Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsPowerhouse flagship of the Panasonic M43 line, packing incredible value, design, quality & features.
Reviewed in the United States on December 28, 2019
After exhaustive research, I decided to go with this camera above even its "full-frame" and APS-C competitors. The 80MP RAW hi-res mode was a big part of it, and as a fine art landscape photographer, I've been using that mode very heavily. I have one of the custom buttons on the camera set to activate it when pressed and have made probably 90+% of my images with this camera using that mode. It also creates a 20MP file as well, just in case you need it for anything. I'm used to waiting for the leaves to stop blowing around before exposing, as I shoot a lot of film and long exposures with my other cameras, so the motion limitation wasn't a big deal, and neither was the tripod requirement.
The ergonomics and menu design on this camera are leagues better than the competing cameras, especially Sony, who's menus seem to have been programmed by a drunk engineer after too much overtime. Compared to Olympus, they are far better as well. The menus are very intuitive and easy to figure out as well as customize. You can also configure most of the buttons and knobs on the camera to do anything you want, which is great and truly allows you to make the camera your own by setting it up exactly how you want it.
The size is rather large for a Micro 4/3rds camera, but for a good reason: it makes the camera meld with your hand like it was custom molded to do so. I have held a lot of Sony and Olympus cameras, as well as Fujifilm, and they all felt like greased bricks in my hand compared to this thing. Panasonic seems to have really put a lot of thought into the placement of controls, the weighting and balancing, and even the texture of the grip. The camera feels extremely well balanced and secure in the hand. I feel like I could shoot all day without fatigue, which is a lot more than I can say for most of the other many cameras I've used. Ergonomics matter, design matters, balance matters, and in each category, Panasonic hit home runs with this camera.
The 4:3 aspect ratio is another thing people never seem to talk about. I vastly prefer 4:3 to the very wide and almost unwieldy 2:3 ratio found in most other cameras. Again, I shoot a lot of film, and this is much closer to the aspect ratios of medium and large format cameras, which were created for a very good reason: they both look more balanced in either orientation and tend to be easier to work with, in both print publications and framing applications. For this reason, I tend to crop 2:3 images anyway, so I would compare the native 20MP size to a 24-26MP APS-C or full-frame camera. In that sense, if you crop down to a 4:3 aspect ratio often, you have about the same resolution. Regardless of this, the actual resolving power tends to be about the same as a 24-26MP APS-C or full-frame camera, as thanks to the aspect ratio difference, you are basically just trimming off the sides of of the frame while retaining about the same vertical resolution if that makes sense. So the 20MP thing is more of an aspect ratio difference than an actual difference in resolution when compared to 24-26MP cameras.
I have found noise at high ISOs to not be a significant issue, though you do get some noise at the higher ISOs in low light, it tends to have a fairly pleasing look to it, much like film grain. I routinely shoot at up to ISO 640 to freeze motion, and many others use it up to around 6400 without issue. Of course, if you routinely shoot weddings in dark venues or something like that, you might either want to invest in a full-frame body like the S1/S1R (basically the same camera with a bigger sensor) or just get some of the excellent M43 fast max aperture lenses that are readily available. The camera does an excellent job in low light at high ISOs, especially compared to even full-frame bodies from a few years ago, but obviously, each tool has its strengths and weaknesses so pick the best setup for your intended use case.
AF speed isn't something I use, so I'll refrain from saying much on this except that this camera is incredibly fast and focuses immediately, even when slewing from front to back of a scene at 100mm/200mm equivalent. It's quick.
The video features are class-leading, right up there with the GH5, thanks to the new 2.0 firmware update, which added 10-bit and HDR/HLG support. There is also an activation code you can get to enable vectorscopes and waveforms. The mic jack is very wisely placed in a spot where you can have an L-bracket or cage mounted and still reach the port without having to reach through the bracket. It also does not block the display when you have the screen flipped around in selfie mode. This sort of stuff sets Panasonic head and shoulders above so many other camera companies who seem to routinely overlook real-world use details like these.
Overall, this is the best-designed camera I've ever owned, and I've owned and used a ton of cameras over the years as both a pro-level photographer and YouTuber with many years of experience. I would buy this camera again and recommend it in a heartbeat.
