"Panasonic G series" Owners Thread

woof woof said:
Remember to make sure that your camera is set to shoot without lens.
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I didn't know about that bit so I'll check that on my cameras. The adapter arrived today so I should be able to give the lenses a go tomorrow hopefully. :)
 
Tulipone said:
I prefer the 12-35 to primes, others will differ.

The LVF comes into its own when you are in sun.
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I just bought the 12-35mm for my GX1 a few weeks back.
Used it for the first time outside the house when I went to see the Cutty Sark in Greenwich.
It's pretty dimly light inside the cargo hold levels but the shots came out really well given the low level lighting. I suspect my 20mm would have performed better but some shots would not have been possible without the zoom.

The 20mm used to stay on my camera 90% of the time - I can foresee the 12-35mm now staying on 90% of the time! I was really unsure about buying the 12-35mm due to the high cost but I am so glad I did now.

I can also vouch for the LVF2 - have had one since last year and really makes a difference in the sun.
 
harry66 said:
I just bought the 12-35mm for my GX1 a few weeks back.
Used it for the first time outside the house when I went to see the Cutty Sark in Greenwich.
It's pretty dimly light inside the cargo hold levels but the shots came out really well given the low level lighting. I suspect my 20mm would have performed better but some shots would not have been possible without the zoom.

The 20mm used to stay on my camera 90% of the time - I can foresee the 12-35mm now staying on 90% of the time! I was really unsure about buying the 12-35mm due to the high cost but I am so glad I did now.

I can also vouch for the LVF2 - have had one since last year and really makes a difference in the sun.
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I'm trying to stay away from the 12-35. Do let me know when you get bored with it :D

Let's see those Cutty Sark pics!
 
laser8 said:
I'm trying to stay away from the 12-35. Do let me know when you get bored with it :D

Let's see those Cutty Sark pics!
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I have bought and then quickly sold many of my lenses over the years. But I suspect the 12-35mm won't be one of them...

Will upload the shots when I get some time at home.. Doing some boring code testing at work - hence the activity during the day...
 
harry66 said:
I have bought and then quickly sold many of my lenses over the years. But I suspect the 12-35mm won't be one of them....
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My thoughts entirely. I liked the GX1 and got an LVf to improve bright light photography. I got the 12-35 and not sure that I have taken it off since. Love it. Love the combination. Can't see me replacing for some time.
 
I managed some time out for the first time in weeks today but the lighting was grey and flat and 'orrible and despite trying to be creative I didn't really get a single keeper :shake:

I got a record shot of a wind farm under construction...

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a bit happier with this one from a distance...

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and interested to see running birdies at something like 120% crop...

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All Rokkor 28mm f2.8 @f8.
 
I have a couple of 135mm f3.5's but so far I've been unable to use them as the light has been so poor each time I took one of them out. As my G1 doesn't have IS I couldn't get usable shutter speeds for hend held shooting even when at f3.5 and ISO 1600.

It's just the luck of the draw I suppose that the days I've been free and able to get out have been the days with complete cloud cover and such flat and dull light.

I'm hoping to get to use a 135mm when/if the northern English weather and more importantly - light, improves.

I'll have a couple of hours free this afternoon but the lighting is just the same today :( and everything is just grey, dull and flat.
 
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I'm after a bit of advice. My wife is having a 40th birthday party on Saturday night (in a hall) and just wondering what people think are the best sort of settings to use to get decent pictures, and to try and capture the atmosphere in this sort of event. I will be using my G3 and either a 20mm prime or standard 14-45. Any advice?
Cheers
 
No expert on this stuff but I am no stranger to taking personal photos at family Asian weddings in a hall. If the place is not really well lit then I have always struggled to get nice clean photos without ramping the ISO up or using a flashgun - which introduces its own problem. However, since I bought my 20mm lens I have had much better results. The F1.7 means that I can get away without a flash under reasonable lighting conditions. Obviously, the lack of zoom means you have to move around much more to compose your shot. Also, not so easy to take candids - but then again the other lens you mention is 14-45 so not a huge zoom range anyway.

The last family wedding I was at I took about 300 photos and almost all of them were with the 20mm.
Currently uploading a few cake photos to http://www.flickr.com/photos/harryw66/ - all taken with the 20mm - in case you want to have a look.
 
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Nice shots there Harry :D

Mark, if the lighting is going to be low I'd go for the 20mm (f1.7?) When taking low light shots I'd shoot RAW and use aperture priority and auto ISO. My G1 seems to default to a shutter speed of 1/30 second when I use auto ISO so if yours does that and you think 1/30 may not be fast enough you may have to select a suitable ISO manually. Assuming you're not using flash.

Good luck with it.
 
woof woof said:
Nice shots there Harry :D

Mark, if the lighting is going to be low I'd go for the 20mm (f1.7?) When taking low light shots I'd shoot RAW and use aperture priority and auto ISO. My G1 seems to default to a shutter speed of 1/30 second when I use auto ISO so if yours does that and you think 1/30 may not be fast enough you may have to select a suitable ISO manually. Assuming you're not using flash.

Good luck with it.
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Many thanks, and to Harry.

Looks like it will be the 20mm and as suggested will probably have to set my own ISO to get desired shutter speed. If all goes well I may post a couple on here!
 
Just to prove I still actually use this camera...

I have been away to Japan for the last 2 weeks on business. Being 6ft 8in tall, I only ever travel hand luggage (there is no way I can find clothes to fit easily if I turn up somewhere remote without any luggage) so I stuffed the G5, 7-14, 12-35 and 35-100, spare battery, card and charger into my small cameras bag which fitted inside my shoulder bag I use for work. If I was still on Canon gear, I wouldn't have taken a decent camera - it would have been too big.

With a public holiday in the middle of the stay, I was able to do some travelling. I was staying in Osaka so bought a rail pass which enabled me to cover West Japan by Shinkansen (bullet train) easily. The following are some excerpts from the trip (yes, the ruined building is in Hirsohima - a totally moving and sobering day - visiting the museum there is a very emotional experience). Having used now used this setup on an extended trip (where I do most of my photography if I'm honest), I can say I am very, very happy with my move from full frame to micro 4/3rds... Also, I am in love with the 35-100 - it is a beautiful lens with a wonderful rendition (the 3 portrait shots were done at the long end of the 35-100).

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Fantastic shots Andy, the 7-14, 12-35 and 35-100 seems like a brilliant combo, pretty much all you could ever need for travel photography in a very compact space.
 
Thank you both. Yes, I'm rather pleased with them myself :) Even up at 100% I'm very pleased with the detail. The 3 lens combo is definitely recommended for travel.

I also took the 7.5mm fisheye. Didn't use it... In fact, I haven't bothered with a prime for some time now....
 
Amazing shots. I'd love to visit Japan.

I'm very interested in your thoughts on the 35-100. Have you tried other longer reach Panasonic lenses such as the 45-100 / 100-300? How does it compare?
 
Tulipone said:
I'm very interested in your thoughts on the 35-100. Have you tried other longer reach Panasonic lenses such as the 45-100 / 100-300? How does it compare?
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I've tried the 45-175 briefly (but not side by side). I am very happy with the 35-100 and have absolutely no regrets buying it (in fact it was the forthcoming availability of this lens that finally pushed me to move to micro 4/3rds from Canon FF). The Pro lenses just appear to work. No double images at certain shutter speeds, ability to hand hold quite slow shutter speed and no appreciable loss of image quality wide open (the 100mm end is supposed to be a bit less sharp, but it's perfectly OK for me).

The priest at 100mm, f2.8 and 100% crop:

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Or actually, probably a better example - the bride at 100% from the parasol shot:

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Andy, thanks. I went for the 12-35 a few months ago and really like it. Thinking maybe the 45-200 may need to go in favour of a better quality longer (than 35mm) range lens. Not cheap though is it!
 
Tulipone said:
Not cheap though is it!
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No... but then buy a decent 70-200 f2.8 for full frame.....

I was fortunate - I benefited from a Lumix Lifestyle members only offer which has now closed so I paid quite a bit less than retail for mine :D

I just don't compromise on lenses any more. I'm fortunate enough to be able to afford what I like within reason and have been frustrated in the past when I've got home and the lens has failed me in some way or other (not fast enough, not sharp enough etc...).
 
arad85 said:
Thank you both. Yes, I'm rather pleased with them myself :) Even up at 100% I'm very pleased with the detail. The 3 lens combo is definitely recommended for travel.

I also took the 7.5mm fisheye. Didn't use it... In fact, I haven't bothered with a prime for some time now....
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I guess it's impossible to know without jumping in, but I often think about whether the 35-100 would be a better option than my Oly 45/75 combo. Whilst the 45/75 is probably as good as gets, the zoom would obviously be quite a bit more flexible and would save frequent lens changes.
 
ukaskew said:
the zoom would obviously be quite a bit more flexible and would save frequent lens changes.
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I've come to the conclusion you are either a prime person or zoom person. I'm a zoom person. Whilst I will use primes, they are just not versatile enough for me and I trade speed and some sharpness for the ability to frame as I want (I still get it wrong, but...). Some people are DoF freaks - I've come to the conclusion I'm not. I really should just sell the primes I have.
 
arad85 said:
I've come to the conclusion you are either a prime person or zoom person. I'm a zoom person. Whilst I will use primes, they are just not versatile enough for me and I trade speed and some sharpness for the ability to frame as I want (I still get it wrong, but...). Some people are DoF freaks - I've come to the conclusion I'm not. I really should just sell the primes I have.
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I have had a number of the slower zoom lenses in the past but seemed to use my 20mm 95% of the time due to the f1.7 advantages in sub-optimal light conditions. However, since acquiring the 12-35mm I suspect I will be using the 20mm less and less. I am hoping the OIS will go part of the way to compensate for the slower speed. Certainly, my recent use inside the Cutty Sark suggests the 12-35mm will be quick enough for most situations.
Next on my list the 35-100mm to replace the (rarely used) 45-200mm -but given the price will be long wait :(
 
I spent an hour experimenting with the G5s AF tracking yesterday. I didn't go into too much depth as it was freezing, so rarely wanted to remove my gloves to mess around, but I was pleasantly surprised.

With the G3 I never got AFC working to a satisfactory level, it wouldn't refocus anywhere near quick enough on a moving car, and seemed to just slow the camera down. Shooting with the G5 yesterday it was immediately apparent that things have improved quite substantially, AFS was awful for moving subjects (as it should be) but AFC really kept up far better than I expected, I headed to the fastest part of the circuit (150mph+ for some cars) and it worked nearly as well as DSLRs I've owned.

I need to play around with the AF Tracking to see if that could be of any use (it wasn't on the G3), I just used 1-Area AF with the smallest size box and that seemed to work nicely.


Audi R8 V10 - Castle Combe BHP Trackday by Harry_S, on Flickr

The above was with the 75mm 1.8, oddly the whole camera seemed to speed up when using that compared to the Panasonic 100-300, everything seemed 'snappier', although I'm not sure why that would be the case.
 
ukaskew said:
everything seemed 'snappier', although I'm not sure why that would be the case.
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Autofocus is probably a lot quicker with the prime. There'll also be a lot more light on the sensor too which might make readout quicker (less time to get to an acceptable amount of light to autofocus with)....
 
The panny 20mm did me proud at the wife's 40th birthday party last night. Here's one of the birthday girl!
[
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arad85 said:
Just to prove I still actually use this camera...

I have been away to Japan for the last 2 weeks on business. Being 6ft 8in tall, I only ever travel hand luggage (there is no way I can find clothes to fit easily if I turn up somewhere remote without any luggage) so I stuffed the G5, 7-14, 12-35 and 35-100, spare battery, card and charger into my small cameras bag which fitted inside my shoulder bag I use for work. If I was still on Canon gear, I wouldn't have taken a decent camera - it would have been too big.

With a public holiday in the middle of the stay, I was able to do some travelling. I was staying in Osaka so bought a rail pass which enabled me to cover West Japan by Shinkansen (bullet train) easily. The following are some excerpts from the trip (yes, the ruined building is in Hirsohima - a totally moving and sobering day - visiting the museum there is a very emotional experience). Having used now used this setup on an extended trip (where I do most of my photography if I'm honest), I can say I am very, very happy with my move from full frame to micro 4/3rds... Also, I am in love with the 35-100 - it is a beautiful lens with a wonderful rendition (the 3 portrait shots were done at the long end of the 35-100).
Click to expand...

Andy these are fantastic, truly beautiful and I hate you :)

That 3 lens combo is so great, wish I invested in less glass, and included the 12-35 and 35-100 now.
 
ShrubMonkey said:
Andy these are fantastic, truly beautiful and I hate you :)

That 3 lens combo is so great, wish I invested in less glass, and included the 12-35 and 35-100 now.
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I think I am now waiting for another Panasonic offer to discount the price of the 35-100, still a tad too rich for me. That said, after getting the 12-35 I understand why you lot spend so much on lenses.
 
ShrubMonkey said:
Andy these are fantastic, truly beautiful and I hate you :)

That 3 lens combo is so great, wish I invested in less glass, and included the 12-35 and 35-100 now.
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Why thank you Julian... Without wishing to blow sunshine up your ...., the photos you post are stunning, so I take that as a huge complement - thank you :D

As a travel set, those 3 lenses are superb. Seriously: absolutely NO regrets about moving from a 5D2 to this.
 
What was the previous offer from Panasonic on the lens, out of interest?
 
That's a good price.

Wish I had the time and the lighting to take some pictures :(
 
arad85 said:
30% off. I paid £630 through Lumix Lifestyle.
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So, how did you find out about the offer? Did you get a Lumix email or just happened to visit the site when it was on?

I have been a member of the Lumix site for a while now, get various emails but never noticed one mentioning the offers - unless I am not reading them thoroughly enough..
 
harry66 said:
So, how did you find out about the offer? Did you get a Lumix email or just happened to visit the site when it was on?
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It was announced on the site... not via e-mails. It was a limited offer (50 lenses).
 
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