- Brand new from Panasonic, the Lumix S5.
Now there's a lot of things that are great about this camera
and also a few things that could use some improvement.
Let's start with this, a full frame, 24.2 mega pixel sensor,
that records 4k at 10-bit 422.
We're getting over 14 stops of dynamic range.
We have dual card slots, a nice flip screen,
Dual-Native ISO,
so we should get some pretty good low-light performance.
And Panasonic has always had great IBIS,
all of this for under $2,000.
What?
I would say the biggest catch has probably got to be
that the autofocus on here isn't the best.
Now it's still usable in some cases,
but if you need perfect autofocus
I would probably look elsewhere.
Now, one way to look at it
is that it's kind of the smaller budget S1H.
Carries over a lot of what its bigger brothers
have to offer, but it's also more compact than the GH5.
So let's go ahead, take this out for a little spin,
and we'll come back and look at the footage.
Here we go.
- Mr.Nagata, I don't think this is a good idea.
- [Nagata] I think it'll be okay.
- Business casual Mondays, am I right?
(motorcycle growls)
(aesthetic music plays)
(motorcycle growls)
(upbeat music plays)
(motorcycle growls)
♪ Ooh,ooh ♪
(upbeat music fades)
- [Nagata] What do you think, Sam?
You think we got some good shots?
- Mr. Nagata I think we got some amazing shots.
- Something's different about you.
I can't quite put my finger on it, but I don't know.
You just seem different today.
So overall, I would say the image quality
coming out of this camera, it's pretty solid.
It's nice and sharp. There's good dynamic range.
It's flexible.
The camera itself is powerful, no reliability issues.
Now me being a first-time Panasonic shooter,
I was definitely impressed with the IBIS.
If you compare it to no image stabilization,
you can see that it helps reduce
a lot of that jittery movement.
And on top of that,
we can go ahead and add in some digital stabilization,
which helps.
And that digital stabilization is done with
information from a gyro,
They all work together from your lens, to your IBIS,
to the digital, to kinda combine all that data
and try to give you the smoothest image
and whatever they do, it works pretty dang good.
And then there's boost IS,
which isn't really designed for too much movement.
So, you can kind of see that at points it's smooth,
but then there's like a jerk and then it smooths out again
and then it jerks again.
But if you're just standing stationary
and trying to get a nice tripod looking shot, you can.
My hands aren't that stable,
but I was able to give it that floaty feel
almost like it's on a gimbal or something right there.
And I am loving the sharpness of the image.
I mean, even if you're not looking at it in 4K,
you can tell that it's really nice and crisp.
Now while I was shooting some of this low-light footage,
one of the things that really spooked me was that
in the shadows there looked like there was so much grain
on the LCD, but luckily as soon as you hit record,
all that noise just disappeared.
So your end result is gonna be nice and crisp.
I mean, look at some of these shots,
how much detail there is in the ocean, it's super sharp.
It's definitely a quality video camera.
Now in V-log the Dual-Native ISO
is at 640 and 4,000.
So when I go up on ISO,
it automatically switches over
to the better low-light circuit and check this out.
It's looking pretty clean right here at 4,000 ISO,
we'll keep pushing it. We'll go up to 8,000,
still looks nice and sharp.
Plenty of detail in there still.
Now we're at 12,800. Typically the highest I'll ever go,
definitely seeing some noise, but it's not bad.
So if you're in the middle of nowhere with no lighting,
you can still get that shot.
And even though there is grain in the shot,
it's not terrible.
I'm definitely not hating
the way the grain looks on this camera.
And to really push it 25,600 ISO,
you rarely have to actually get it
all the way up to that level.
So you can definitely use this camera
to get amazing images, even in low light.
But I wouldn't personally use it for vlogging
because cause the autofocus
just isn't a 100% there.
Autofocus, come on buddy, you can do this.
I believe in you. Oh, that focus,
come back focus.
Argh! Son of a (beep)
I would say ending on your lighting and lens.
There are times where it is decent.
I did shoot a few vlogs on my second channel
with this camera, and immediately people were like,
"what's wrong with the autofocus?"
And keep in mind that this is still a prototype unit
and there's probably more firmwares to come,
which may improve that.
But I still don't see it as good as a Canon or Sony.
So for vlogs, I feel like autofocus
is one of the most important priorities,
so because of that, I wouldn't vlog on this,
but I don't really think of this as a vlog camera.
I think of this as a really powerful camera.
Again, the autofocus, it's usable in some cases.
So here's a few shots
that I used this camera for on the vlog.
And I did really treat this like a point-and-shoot.
I had it on shutter priority.
So I locked it in the shutter speed.
I rely completely on the auto exposure,
the autofocus and there's definitely a few shots
where the focus was missed,
but you know,
in general they did come out looking fairly sharp.
It just isn't super consistent.
But when the focus does hit, the image quality outstanding,
even in unideal lighting because of that dynamic range.
So right now they're standing in the shadow
on a bright sunny day
and I was still able to easily bring up those shadows.
So there's still enough detail in their faces
and parts of the motorcycle.
Another downside is that you're not gonna get
a ton of high frame rate options out of this camera.
Here are some shots in 60p,
and there is a pretty significant crop-in
just to go past 30.
So again, 24 and 30 frames per second
in 10-bit 4K is its sweet spot.
But if you go to 60, then you face a crop.
- Excuse me, Mr.Nagata can you keep the,
this whole ruckus down?
I'm trying to edit in the other room
and it's kinda distracting.
- Nice, nice tie.
If you drop into 1080p, you can still get,
you know, 120, 150, 180
but you do start to lose quite a few things.
For example, you can't shoot 10-bit anymore.
You lose autofocus at 120p
and you get a slight crop in 180p.
And again, these are all HD modes.
Though I did do a few rolling shutter tests
and it's really not bad if you really whip it around.
You could definitely see a little bit in there.
I think in most cases,
you're not gonna have any problems there.
Now on this shot,
I was actually pretty impressed,
with how stable the image actually came out.
I had it on boost image stabilization,
and I was just walking parallel with them.
And it really came out looking smooth
considering that I was walking
and just holding it like this.
I wouldn't say gimbal like stability,
but definitely some of the smoothest shots I've ever gotten
out of a small camera, just hand-holding it like that.
So definitely props to Panasonic for their IBIS.
Now like I said,
this is my first time shooting on a Panasonic camera,
but let's go meet up with my buddy
who shoots on Panasonic all the time.
You are Panasonic guy.
- I have been, yeah.
This is the GH4.
A few years ago,
I made the decision to
get rid of the filter that goes in front of the sensor
and normally blocks ultraviolet light and infrared light
and just have a clear piece of glass put in front there.
And so this camera is now sensitive to infrared light
or to ultraviolet light.
So you can put on a lens and as long as it passes,
that kind of light through to the sensor,
you can essentially see in the dark
with like infrared mode and you can see ultraviolet.
- [Nagata] So anyone with a GH4
all you have to do is take a knife,
throw it in there, and just (knife slicing)
- It doesn't have to be a GH4,
you can do it with basically any camera
(Nagata laughs)
cause these sensors, right, these are solid state sensors,
Silicon chips essentially.
And they are sensitive to all sorts of wavelength.
- [Nagata] Click right there.
If you want to see,
- The world in the UV.
- Yes.
So then you went to the GH5.
- GH5 and I feel like the GH5 is a big step-up.
Great image quality I think, great colors,
I love V-log. And I was amazed at what you're able to do,
shooting with windows behind you,
and normally things would totally blown out.
But with these cameras,
you can just get way more dynamic range
than I think you would expect
out of a little camera like that.
- GH5 seemed like it was ahead of the time, right?
Cause it was one of the first ones to get to 4k 10-bit.
- Is amazing. So when the S1H came out,
there were some features that I really jumped at.
I think it is a low-light beast with Dual-Native ISO.
I mean being full-frame is fantastic.
Two big problems with the S1H, super heavy,
very difficult to vlog with, and other problem is autofocus.
They just haven't improved thought of autofocus in my mind,
to a level where it's a 100% reliable.
- Right.
So you've been doing this, huh?
You leave this on the tripod - Sometimes
- and you kinda.
- I lean as far back as I can.
I assumingly press the shutter button at my full arms reach,
and I just try to make sure that it like,
goes green on my face.
That I feel like is annoying.
- What are your first thoughts on this camera, the S5?
- There's a lot that feels similar,
but it is much smaller than the S1H.
if you take a look at that body,
it's almost like half the size.
I also loved the little hot shoe adapter that comes in
and I can plug XLR mics into. - [Nagata] Oh that's right,
yeah.
- I love being able to plug my XLR mics into all of these.
- [Nagata] What made you go Panasonic?
- Before this I had the M50
and so I was just looking for an upgrade from that.
- [Nagata] Oh okay,
wait getting pretty dark but, - yeah
- This light.
- I reduced everything, is that bright enough?
- [Nagata] Oh yeah, - Is that okay?
- [Nagata] there you go - yeah? Is that good?
- [Nagata] That's a light right there.
- Okay cool.
- [Nagata] Atomos Ninja also doubles as a little light.
- I can turn on that too, there we go.
- [Nagata] All right. Oh man. Two lights.
- Two lights here we go.
- [Nagata] Oh Look at that.
If you hold it down low,
you look like a monster. - Oh, yeah right.
- [Nagata] You gotta bring it up like that.
- Yeah, here we go,
here we go, by myself - [Nagata] Well perfect. Yeah.
All right. So why'd you go with the GH5?
- The reason I went with the GH5S originally
is because it produced a nice 4K image,
which it definitely does.
And when I was shopping around,
I was watching a lot of Caleb Pike, DSLR video shooter,
and Gerald Undone
and they were shooting on GH5, GH5S'
and just overall the vibe around it,
felt really good to me.
I put it to the Atomos as a monitor,
and then also, so that it goes straight into ProRes.
I do have to carry it around with me everywhere,
but I make it work.
All they need to do with this,
is fix the autofocus and the IBIS.
And this would have been like my perfect camera,
at least like the image, - [Nagata] Yeah
- I love the image.
- Okay one of the things that blew me away
with this S5 was the dynamic range test.
So first of all,
let's look at the shadows
and everything is underexposed with the lens.
The ISO is locked in at 640,
which is its native ISO for V-log.
Now I'm gonna go ahead and take all these shots
and try to correct them in post
and see how recoverable these shadows are.
At three stops underexposed.
I'd say it's somewhat recoverable.
You definitely see some grain.
And at five stops underexposed.
I mean, that's pretty extreme, not usable,
but that's no surprise, right?
This is pretty decent for shadows,
but what blew my mind was how it handled the highlights.
So same type of deal,
same test five stops overexposed on the right.
And we correct everything , and Oh My God!
Everything looks so clean.
You almost can't even tell
that the shot on the right was corrected.
I mean, the dynamic range is that good in the highlights.
There's a lot of professional cinema cameras
that can't gather that much detail in the highlights.
I also loved how streamlined it was working
with the V-log on this camera.
Just go to their website, download a batch of LUTs.
They also give you a dozen different looks
that you can go with.
So by shooting V-log,
they already supply you with a package of LUTs.
I feel like every camera manufacturer should just do that.
Looking at the ports up here, we have our headphone jack,
our mic jack, and then down here,
we have our micro HDMI, wish it was a larger HDMI,
but aye, it's an HDMI port, it works.
And there's a USB-C cable here.
So you can actually charge the camera up
while you're shooting.
So that's definitely nice.
You can keep this camera on for extended periods of time.
And again, it takes a lot to overheat this camera.
So yeah, it's an option.
Now this is an L-Mount
and they have their alliance with Leica and Sigma.
So it's not like they have as big of a selection of lenses
as Sony or Canon would have,
but with that alliance its cool
that you can use different lenses from different brands
and they work just as well as if they were native lenses.
You can't really adapt this to other mirrorless lenses,
but you can adapt it pretty easily to EF or PL.
So, that gives you a whole world of options out there.
Also anamorphic modes, built into this camera.
Now this doesn't really have some of the flashy, you know,
240 frames per second options in here.
But what it does have,
is the tools that cinematographers want,
not just zebras,
but we actually have built-in wave form
on this camera itself.
There's this little spot meter
that I can drag around the frame.
It tells me how many stops over
or how many stops under I am on that part of the frame.
That's pretty cool when you're going manual focus
that has built in peaking
as well as magnification that pops up.
So, you know, if you're not too scared of manual focus,
I mean, this camera kind of has it all
like I'm gonna say if I was shooting
a professional project or a short film
or something like that,
and my budget for the camera was $2,000.
I would honestly probably go for this camera.
Now, even though this may not be my next vlog camera
for YouTube,
I am still blown away at how much power
and performance we're getting out of this camera
for $2,000.
Should we wrap this up
by reading a few comments from my last video?
Oh my God!
Everybody is still commenting, "entry, done, reason."
Everyone is commenting like that.
What the heck?
What has my comments section turned into?
Entry, done, entry,
done, entry.
What am I missing?
Why does it just all look like that?
Oh, finally, here's one that's a slightly different,
"exit, just starting, excuse, being different."
Well, I guess that's kind of different of a comment.
- Mr.Nagata. I think we did an amazing job today.
- [Nagata] Can you stop talking like that?
- Talking like what?
- You're sophisticated and all,
could you give me my Sam back?
- No, it is Samuel now.
- I think I'm just gonna to go to sleep now.
And hopefully when I wake up,
like things will be back to normal.
- Would you like me to tuck you in sir?
- [Nagata] No, please don't.
(upbeat music plays)