Panasonic Removable Lens Four Thirds HD AVCHD Camera

Not only is it subjective, it also depends on your situation, your shooting style, your subject and your process.

Nice thing about Canon dumping the FD is that now there are a lot of FD lenses on the secondary market at a discount... to use on the GH1.

For someone who already has a 5D, it seems like it would be worth waiting a year to see what the market is like, if the 5D is meeting your needs. I'm expecting there to not be significant compromises in image quality for the GH1 vs the 5D. The main reason I'll likely buy a GH1 over the 5D is due to the control and shooting format, etc. (EG: 24fps rather than 30). But that's not necessarily a compelling reason to get rid of the 5D and buy a GH1.

That and DSLRs are just really so much bigger than it seems they would need to be. The smaller formfactor of micro-4/3s is an advantage to me.
 
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And on and on and on we go. It is basically pointless to compare one camera with another and another. The best thing to do, when it becomes available in your area, is go out and test the new GH1 yourself, then you can see with your very eyes how is working for you. Another thing is why bother transcoding the original AVCHD to anything? Just dump the thing in the NLE and edit the original. Oh, you can't do it in your NLE?, well then get one that does it.
 
John Caballero said:
And on and on and on we go. It is basically pointless to compare one camera with another and another. The best thing to do, when it becomes available in your area, is go out and test the new GH1 yourself, then you can see with your very eyes how is working for you. Another thing is why bother transcoding the original AVCHD to anything? Just dump the thing in the NLE and edit the original. Oh, you can't do it in your NLE?, well then get one that does it.
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Well, Its sitting on the shelf here in Tokyo, in fact its collecting dust. Its been out since friday on display at all the major electronic stores and I haven't seen anyone else besides me checking it out and I've been in everyday. Its a cool little camera from what I shot in store (on the stores card so don't have sample footage sorry) Full manual controls on aperture and shutter speed controlled by a dial located on front right hand grip by index finger are nice. Wish they had let me take it outside.
 
I once heard somewhere that Roxio Toast will take AVCHD and pull the H.264 video out of it (without re-encoding) and convert the audio to AAC and make a standards complaint MP4 file of your footage.

This may solve the NLE issues, as without re-encoding the video it goes very fast and would incur no quality loss.
 
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Well, Its sitting on the shelf here in Tokyo, in fact its collecting dust.
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I guess the recession is taking its toll. Thats a lot of money for a family camera for many regular folk. Just tell Panasonic to send them back here ASAP.
 
kubalsky said:
Well, Its sitting on the shelf here in Tokyo, in fact its collecting dust. Its been out since friday on display at all the major electronic stores and I haven't seen anyone else besides me checking it out and I've been in everyday.
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Send 'em all to the States!!! :happy: With English text/menu, please.
 
John Caballero said:
I guess the recession is taking its toll. Thats a lot of money for a family camera for many regular folk. Just tell Panasonic to send them back here ASAP.
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Its kinda an odd product for the market segment. Its really a video-centric camera that's competing against the dSLRs, and ~$1,500 is a lot; its priced in Nikon D300, Oly E3, Canon 50D territory.
I think the average vacationer is happy with the video on their point-and-shoot cameras, and for other people paying a $900 premium just for video over the G1 kit (which is around $600 in Japan now) is an unattractive proposition. The people that can appreciate the GH1's attributes are few and far between- probably concentrated in this forum.

Personally, I think they should have gone for a 'range-finder' body style, like the Panasonic L1, to differentiate itself from the entry-level dSLRs.
But the price problem is biggest issue, the 14-140mm HD lens is expensive, it costs ~$800(￥84,840 ) separately and is a major contributor to the camera's high-price. Perhaps Panasonic should have also made a 'entry-level' HD lens for video like a 14-50mm that can do AF in video and priced camera at ~$900 for a GH1 kit.
 
hi Kubalski, I read someone else posting that they couldn't access English menus on the Japanese model. Could you tell us if this is the case? I mean, maybe that poster could not access it because, well, you would need to know Japanese to find the language option, OR the camera actually doesn't allow you to do that.

If it can be changed, I need to find a Japanese friend that is planning a round trip back home...:)
 
Steve Castle said:
But the price problem is biggest issue, the 14-140mm HD lens is expensive, it costs ~$800(￥84,840 ) separately and is a major contributor to the camera's high-price. Perhaps Panasonic should have also made a 'entry-level' HD lens for video like a 14-50mm that can do AF in video and priced camera at ~$900 for a GH1 kit.
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Yeah, I wish they just gave it cheaper prime lens and let people upgrade themselves but I guess people want zooms these days.
Btw, the autofocus is super fast on this thing. It seemed faster than the Nikon D700 that was on display nearby.
 
The Japanese model is only in Japanese, The fellow who picked mine up confirmed it. (and he speaks way better Japanese than he does english!) Maybe later on though you could update it with english firmware?
 
Steve is right, it costs more than high-end consumer camcorders (the HF S10 is $1300, others less), 2+x the price of the visually nearly identical G1, and more than the D90, T1i, and others that seem more substantial, have large sensors with the ever popular more 'megapixels', and to some will seem not as sharp as a $600 SX1 point and shoot.

The video is appreciated by those who clamor for a 5DM2, which is pretty close to sold out. However, the manual controls are offset by the weaker compression and at over twice the price the 5DM2 generally sells in much smaller numbers. Also, the 5DM2 is priced equivalently to still cameras with the same features. The GH-1 is 2.5x the price as the still image equivalent G-1.

If the HDMI was before in camera detail reduction then there may be hope. If there is no live HDMI or it is after the camera removes the higher frequency detail then...

Note: the sole advantage of oversampling is capturing that higher frequency detail.

Note 2: The images may look very similar to a EX1 with all edge sharpening turned off.
 
The Intern said:
hi Kubalski, I read someone else posting that they couldn't access English menus on the Japanese model. Could you tell us if this is the case? I mean, maybe that poster could not access it because, well, you would need to know Japanese to find the language option, OR the camera actually doesn't allow you to do that.

If it can be changed, I need to find a Japanese friend that is planning a round trip back home...:)
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There are no english options in the mennu. Apparently it's specifically so people won't do what you're talkng bout. LoL
 
Not really- the lumix series cameras have symbols for most menu settings- you dont really need the text to understand what your adjusting.
 
Awesome, so you are good to go, Hunter! Checked out your reel, nice work. What cam did you use in the Go west shoot? I want a similar look for my Questfest entry and am shooting on a Nikon D90.
 
Just an FYI: If you haven't already seen it, Panasonic has posted some documentation in English for the GH1 on their global website:
http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/dsc/index.html

I haven't found an English version of the GH1 user manual yet (if anyone knows where it's hidden, please post a link!), but the Japanese-language version of the GH1 user manual is available as a PDF via the following link (Note: It's a 75MB file via a s-l-o-w connection!):
http://dl-ctlg.panasonic.jp/manual/2009/dmc_gh1k.pdf

Among other things, a few of the illustrations in the Japanese user manual might be useful for those of us who only read English.

If anyone here reads Japanese, please let us know whether or not the manual says the GH1's HDMI port can output "live" full HD video all the time or not -- the relevant pages might be around p. 144-147?

For the past several weeks I've been posting GH1-related info, pics & links in a thread on the Cinematography.com website. I'm doing my best to keep it up-to-date as information concerning the camera becomes available:
http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?showtopic=37701

Your comments & questions in reaction to that thread are welcome.

I'm looking forward to assisting Hunter when he tests his new GH1 in a few days. "Looking forward to" is putting it mildly!

I'm new here on DVXUser, but I've been a long-time lurker. If I've broken any forum rules already, please let me know. :happy:

- Peter
www.peterdv.com
 
If I have to buy a GH1 with a lens I don't want, that's bumping £800 on the price then forget it. Why don't they make it available body-only, like other "DSLR"s, then you can add whatever lens you want. My choice if I went that route would be Voigtlander primes and a Leica zoom, (With real calibrated rings, 3 of them) all bought S/H.
As it is, where a 5DII scores for me is the QT MOV file format, which I can import as DNxHd 145, or even 220x and the fact that I could just P/Ex my 5D body for a 5DII body. Ah well, wait and see, financially I'll have to anyway.
 
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