After the GF2 also the GF3 could be hacked soon…
I consider the hacking possibilities one of the strengths of the Micro Four Thirds system. A not so popular camera like the Panasonic GF2 suddenly became an appealing camera because of the recently released hack (Click here). The hack adds identical GH2 features on the GF2 (except 24p)! Mix that with the current very low price of $375 for the camera with kit lens (Click here!) than we have an explosive little jewel. And it doesn’t stop here!
The hacker Vitaly Kiselev (Click here) reports that he got the GF3 and will start to work on the hack soon! At that point I want to say thanks again to Vitaly for what he is doing. And I hope Panasonic and Olympus understand the power of his work!
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Shop search links to the three hackable Panasonic cameras:
Panasonic GH2 at Amazon, Adorama, B&H, J&R, eBay.
Panasonic GF3 at Amazon, Adorama, B&H, J&R, eBay.
Panasonic GF2 at Amazon, Adorama, B&H, J&R, eBay.
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Recent comments
Comment from Uberzone: You must own an Olympus. :p...
Comment from BLI: Please… "MB" is, as you say, "Megabyte...
Comment from bilgy_no1: mb is 'megabit'
MB is 'Megabyte'
one...- Comment from bilgy_no1: wow, that forum has a really Nasty vibe....
Jekins
3 months ago |I think bitrate of E-M5 is low.
I think good idea donate Olympus E-M5 to Vitaly Kiselev to investigate.
Sandy
3 months ago |Will Vitaly also hack the EM5?
Andrew
3 months ago |I asked him, he didn’t respond. I don’t think it’s possible to add 24p/25p, though.
Alexander
3 months ago |He did not respond me too) I think he got 100 messages per day with similar content)
Duarte Bruno
3 months ago |I doubt it’s going to happen: http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2071/olympus-em-5-topic/p1
bilgy_no1
3 months ago |wow, that forum has a really Nasty vibe…
I’ve noticed before that the Panasonic hacker can be very blunt (interview here e.g.). Not dissing his work, just his tone…
Doug
3 months ago |What does this hack do? I can not open the FAQ (permission denied it says)…
Uberzone
3 months ago |You must own an Olympus. :p
onlyme
3 months ago |Yawn video
Give us flash exposure compensation and rear curtain flash
Drazick
3 months ago |Hi,
Anyone got a recommendation for an Intervalometer for the PEN E-P3?
I’d like a recommendation for an Intervalometer which was tested with the EP3.
Thanks.
Drazick.
Pixnat
3 months ago |Yup, I’ve just bought a GF2 for a dirt cheap price, and got a powerful video-photo camera for less than a lousy compact! Life’s beautiful!
Thanks Vitaly
Jon Petersen
3 months ago |Keep in mind, with a GF2 and the latest hack, you can set the FPS to 2 and take some pretty nice time lapse at 1080.. Glad I donated to the cause! Vitaly rocks
Duarte Bruno
3 months ago |Wait a minute, you’re talking MJPEG right?
Remy
3 months ago |I’m sure Panasonic and Olympus do understand the power of his work – it powerfully reduces the comparative value of their higher-priced GH2. I’m sure they appreciate that.
Sean Nelson
3 months ago |The GF2 doesn’t have the same sensor with integrated AD converter and so the video quality, even at a higher bitrates, will never be as good as the GH2.
David
3 months ago |Can we get something for the Olympus EPL1. It’s the top selling m43 camera on the market
ght
3 months ago |Agree. The EPL1 is a,hundred bucks cheaper. But I don’t think he can hack it-just Panasonic.
marsupial2go
3 months ago |The GF2 hack is stellar! There’s probably not enough Vitaliys to do all the requested hacks, but his existence proves that corporations are limiting their own products. Kinda strange to self-limit potential. Business and psychology journalists should do an expose on why companies limit themselves. ‘Seems like a stupid business trend that needs to stop.
Peter Thomson
3 months ago |The book ‘The undercover economist’ includes a discussion of this limiting. It’s called ‘price discrimination’ because it allows companies to use multiple price points for essentially the same product.
JimD
3 months ago |Car manufacturers have been doing it for years, so have computer makers, even your local butcher does it and always has. So an economist has just discovered it, shows why economists are failed accountants as the old adage goes.
Diane B
3 months ago |There are many many people totally unaware of hacks so ghe companies can advertise the added features available in the hack in their new model.
JimD
3 months ago |Diane, I can assure you Pany will, right now, be trying to stop hacking. They lose their product integrity if any man/woman or their dog start hacking. If they allow hacking and the hack does not work or breaks the firmware Pany will take the flack not the hacker. However there is a solution see my next post.
Duarte Bruno
3 months ago |Last Panasonic interview I read, they were pretty neutral about it. They are well aware that it sells bodies and brings people into the system. The hack has sold more GH2 bodies than any Panasonic marketing campaign and they know it, so I have serious doubts that they are going to stop it.
MikeH
3 months ago |They don’t lose jack, diddly, or squat by allowing hacking to exist as long as they done officially condone or recommend it. Their official position is that you void your warranty and that it is done only at your risk. I haven’t seen one shred of evidence that they are trying to now or have plans in the future to prevent this from occurring.
JimD
3 months ago |As I said in an earlier post “Maybe modular firmware is required. Basic functions and some fixed extras with the ability to add, say 2 or 3 chosen functions from a list of 5 or 10 options” with the intention of making a camera cutting edge and very good and flexible within each of the chosen options. Manufacturers could then limit their offerings to 2 bodies in each range, say, a rangefinder and slr style for example, then 2 physical sizes of each making a total of 4 products. By becoming firmware modular, cameras could be come very advanced and customisable for 1 or 2 specific purposes, not generalised and falling short on many fronts. The options could be purchased and changed as required from day to day.
Vivek
3 months ago |Are there straightforward procedures to implement the hacks without bricking a camera? That is a huge problem.
As creative as Vitaly is, the website is a mess and if you check out the threads, it convinces many not to deal with the hacks.
Evan Kimball
3 months ago |Yeah, the website is a awful mess and kept me away. Check out EOSHD’s site for better instructions, or google it. From what I have read, it won’t brick the camera like the Canon hacks will, unless your battery dies while loading the firmware. Thankfully, Panasonic won’t let the firmware update if the batter is not full- so thanks to them it is really hard to brick it. Only one guy I know who managed to do it, he used a cheap knock off battery to do it and it died.
If the card you are using can’t handle the hack, or the hack has issues on camera then the camera just says can’t record video and that’s it. And anytime you can go back to Panasonic’s firmware with no issues. I’ve done it many times and it is easy.
ght
3 months ago |Will a hacked gf3 have better video than gf2?
kesztió
3 months ago |All Panasonic cameras BUT G3 are going to get hacked!
Really cannot understand why Vitaly does hate G3 so much…
Duarte Bruno
3 months ago |Where did you get that idea?
http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/comment/30806#Comment_30806
Duarte Bruno
3 months ago |@Admin: A correction on your post. I don’t think the hack magically gives the GF2/3 GH2 features like manual video control or the like. What it does is allow the GF2/3 to support higher bitrates but you’ll still be limited to 720p or 1080i.
steve
3 months ago |why would pany trying to stop hacking. Because of vitaly there has been thousends of GH2 cameras sold. I think he has done them a favor. If he hacks GF3 more will be buying that model as a B-cam to go with there GH2.
JimD
3 months ago |If pany condones a hack they open themselves up to every man and his dog hacking and the results being unknown. Pany would take the can for every hack that does not work. No manufacturing company of anything that includes built in software or firmware can afford to accept hackers, none. Android does not allow hackers, however it is built in such a manner that it can accept apps. You may have noted that not all apps are good and not all work, and they are the ones from reputable organizations, just imagine the junk that comes from some individuals and groups with no quality control. Steve Jobs managed the issue, being well aware of the results, by only allowing tested apps to be used on apple products and no hacking of firmware.
Pany nor any other company can afford hackers, however they do have the ability of forcing manufacturers to think. Something they are devoid of from time to time. See my comments on modularity of firmware above.
debuys
3 months ago |Android is open source….So in a way you are correct they don’t allow hacking…wait…huh?
Panasonic sets up their camera to work within a target reliability. Sometimes my hacked GH1 will fail. It wouldn’t be a good idea to release the camera to the general public if it wasn’t 100% reliable to record video when the button is pressed. A person who hacks or modifies their gear is aware of the risks and implicitly accepts them.
your just wrong on this one jim
kesztió
3 months ago |For G3 even exposure correction adjustment during video recording would be a welcome.
BY THE WAY.
“If the mode dial is set to intelligent Auto (iA) when video shooting is commenced, the G3 will set most parameters for you automatically. Interestingly, however, iA is the one mode which allows you to adjust aperture during a video. By dragging the defocus slider while filming, you can control the depth of field beyond your area of focus.”
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonicdmcg3/15
DPReview even attached an image to prove that, although I’ve never managed to modify either brighthtess or peripheral defocus during video in iA or iA+: I mean I simply cannot move (or even show) the sliders in question when recording mode is active.
So does anybody know a bit more about this thing?
Ru Elpser
3 months ago |It was probably an
Easter egg
Charlie
3 months ago |Buy Olympus,
You won’t have to hack it to make it work.
43shot
3 months ago |Correct, it will come with dated working video that likely won’t be upgradable.
Federico Roitberg
3 months ago |Panasonic should pay (and admire, thanks and listen to) Vitaly and crew.
marsupial2go
3 months ago |According to nofilmschool.com, the new Canon 5D Mark 3 has “ALL-I = ~100mb/12MB” and “IPB = ~33.6mb/4.2MB.” I don’t know if mb is the same as Mbps, but if they are, then Vitaliy’s 32Mbps and 46Mbps on the GF2 is respectable on a $300 body (versus 5DM3 $3500).
Nevertheless, Panasonic are the only DSLRs I know of that allow long GOP recording, shoot video until the card is full. I shoot a lot of interviews, events, performances, etc., and can only use Pannys. That is not a bad thing, of course, but I might consider the 5DM3 for shorter shoots. Nothing wrong with D(slr)iversity.
bilgy_no1
3 months ago |mb is ‘megabit’
MB is ‘Megabyte’
one byte contains eight bits. That’s why 100mb equals 12MB. Other than that, I don’t know what those Canon numbers refer to. Probably not the video bitrate, because there is no reference to seconds.
BLI
3 months ago |Please… “MB” is, as you say, “Megabyte”. BUT “mb” is *”millibit”*!!!!!
One million (Mega) is written as “M” (yes, capital M!). ALWAYS. No exception — unless for misprints. Why is the capitalization important? Because lowercase “m” means “milli” — as in “millimeter” — mm, “millibar” — mbar, “milligram” — mg, etc, etc. The difference between “M” and “m” is thus a factor of one million…
Similarly, one thousand (kilo) is written as “k” (lowercase k). ALWAYS. No exception!!!
Of course, in IT “k” *normally* means 1024 = 2^10 because computers use digital electronics to represent numbers. likewise, in IT “M” normally means 1024*1024 = 1 048 576.
In a digital photography context, this may create uncertainty: is 1 Mpx (Megapixel) = 1 million pixels, or is it 1024*1024 pixels?
. Normally, it means 1 million pixels.
Thus, regarding data transfer rates: 1MB/s is one million bytes/second, while 1Mb/s is one million bits/second. Of course, one byte contains 8 bits, thus 1MB/s = 8 Mb/s. (In 1 byte = 8 bits, it is possible to distinguish between 2^8 = 256 different bit patterns, thus 1 byte can e.g be interpreted as 1 out of 256 different characters in the ASCII character set.)
The unit “mb” is never used, i.e I haver never seen it in use.
Btw: 100 Mb = 100/8 MB = 12.5 MB.