Introduction

This blog is a user's perspective on the Micro Four Thirds camera system. Read more ...

Lens Buyer's Guide. Panasonic GH4 review.

My lens reviews: Olympus 9mm f/8 fisheye, Lumix G 12-32mm f/3.5-5.6, Leica 25mm f/1.4, Lumix X 12-35mm f/2.8, Lumix X 35-100mm f/2.8, Sigma 30mm f/2.8, Sigma 19mm f/2.8, Lumix X PZ 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6, Lumix X PZ 45-175mm f/4-5.6, Olympus M.Zuiko 45mm f/1.8, Panasonic Lumix G 100-300mm f/4-5.6, Panasonic Leica Lumix DG Macro-Elmarit 45mm f/2.8 1:1 Macro, Panasonic Lumix G 45-200mm f/4-5.6, Panasonic Lumix G 20mm f/1.7 pancake, Panasonic Lumix G 14mm f/2.5 pancake, Panasonic Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8, Panasonic Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/3.5-5.6, Panasonic Lumix G 8mm f/3.5 fisheye, Lumix G 7-14mm f/4, Samyang 7.5mm f/3.5 fisheye, Tokina 300mm f/6.3 mirror reflex tele, Lensbaby 5.8mm f/3.5 circular fisheye lens
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Sunday 13 September 2015

Olympus E-M5 Mark II sensor shift demo

All Olympus Micro Four Thirds cameras have had in-body image stabilization (IBIS), however, it was not until the Olympus E-M5 Mark II that this feature became truly useful also for stabilizing video recording. To illustrate how it works, I have mounted the Lumix GH4 facing into the E-M5 II using the Leica 45mm f/2.8 macro lens, both mounted to a dual camera bracket:


Before actually starting the recording, I put some transparent plastic around the lens, between the cameras, to make the lightning more even. Here is the outcome, in an animated GIF:




See also the full movie here, for more details:



This looks very impressive, of course. But does it work? If you use a Panasonic lens, with built in Optical Image Stabilization, you must make sure to set the "Lens I.S. Priority" item to "Off", you'll find it in the C-section of the rather confusion menu.

If your lens has an OIS switch, you need to set that one to off as well. If not, the camera will try to use the lens image stabilization, which is not as effective.


Using the Lumix X 12-35mm f/2.8 lens, I recorded this handheld example video. Even when walking around with the camera, the video is remarkably stable. For even better effect, I could have added some Warp Stabilizer in the Adobe Premiere Pro, but even without additional software stabilization, the video is very smooth:



If I had used the same lens on the Lumix GH4, the results would have been far less stable. See a direct comparison between the two cameras here.

1 comment:

  1. It would seem that mFT users that work with Olympus cameras only would be better off buying non-OIS lenses, since those lenses are more expensive to build and more prone to internal damage. I read about some of those lenses that rattle when moved -- that doesn't give me confidence in their long-term reliability. I also worry about a similar vulnerability in IBIS camera bodies; so, for situations where ruggedness is critical, there may be a reason to avoid using lenses & cameras with IS. I would be interested to learn the service records of these products.

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