Earlier this year in February 2014, Panasonic announced the GH3’s successor – the Lumix DMC-GH4. It was to be their first mirrorless still camera capable of 4K video recording on board. The GH4’s pricing was announced this past March 2014, and at less than $2,000 it is the most affordable 4K digital mirrorless camera on the market today, and for most of us certainly the most exciting. It currently retails at B&H, for the body only. The price tag alone is impressive indeed, but before we see how well it performs, lets take a look at the specs sheet:
- 16.05 Megapixel Micro 4/3 Sensor
- 4096 x 2160 up to 24fps (100Mbps)
- 3840 x 2160 up to 30fps (100Mbps)
- 1080p up to 60fps
- Variable Slow Motion in-camera up to 96fps (no audio)
- 200 Mbps (ALL-Intra) or 100 Mbps (IPB) at 1080p
- 2,359K-dot LVF (Live View Finder)
- 3 inch 1,036K-dot Rear Monitor
- 4:2:2 10-bit or 8-bit External HDMI (4:2:0 8-bit internal)
- Cinegamma Modes
- Peaking and Zebras
- ISO 200-25600 (Extended Mode: 100-25600)
- New UHS I Class III SD card (min. 30MB/s) format needed for over 100Mbps
- 1/8″ Headphone, 1/8″ Microphone, AV Output, HDMI D (Micro), USB 2.0, Wired Remote Port
- 12 fps(AFS) up to approx.40 (including RAW) / approx.100 (excluding RAW) and 7.0 fps(AFC)
We’ve selected some interesting reviews about the GH4 we want to share with you. We’ll start with a video review of the GH4 shot by Griffin Hammon. He shows us some useful tips and tricks how to optimise the GH4 for 4K video and HD performance.
Let’s not forget that the Panasonic GH4 is also an amazing stills camera.
We’ve even got a couple of reviews in 4K done by the good folks at The Camera Store TV (use the max 2160p setting on Youtube for 4K resolution).
And their “first impressions” 4K review of the GH4:
Finally here’s what the acclaimed cinematographer and filmmaker Philip Bloom managed to get from the camera. You can find his evolving review of GH4 here.
After all, we are really impressed by the performance of this small Micro 4/3 mirrorless beast. Panasonic have managed to pack some incredible horsepower in a tiny package, giving us for the first time an affordable 4K acquisition system with a manageable and non-taxing workflow.
It’s amazing how digital technology evolves. It seems that the drawbacks of DSLR video we were all used to, like moire, aliasing, line-skipping, the inherent softness of the 1080p DSLR image, the lack of proper exposure features, such as focus peaking and zebras already are things of the past. We are eager to find out what’s coming up next, as we all know the brand new A7s full-frame digital mirrorless camera from Sony is just around the corner.
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