Image courtesy: Giulio Scorio

After weeks of rumors, news and deals it’s time to talk about some serious stuff ;)

Our friend and reader Amos Chapple is professional photographer for Lonely Planet and his latest work has been published by The Guardian (Click here). Did he use a Canon? Or maybe the new superhot Nikon D800? No! Amos sent me this: “The UK Guardian have just published a gallery of images from Iran which are currently featuring on the front page of their website. All pictures shot with m43 kit! They will be running a two-page spread in the paper edition of the newspaper later in the week also. Pictures shot using a [shoplink 16254]GH2[/shoplink] camera body and [shoplink 23110]25mm Leica[/shoplink], [shoplink 23577]45mm Olympus[/shoplink], [shoplink 14822]7-14mm[/shoplink] and [shoplink 14796]20mm Lumix[/shoplink] lenses. Hope you’re well, congrats on the lens survey – lets hope they listen!!
Best from St. Petersburg, Russia.
Amos.”

And another pro, the award winning commercial photographer Giulio Sciorio wrote a must read article about “How to overcome fears using Micro 4/3rds cameras in a professional environment” (Click here to read it!). I agree on all his five arguments! Share this on your website! :)

Once again the real good camera is the one that helps you best in expressing your vision. The camera itself has no vision :)

P.S: If you have some great work to show comment this post with your link!

P.P.S.: 100 Tips from a Professional Photographer (Gizmodo).

A fake image of the GH3 of course :)

Take that with a grain of salt. It’s coming via a new Asian source! This is an extended GH3 spec list (some part were already posted weeks ago). As usual I would be happy if other sources can confirm or deny the spec list. Just send me a message through the anonymous contact form you see on the right or contact me at 43rumors@gmail.com. Thanks!

And here it is the GH3 spec list (reminder, not coming from trusted sources!):
Sensor: 15.5 mega-pixel sensor
Iso: Iso 160-12800, extends to 80-51200
Speed: 6.7fps
Body: Magnesium alloy body, weather sealed, thinner and lighter than GH2, overall design evolves with improved ergonomics
LCD: 3.2″ ips, 1050k-dots, with capacitive touch screen (multi-touch depending on final setting in firmware). LCD tilt-able
EVF: new EVF with 2.06 mega-dots
Card: double SDXC slots
Flash: wireless flash trigger (pending new flagship flash gun)
Video: 1080p60, 24Mbps AVCHD, super slow-mo:480p @ 220fps (reduced FOV)
Battery: battery life >500 CIPA
GPS: in-camera GPS
Wifi: optional wifi accessory
Other features: firmware is not finalized. in-cam HDR, multi-frame night scenes will go into production units once qualified.
X kit: GH3 + 12-35X

What do you think about it?

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Meantime the hackable GH2 is becoming cheaper and cheaper. You may check for a decent deal: [shopcountry 16254].

Rumors classification explained (FT= FourThirds):
FT1=1-20% chance the rumor is correct
FT2=21-40% chance the rumor is correct
FT3=41-60% chance the rumor is correct
FT4=61-80% chance the rumor is correct
FT5=81-99% chance the rumor is correct

Source: Wikipedia.

It’s three years now that I am working on that tiny website. During that time I saw many “marketing-blabla-battles” :) There was first the Megapixel war, than the ISO war, than the 3D war and than the camera miniaturization war. Of course 98% of these are driven by marketing departments more than real customer needs.

The 4K myth:
So what’s coming next on the Advertising front? At NABshow in Las Vegas everything was about 2K-4K-8K video recording. So I guess we will soon see massive advertising for broadcast but also consumer cameras with 4K recording. Panasonic already announced that they will implement 4K in many new consumer camcorders. At that time it’s hard to think that the nee Panasonic Gh3 will have 4K (really don’t think it’s coming) but I thought it would be interesting for you to share that article about 2K and 4K:
http://magazine.creativecow.net/article/the-truth-about-2k-4k-the-future-of-pixels.
Here John Galt writes says about 4k: “The great perpetrators of that mythology have been RED and Dalsa. That’s why I call these “marketing pixels.” It’s intentional obfuscation. Because they really do nothing to improve image quality. They may improve sales volume. But they don’t do anything to quality. But somehow the world has accepted that that’s 4K. It’s purely semantic. It’s like saying, “I don’t like my weight in pounds so I converted to kilos. It sounds better! You’d be amazed at how many non-technical people I meet, often producers and directors, but sometimes even cinematographers get fooled by that stuff.”

Global Shutter:
One of the few things I got from my sources is that Panasonic is working on global shutter sensors. That yes could be implemented in a future GH3. To learn more about that technology read that pdf document at Caspegroup (Click here to download).

Interesting or not? I hope I can get some top rumors about the GH3 soon. About time for Panasonic to steal the show from the [shoplink 29074]Olympus E-M5[/shoplink]! ;)

P.S.: The Panasonic m43 3D lens isn’t really a hotseller and Panasonic lowered the price from $249 down to $79!!! Check at Adorama (Click here).

The 75mm f/1.8 lens should hit the stores in June/July!

I know you guys are already impatiently waiting for the next rumor period. You really will not have to wait a lot. My sources confirmed to me that both Panasonic and Olympus will have new product announcements in June/July. I will soon write a post with the stuff that we might could see in June.

Under the category “dream” or “speculation” I have to remind you that:
1) Olympus officially said that they are considering a PEN with built-in EVF (Source: here at 43rumors)
2) Panasonic also filled some patent with an [shoplink 23692 ebay]L1 styled GF camera[/shoplink] (could be the “GL1”).

Let me dream! Are you dreaming something else? :)

—

P.S.:
The Sony NEX-7 (Click here) and the Fuji X PRO 1 (Click here) on top of Amazon ranking (Click here).
The [shoplink 23692 ebay]DMC-L1 eBay (Click here)[/shoplink].
The [shoplink 26385 ebay]DMC-LC1 on eBay (Click here)[/shoplink].

Panasonic released a new pdf document (Click here to download it) that includes the presentation of a Micro Four Thirds sensor. As our readers pointed out this could be the description of the current GH2 sensor. It has:

• 4:3 aspect ratio (diagonal: 21.9 mm optical format) with 17.78 million pixels.
• Effective pixels: 5,054 (H) × 3,518 (V) = 17,779,972
• 3.80 μm square pixels
• Capable of full-HD video at 59.94 frames/sec (pixel addition mode)

It’s a bi weird that the [shoplink 16254]GH2[/shoplink] image-sensor’s pixel size is 3.63 Microns and the [shoplink 26836]G3/GX1[/shoplink] image-sensor’s pixel size is 3.75 Microns. So is this really the GH2 sensor description? What’s also interesting is that Panasonic is using a new term I never heard before… “Micromachined cell technology” that delivers high resolution performance! It has a 12 bit ADC with high Singal to Noise ratio.

And there is also one more graph showing the new Imaging Processor:

Would love to hear your thoughts on that. And maybe our more expert readers can find out more?

As you may know Polaroid announce an Android powered camera. And Barney Sykes from Panasonic told TechRadar (Click here), “We had a little bit of a discussion around having Android as the operating system. One of the issues is that we have so much optical technology in the cameras, even in compacts, we have Leica lenses. When you download something, it’s got to be able to work with the optics of the camera. But it is very interesting, in particular when you look at some of the apps you can download, the filters, the effects you can make, it’s an interesting step. It’s always good to see innovation.”

I think Panasonic and Olympus will sooner or later have to open their software for third party applications. The advantages are so great that it’s worth to “take the risk”. And if they are going to use the Android platform they would have an immense access to photography apps. I believe this IS the future! I am pretty sure Samsung will do it the Japanese companies will be “forced” to follow soon after!

The image you see here on top is a drawing from a Panasonic in body stabilization patent. That alone is an interesting news and I would be happy to see Panasonic offering such a solution. But what’s even more intriguing is that the same patent actually shows the camera that could use the system and it looks like a sort of Sony NEX-7 competitor with build-in viewfinder in the corner. Check out the pic:

“Point 60” shows what looks like a viewfinder that can be tilted up to 90 degrees! I already saw a patent like this two years ago (that’s why I know it can tilt). You can look through the EVF from top to bottom. Yeah like in old days with the [shoplink 30387 ebay]Rollei or Yashica twin lens (here on eBay)[/shoplink].

As usual with patents they are no prov at all that this could become a real product. But It’s nice to see that Panasonic is “thinking” on a camera like that :)

You readers already expressed your opinion about a sort of “rangefinder styled” Micro Four Thirds version of the[shoplink 23692 ebay]Lumix DMC-L1 camera[/shoplink]:

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P.S.:
The Sony NEX-7 (Click here) and the Fuji X PRO 1 (Click here) are selling very well according to Amazon ranking (Click here).
The [shoplink 23692 ebay]DMC-L1 eBay (Click here)[/shoplink].
The [shoplink 26385 ebay]DMC-LC1 on eBay (Click here)[/shoplink].