5 Comments for Panasonic DMC-GH1 12MP Four Thirds Interchangeable Lens Camera with 1080p HD Video

• 1. H. Massey  |  November 18th, 2009 at 7:48 pm

  This camera has a lot of promise, but Panasonic has hobbled it with a low data rate. On top of that, HDMI is not live during recording. It’s a shame because so many were looking forward to the promise of this camera.

  Wait to buy when and if Panasonic decides to fix this camera.

  UPDATED 08/26/09: Would three stars be more appropriate?

  It seems my opinion upset people. So much so that I was called a “jerk” and a “baby”. Deemed “immature and irresponsible”. Accused of “working for the competition”.

  First, the GH1 is capable of shooting great video. Go see some of the best (most watched) at Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/groups/gh1/videos/sort:plays

  Beautiful stuff by talented people. I amend my rating to three stars. Hell, footage shot by Philip Bloom, Kholi and that German carnival Matzeb shot deserve four just because the pictures are very pretty.

  The camera is well built and has a nice form factor. It has a very good, albeit slow, zoom lens designed for video. All positives.

  BUT

  There are issues with compression / mud that don’t exist with other cameras. It is there. Download that some of that beautiful Vimeo footage to avoid the recompression. Start looking though and read the comments. Compression is an issue. The data rate could be better; AVCHD allows for up to 24mbps. The GH1 is 17mbps.

  Don’t just take my opinion:

  Stu Maschwitz: http://twitter.com/5tu/status/1757568131
  
  “Looking at some GH1 sample clips now. The compression artifacting is pretty nasty.”

  Phillip Bloom: http://vimeo.com/groups/gh1/videos/4432196
  
  “Wish codec was stronger….17mbps bit stingy.”

  What about the ten page petition to address the camera’s weaknesses?: http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=173291

  As to my expectations being unfair comparing the GH1 to equipment costing “10 times as much”. This is hardly the case. The Panasonic TZ7 ($400) uses AVCHD, as well, but has a slightly better and more efficient compression scheme. The Canon HDV and HFS consumer video cameras record nice images and have live video out via HDMI. So is the GH1 incapable or purposely hobbled due to market segmentation?

  The anger over this truly baffles me. I attacked no one personally. I didn’t call GH1 buyers / owners suckers. I didn’t say you were worse than Hitler. I stated a point of view about an inanimate object that I felt fell short of expectations.

  My one star rating may not have been apt, accurate or warranted. It was not, however, “inappropriate” as many of the responses to my opinion have actually been.
  Rating: 1 / 5

• 2. David A. Flores  |  November 18th, 2009 at 7:50 pm

  Panasonic DMC-GH1 12MP Four Thirds Interchangeable Lens Camera with 1080p HD Video

  i give the product 5 starts because i believe its legit, but ive been following the Panasonic Lumix GH1 for quite a while now and i noticed that recently the price just shot up 1000 dollars, why is this? i think its a boat load of bs, but come on, really amazon? you used to be cool
  Rating: 5 / 5

• 3. Moe Greene  |  November 18th, 2009 at 10:25 pm

  Everything about this camera spec-wise is very attractive. I really like the size, the range of the lens, the versatility of the video, etc., but when it came right down to it, the image quality and performance of the camera/lens combo for still images was pretty bad, especialy indoors. First, the lens is quite slow. Combine this with a very weak flash, and you have a lot of trouble getting a properly exposed picture indoors. Wehn you use auto ISO, the camera stubbornly keeps the ISO at 100. The camera always selects a slow shutter speed (1/30 or 1/40) instead of upping the ISO. If you are content to use all manual settings, it is posible to get a well-exposed indoor shot, but with the auto modes, forget about it. Outdoors the image quality is pretty good, but nowhere near the quality from a standard sized DSLR like a D90.

  So after using the camera for a couple weeks, I sold it. Even thought the D90 is considerably bigger, the small size of the GH1 is not worth the trade-offs to me.
  Rating: 2 / 5

• 4. J. Janca  |  November 18th, 2009 at 10:35 pm

  First, I will be fair to the GH1 camera. Coming from a 1DSMKIII and 5D, the little GH1 was easy to get used to design-wise, and I felt the quality of the pictures were very good at lower ISOs. The kit lens actually looks sharper at wider focal lengths then my Canon 24-70 2.8 L, though the tele side is pretty soft. You can carry this thing around and not even feel it. But it is not built like a professional camera, even a semi-pro one. I’ve owned mine for 1 day shy of two weeks and already the i-bolt (don’t know the real name) that is physically attached to cameras side where the camera strap is supposed to connect to popped off. This is a major problem as it happened while the camera was around my neck. Luckily I felt the camera slip and was able to catch it before it fell. Others might be less fortunate if this problem turns out to be a design or manufacturing defect because in addition to the potential for the camera to drop off your neck at any moment, the connector that attaches to the i-bolt inside the camera is now off floating around inside the body somewhere… if its metal and it connects with a circuit board this could get ugly.

  I hope this does not happen to anyone else.

  **Update**

  As of Nov. 2nd I have received a full-refund for this problem, though it took a lot longer than it should have. I updated my star rating to reflect that.
  Rating: 2 / 5

• 5. kandoro  |  November 18th, 2009 at 10:51 pm

  Without elaborating too much I’ll just say I was mostly disappointed.

  Primarily I was annoyed at the sloppy lens mount which twisted/clicked everytime I zoomed…Started out at about 1/32″ play and increased to 1/16″…Then I started receiving lens connection errors…
  
  The autofocus was back focusing and even manually adjusting for that the resolution was just average for a $1500 camera…Even in RAW…Obviously I had a somewhat duff camera but with reading many reviews and some of them mentioning the loose lens mount I decided to abandon any further testing and just send it back…

  Because of the lens problems I didn’t bother with any videos as this aspect of the camera is secondary to me…

  I did really like the rubberized body,the articulating screen and the VERY bright/sharp EVF…For a non DSLR that view is Superb in this stage of EVF development…I also like the whole 4/3 concept but I’ll wait until a GH2 and try again…

  kd
  Rating: 3 / 5

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