GH3 Why Does G6 have Focus Peaking but not the GH3?

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Ianscreations

Well-known member
I still can't believe the GH3 does not have focus peaking. This is the number one issue with this camera for me. I am shocked that the G6 can do focus peaking and include many features found in the GH3, for about half the price. Do you think we will ever see peaking without a hack?
 
Good question. There is hope that the next firmware update will add it. Panny keeps hinting that it *might* be coming in a firmware update. Seeing it on the G6 actually makes that seem like it could be more of a reality.
 
Yea, it's really silly. Hopefully peaking, zebras, and no disappearing screen info will be added in a firmware update.

As far as I know, Vitaly's hack has never added functionality or features (like Magic Lantern does), it's just upped the encoder performance. Not sure why this is, probably just a lack of time or manpower to put towards it. Or maybe Panasonic's firmware can't be modified in those ways as easily as the Canons.
 
blazer003 said:
Good question. There is hope that the next firmware update will add it. Panny keeps hinting that it *might* be coming in a firmware update. Seeing it on the G6 actually makes that seem like it could be more of a reality.
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I light a candle for that.... :-)
 
Ianscreations said:
I am shocked that the G6 can do focus peaking and include many features found in the GH3 for about half the price
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...And I am sure the G7 will have features that the GH4 doesn't have.

Progress moves on, gear generally gets better over time. Why does any of this have to prevent you from shooting what you want?

Yes, this would be a nice feature to have but the camera is still very functional without focus peaking.
 
TheDingo said:
...And I am sure the G7 will have features that the GH4 doesn't have.

Progress moves on, gear generally gets better over time. Why does any of this have to prevent you from shooting what you want?

Yes, this would be a nice feature to have but the camera is still very functional without focus peaking.
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+1
 
TheDingo said:
...And I am sure the G7 will have features that the GH4 doesn't have.

Progress moves on, gear generally gets better over time. Why does any of this have to prevent you from shooting what you want?

Yes, this would be a nice feature to have but the camera is still very functional without focus peaking.
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Obligatory "there won't be a GH4" post :)
 
Fresno Bob said:
Obligatory "there won't be a GH4" post :)
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...But Nikon made the D4.

So maybe somebody needs to make a "Camera of Death" horror flick, where unsuspecting film-makers are slowly killed off one by one as they try to enable the GH4 peaking function. ;-)
 
Because the G6 is a year newer than the GH3 and Panasonic decided they should add it based on the feedback from the GH3. Technology advances and newer models tend to improve certain functions even if that means a lower end model may do one thing better than the higher end model. We this happen all the time with technology and this is nothing new.

Firmware is not as flexible as some people think it is. You cannot usually just add in a complex new feature with a snap of the fingers. Peaking is not going to be an easy thing to add to a firmware and camera that was not designed to handle it. Maybe it can be done but Panasonic has to make sure it is stable and isn't going to affect the performance in a negative way. The thing is nobody but Panasonic can know if it is even physically possible with the current firmware.
 
TheDingo said:
...And I am sure the G7 will have features that the GH4 doesn't have.

Progress moves on, gear generally gets better over time. Why does any of this have to prevent you from shooting what you want?

Yes, this would be a nice feature to have but the camera is still very functional without focus peaking.
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Dingo, I didn't say it prevents me from shooting what I want nor that the camera is not functional without peaking. And while I welcome progress, I feel this move is slightly from the Apple play book: controlled iterative updates that to some appear to be deliberately withheld. We are talking about a 'lesser' camera that offers this major video feature when it's bigger brother is barely 6 months on the market.
 
From reading around, the excuse seems to be that the G6 and the GH3 use different chips. The G6 basically uses a GH2 chip and with that chip you are able to get peaking, whereas with the GH3 chip you can't. Now, I don't know if that's true or not, but Panasonic managers were making noises to the effect that the lack of these features is a hardware limitation in the GH3. So you have to examine what's due to the chip - for example, the GH2 chip was able to handle multi-aspect ratios whereas the GH3 can't. But note, interestingly, that even though the G6 is supposed to have the same chip as the GH2, the G6 doesn't have multi-aspect ratio capability.

Bottom line - it's a mix of software and hardware. Since both are different between the G6 and the GH3, you'll have different things you can implement. So you have to decide what's important to you and go with that. For example, I'd love for the GH3 (and G6!) to have the same multi-aspect ratio that the GH2 has, but there you go - and I'd rather take another stop in DR because that's more important to me, so it's a tradeoff.

Progress never stops, but features have already been shot on hacked GH2, so I'm sure that whatever the successor to the GH3 will be, should be more and better... but not always - f.ex. it seems that the GH3 represents backsliding compared to the GH2 in at least a few respects, such as the previously mentioned multi-aspect ratio capability, as well as having arguably worse moire. So it's a mixed bag. For the GH(4?), I'd personally like to actually get what I thought we'd be getting in the GH3 - at least as good moire and less jello, the supposed better DR which is really hard to pin-point (yes, claims are made, but the evidence is thin on the ground), and definitely better sensitivity as there's been no real progress in low-light ability. I don't think that this is what the G6 represents - even if it's a definite improvement in some respects.
 
Regardless of the reasons after the fact, it was simply a stupid omission on their flag ship "video" DSLR.
It doesn't reflect well on the development team.
We use two GH3s and everyday the lack of peaking makes them far less than the camera they should be.
Simply stupid.
 
jimagine said:
Regardless of the reasons after the fact, it was simply a stupid omission on their flag ship "video" DSLR.
It doesn't reflect well on the development team.
We use two GH3s and everyday the lack of peaking makes them far less than the camera they should be.
Simply stupid.
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Agreed 100%. That said, I suppose there's a reason why people use monitors, even for full-featured video cams like the AF100. I'd love to have all sorts of features on the GH3, but on that little screen, it's not optimal under the best of circumstances... a waveform function is going to be more useful on an 8" than on a 3" screen, and if you want to keep the GH reasonable size you'll never get a bigger LCD screen than about 3-4", so be that as it may, you'll still need a monitor. And once you have a monitor, you can have all the feature functions your heart desires.
 
jimagine said:
Regardless of the reasons after the fact, it was simply a stupid omission on their flag ship "video" DSLR.
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...I am more annoyed that the GH3 shows more moire than the GH2 does, as this is something that is difficult to fix in post and may mean cutting some shots or a reshoot to get rid of it.
 
TheDingo said:
...I am more annoyed that the GH3 shows more moire than the GH2 does, as this is something that is difficult to fix in post and may mean cutting some shots or a reshoot to get rid of it.
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The problem you have is those Panasonic lenses...... Slr Magic lenses have never given me Moire....
 
J.F.R. said:
The problem you have is those Panasonic lenses...... Slr Magic lenses have never given me Moire....
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No it's the new GH3 sensor that's the cause of the moire. If I switch back to using the GH2 body with the same lenses the moire disappears.
 
All the people complaining are current gh3 owners, but those of us waiting to see how things shook out are now pleased that the g6 shook out .
 
TheDingo said:
No it's the new GH3 sensor that's the cause of the moire. If I switch back to using the GH2 body with the same lenses the moire disappears.
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While it is true that the new GH3 will cause moire and aliasing vs the GH2, it is also true that the Panasonic 12-35mm enhances this by being a Very very sharp lens, tested by myself many times. Slr Magic lenses never cause moire, go use one on your GH3 and it will not happen.
 
J.F.R. said:
The problem you have is those Panasonic lenses...... Slr Magic lenses have never given me Moire....
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Moire originates with the sensor not the lens. A softer lens may minimize the effect of moire, but it is still coming off the sensor.

In my experience, shooting all sharp Lumix glass, moire is nonexistent if All-I is avoided.
 
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