Mirrorless camera systems

Micro Four Thirds

While Micro Four Thirds was the first and only mirrorless camera system back in 2008, the competition is now fierce. All major camera producers have launched their mirrorless systems by now, with Pentax/Ricoh being one of the notable exceptions, still sticking to digital single lens reflex (DSLR) systems.

The major players here are OM System (previously Olympus), and Panasonic with their Lumix G line. They used to have full lineups starting with basic, affordable cameras, up to professional level kits. With the decline of the camera market, in the sense that the bottom end has almost completely been replaced with smartphone usage, only the higher end cameras are left now.

For OM System, the niche they have been going for is relatively compact sports and wildlife kits. With the 2x crop factor, tele lenses can be made much smaller and lighter than for fullframe systems. This helps explain why they have aimed for this market: People who don't want to carry a lot of weight can get good tele performance for bird and wildlife use.

The OM-1 camera is a good choice, and is know for very good weather proofing, high framerate and very good continuous autofocus for capturing birds in flight. A typical lens is the OM System Olympu 300mm f/4, which gives a 600mm equivalent field of view at a relatively compact size.

Panasonic, on the other hand, have gone for the high end video niche: With the GH series, currently at Lumix GH6, they have been pushing the limits for what small form factor cameras can do. Other manufacturers have to some degree caught up now, but I would say that the GH series is still class leading in terms of video capabilities.

A popular lens to use is the Lumix 10-25mm f/1.7. This is a high end wide angle zoom lens with a very bright aperture, and it corresponds to 20-50mm in fullframe field of view. Optimized for video production, it features a staggering amount of video specific features, like clickless aperture selection, easy switching between manual and automatic focus, and the optical design avoids focus breathing and brightness shifts while zooming.

Here is the original content:

Back in 2008, Panasonic launched the first consumer mirrorless system camera with the Panasonic G1. Since this time, a lot of competitors have introduced their systems. I take a look at the competition, to summarize what they are all about.

Sony NEX, E-mount

Headline comments: Small cameras, large lenses.

Crop factor: 1.5x

The first Sony NEX cameras introduced were truly strange: No built in flash, a minimum of buttons, no touch screen interface, a non standard flash connector. The cameras were slim, but also had a fairly poor grip and ergonomics. Later, a camera like the Sony NEX-6 appeared to take the system in a more traditional direction, with a proper flash shoe, better grip, built in flash, and even a built in EVF on the side, to give it a range finder appearance. The Sony NEX-6 looks and feels more like a normal camera.



Sony NEX-6

Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/3.5-5.6 review

When I first bought into Micro Four Thirds, it was with the GH1 and the kit zoom lens, the Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8. In the beginning, I was thrilled with the superzoom lens, my first, and it was also a lot better than the previous Pentax lenses that I used. However, after some time, I was quite disappointed with it, since it is not very sharp in the short and long ends, and it is very large and heavy. So it mostly sat unused.

It was not surprising for me, then, that Panasonic announced a new, revised version of the lens called Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/3.5-5.6. Then new lens comes at a smaller size, it is lighter, and has a faster aperture range. It even has a lower list price than the old version. So, I was very curious to see how they compare.

They are shown below, with the new version to the left:

Focus pulling with the GH3 touch screen

Focus pulling is a cinematic technique often seen in movies and TV series. Quite simply, this is to change the focus distance during recording. This is often seen during dialogue, for example, where the focus could change between the persons speaking to highlight the reactions.

When done by a professional film crew, the focus pulling is done by manually turning the focus ring. Manual focus is possible with Micro Four Thirds cameras as well, of course, but there are a couple of reasons why it might be hard to do this during video recording:

Lumix X PZ 14-42mm vs NEX PZ 16-50mm

Panasonic and Sony have released two surprisingly similar lenses: The Lumix X PZ 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 and Sony E 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6 PZ. Both are shown below:



Note that in the picture, I have modified their appearance slightly by adding "lens hoods". On the Lumix lens, to the left, I added a 37mm stand off ring to the front lens thread.

On the Sony lens, to the right, I screwed a 40.5mm to 52mm step up ring into the front lens hood. For the Sony lens, I also need a new 52mm front lens cap.

While I don't think these small rings do a significant job as lens shades, I think they keep the front lens element better protected against objects touching it accidentally, and that gives me more peace of mind.

Lens	Lumix X PZ 14-42mm	NEX 16-50mm PZ
Announced	Aug 26, 2011	Sep 12, 2012
Image stabilization	Yes, optical	Yes, optical
Lens elements/groups	9/8	9/8
Weight	95g	116g
Diameter	61mm	65mm
Length	27mm	30mm
Filter thread	37mm	40.5mm

New 14-140mm: Smaller, faster, sharper

Since writing this first impressions article, I have made a more thorough review. Most likely, this is what you want to read.

When I first bought into Micro Four Thirds, it was with the GH1 and the kit zoom lens, the Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8. At first, I was thrilled with the superzoom lens, my first, and it was also a lot better than the previous Pentax lenses that I used. However, after some time, I was quite disappointed with it, since it is not very sharp in the short and long ends, and it is very large and heavy. So it mostly sat unused.

It was not surprising for me, then, that Panasonic announced a new, revised version of the lens called Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/3.5-5.6. Then new lens comes at a smaller size, it is lighter, and has a faster aperture range. It even has a lower list price than the old version. So, I was very curious to see how they compare.

They are shown below, with the new version to the right:

Lens	Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/4-5.8	Lumix G HD 14-140mm f/3.5-5.6
Announced	Mar 3, 2009	Apr 24, 2013
Weight	460g	265g
Diameter	70mm	67mm
Length	84mm	75mm
Filter thread	62mm	58mm
Minimum focus	0.5m	0.3m
Maximum magnification	0.2 x	0.25 x
Lens elements/groups	17/13	14/12
Product code	H-VS014140	H-FS014140

Product news

Here is a summary or recent interesting product news, and my comments to them.

Panasonic GX7

Of course, the big news right now is the Panasonic Lumix GX7, which was announced on August 1st.



To better understand what the fuss is all about, let's look a the key features of the GX7, compared with other premium mirrorless cameras:

Camera	Crop factor	Tilt LCD	EVF	IBIS	PDAF	Flash	Compact	Focus peaking	Price
Lumix GX7	2x	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	$900
Olympus E-M5	2x	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	Medium	No	$900
Olympus E-M1	2x	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Medium	Yes	$1400
Olympus E-P5	2x	Yes	Optional	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	$950
Lumix GH3	2x	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	No	$1100
Lumix G6	2x	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	Medium	Yes	$750
Sony NEX-6	1.5x	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	$650
Sony A7	1x	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	$1700
Sony A7R	1x	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	$2300
Fujifilm X-Pro1	1.5x	No	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	$1200
Fujifilm X-E1	1.5x	No	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	$800
Fujifilm X-E2	1.5x	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	$1000
Canon EOS M	1.6x	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	$300
Nikon 1 V2	2.7x	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	$800

Distorted images

With the development of photographic equipment over the last decades, we have been able to capture more accurate representations of the reality than ever before, and at a higher resolution and lower cost. Some are obsessed with the sharpness of lenses, and closely read MTF tests to find the best. And there is a trend now that sensors have a weaker anti-aliasing (AA) filter, or even gets rid of it completely, to reveal even more details.

Still, there are some who go in the opposite direction, and use the camera not to accurately depict the reality, but to deliberately distort the reality in various ways. One example is the "Instagram" trend, in which filters are often applied to images to distort the colours, add dark corners, add film grain noise, and so on.

In this article, I look at some methods for creating images that are not natural looking.