to 23.98p 1080 since I am based in US and our flicker is on a 60Hz cycle - which is kind of beauty with 180 FPS in North America, you should be able to use a 1/180 shutter if needed for most light possible when shooting at 180fps and as a factor of 60, should cancel out most if not all flicker. Rest of world could do same with 150fps (1/150 sec shutter) with 50Hz electricity - or just bump shutter to 1/200.

It seems like improvements in the dynamic range of Micro 4/3 sensors are happening at about the same pace as for other sensor sizes like APS-C.

For example, if you look at the sensor DR numbers from DxOMark:

Micro 4/3

• Panasonic GH2 (released 2010): 11.3 stops
• Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II (released 2016): 12.8 stops
• Improvement: 1.5 stops

APS-C

• Sony NEX-5 (released 2010): 12.2 stops
• Sony a6500 (released 2016): 13.7 stops
• Improvement: 1.5 stops

So basically in 6 years we have seen an increase of 1.5 stops of dynamic range.

It's true that the APS-C cameras are about 1 stop better than the Micro 4/3 cameras of the same generation, but that's roughly what you might expect given the larger sensor size.

@davedv @caveport I dont understand one thing - are BM sensors gifts of god or aliens from another planet with their 13-15 steps? Im shure they soon will make compact camera from their cropped 4,6k sensor. Even x5s mft cam for copters can make 13 steps and 5k, and shoot in prores 4444xq + raw.

BM sensors are 12 stops for Cinema cameras and 15 stops (barely) for Ursa. The Ursa body is twice the price of a GH5 with lens. It's time people realised that comparing a dedicated movie camera to a still camera with video options is just plain old f**ing ridiculous. I have seen the images from the x5s and colour graded them on a professional job. The specs look great but the images needed way more work than a GH4 or GH5. There is more to a camera than specs!

@davedv all that numbers means nothing. You wrote that nex-5 has 12.2 stops))) Just look on footage and you will see big difference between gh4 and pocket/bmcc dr and color, and HUGE difference between gh4 and ursa 4,6k. A7s log is not usable because of 8bit (marketing).

@1917, " I do not know any guy who bought gh4 for photo"

I bought two GH4's for both photo and video work. :)

@1917

Some people here dont understand that DR can be higher on m4/3 sensors. Then as you said BMPCC "is black magic". Cos when i have worked on those cameras, the sensor size on it throw me more than GHs series. Even on 10 bit. and m4/3 is bigger sensor that super 16.

There are lots of specs to consider but when you look at the image from a Sony 6500 or 6300 and compare it to any Panasonic there's a small but present IQ gap. I would have switched over at the latest upgrade round but I can't deal with the overheating, plus I have a boatload of lenses....

@Scot

yup i do only video. Though my company represents some pro fashion photographers. Neither of them use m4/3.

I use gh4 for small projects and do some pictures from the same work at the same time. That is the advantage of the system.

Personaly the format of the sensor is good enough for video even i have a thread about why i think is the best format cos is the same size of your retina.

But for Photography you encounter real best results from bigger sensors.

BUT I RECOGNISE IF m4/3 sensor tech could be applied on full frame size, we would have an exelent results. Better than current ff senzors I Think

@endotoxic

Any modern interchangeable lens large(r) sensor digital camera is good enough most professional photographic applications, including the MFT format, since it gives you very large set of creative controls and generally very good image quality, except for certain very narrow and specialised applications . Mind you, the 135 film format, frequently addressed as the 'full frame' today, was created as news gathering, more portable, cheaper compromise to the 120 and large format photo standard, and the same issue always persists, what is 'enough' im the compromise.

The situation that we have, statement that MFT is not pro format in photography comes more from the artificial gaps and margins created by the industry, than by the real value and capabilities of the gear. So without precise definition of the specific situation where the MFT cameras underperform, and how exactly, it is mostly generalisation.