The cam looks great, look at that huge list of improvements few posts above! I am sure it will tick many boxes with many people. I will not be buying it, as my upgrade cycles are very slow, and honestly, nothing revolutionary here, which is just common sense for a traditional company like Panny. I will be buying a Panasonic product soon though, the 14mm pancake to use with my GF2 :) If my GH2 breaks, I'll get another one, works really well for me and it will last me for some time to come. If blackmagic made a BMCC with a MFT sensor, that would be great, but in best case that is some 2 years off so... A lot can happen. I am not "switching to an HD 4:2:0 8-bit, I have had that since 2005, and latitude aside, GH2 still rocks in right hands.

I am pretty sure my next cam will be RAW, and I'll be able to store and edit the footage by then without headaches. I will probably be using the same lenses as well :) or maybe complementing them with a more "modern looking" manual set like Samyangs or, the way things are going Voigtlanders or SLR Magic. Maybe I'd get the GH3 if my GH2 went AWOL and the GH3 was hacked and at the same price point... But I take care of my stuff so unlikely.

Just my 2 cents, I really like the cam and there is something for everyone (admit it some juicy things). But I don't really like owning equipment - the lenses are good, because it's better to have a good set of FDs than renting whatever (prostituted) glass and being held responsible for it. GH2, however, costs very little (as does GH3) and all your team can have one and be ready to get to work right away. Otherwise, I am sure it is pretty much the same everywhere - here in Barcelona Alexa is 600-950€ a day and Red 1 is a few hundred to rent. If the client or the agency insist, you get that and use it. Most times shooting RAW is easier as all you have to worry about is exposure (although the lighting freelance guys here can suck real bad). Spanish clients can be so possesive and want the footage "to go" right away.

Just my point of view - I have an iPhone 4, 2 years ago I thought that phone was cool since it had an insanely high screen resolution. Then came 4S, and now the iPhone5. All I did is get a plastic protector, so my iPhone 4 can last me another 2 years until something I NEED comes out. Like @Vitaly said some weeks ago, I also think pretty soon serious features will become standard like RAW, 4K etc. You will get that when the manufacturers feel they have no other option, and it is only the question who will be the first to undercut the others.

All this may seem offtopic, but it is actually how I think all the time - do I need this, is this a waste etc.

And something else I must share - an aquaintaince of mine bought his first SLR today. A Canon 600D or whatever. OK, who buys a camera on the Photokina opening day - probably will be 20% less next week. When I mentioned this, He went online to see what Photokina is and was already depressed with the purchase because it is not full frame. :) I'll bet you he'll be getting an FF for Christmas, as the stock lens will be disappointing :)

This is how Canon makes money. Panny is just too sophisticated for these people who think they need an archaic camera with a MIRROR in it and a lens that looks like a scythe to be "pro". And so is Blackmagic. RED were right on money to make every screw look like it is taken out of an ICBM and mega-military. Same with Tilta from China. People are scared and need something intimidating. So it was good to see the GH3 buffed up and all serious today! Panny might have been screwing us with their 5-year plan, but then someone took note and gave them a run for their money! Any Panny pro video announcements? I'd love to see that! 4:2:2, 10-bit and 4:4:4 12-bit RAW "is clearly what differentiates us"..... save it!

All professional cameras store meta data. Look at the red. Each frame is still just a still image. There would be no difference in recording timecode, audio or meta data in the video file.

The first all-Intra 72Mbps 1080p25 file I've examined has the following properties:

1. High 5.0 profile, 8-bit 4:2:0 color depth.
2. Each Intra frame contains about 3Mbytes data
3. Both 8x8 and 4x4 quant matrices used in each I-frame

The all-Intra H.264 encoder uses 8x8 macroblocks to encode smooth, low-detail areas without noticeable banding or posterization. It uses 4x4 macroblocks to encode sharp edges and highly-detailed areas. The GH3 doesn't appear to lower its bitrate much with low-detail scenery, it looks like it's configured to encode at the highest quality it can within its 72Mbps bitrate. I suspect highly detailed scenes will force the encoder to use mostly 4x4 macroblocks, which would make it operate more like the GH2 AVCHD encoder hacked with a GOP-1 patch. In that case, the GH3's fixed 72Mbps bitrate may not be enough to maintain the highest possible image quality.

The funny guys are the ones who want RAW on a FF with photo lenses so they can make "art" of the sesame seed bun in the mcdonalds while badly recorded audio "narrates":) Enter your narration here (should include at least 5 instances of "like" in a sentence to qualify). I can see GH3 being a great tool out of the box - these products are not about "magic" they are efficient and very, very good!

@plasmasmp Don't know, I saw a lot of ugly blow out highlight in this video. I now feel that the video look a bit like af100 footage.

I think it's unrealistic to expect 13 stops type of DR. I was expecting about 11 stops. Some of the early reports is that it handles low light better. Perhaps they still don't have great highlight handling. IMO as long as I can expose for the highlights and they give me much improved lows then i'm good. As long as there's enough latitude to bring up the image in post and have a solid clean image then that's realistic to me. We'll have to wait and see just how far this image can be tweaked in camera and pushed in post.

@kellar42 it is how I look at most of my footage. 70% is taken away before we can even see it (Spain rocks, so they can blame the tech team if they don't like it- try to get a re-shoot LOL) Sharp is never the reason. Banding is never the reason. Crane movement is always commended, BUT someone's daughter walked into the frame too late as she was too busy... with other things. That is why this cam will not do me good. The footage needs to be smashing to laugh all the douchebags away right off the bat!

I am really excited about the wide dynamic range. there should be a comparison to gh2. i will try one tomorrow. :)

@mlysbakken i know, i know...but i have no time to watch it...:-(((( but nooow heheh !!!

@allenswrench True. But still if you are shooting a good planned fiction, RAW will give you some much room in the PP. Off course ProRes and DNxHD are a great options. @Aria we use DSLR because they are Small, versatile and CHEAP, this guys make a 4 minute movie with 30K of lens budget in it! That kind of kills it no?

Hi, I love that it's gh cameras are more of an evolution [sorta] rather than a revolution. Really, Arri was always that way, inching ahead and producing failsafe cameras.

Red - the revolution came along, just like a holy new ford passenger car, re-designed from the ground up, filmed rising up out of the lake for a tv ad... Red's great camera, nice images, but holy! can you get into technical hot water on location!

With the little gh2, I've always felt confident on a job, because everything works as advertised. Having a second or third body around is easy. Hats off to panasonic for listening and doing their best to produce a great new updated product that people will like. I hope I can get one asap. I just wonder where I should order from.

Thanks to the folks who made the effort to go to the trade show and to the filmmakers and photogs who tested the camera. (even if it was promotional material).

@danyyyel

By the way, i think that DR is improved in the black tones, i don't find highlight handling to be very good in pampuri's video.

@kholi yeah i feel the same thing, BMC its a great camera but it will force you to spend some extra bucks to pimp it up, even in Post. But its a RAW - ProRes - DNxHD camera. And it just amazes me how a small player can come up with a camera like that and all this big players can't... or won't... @Vitaliy_Kiselev should look into that camera :) Still i don't think i will ever sell my "old" GH2 VK pimped :)