15th anniversary 2008-2023

Panasonic Lumix G1 (2008)

15th anniversary 2008-2023

Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 (2008) by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 12.1MP (4000x3000)
1st micro 4/3 mirrorless
$750.00 USD

Here are seven comparisons made with my Lumix G1

Olympus E-1 (2003) / Lumix G1 (2008)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72157666938719943
4/3 and micro 4/3

Lumix DMC-L1 (2006) / Lumix G1 (2008)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72157709592843381
1st Lumix 4/3 and 1st µ4/3

iPhone 3G (2008) / Lumix G1 (2008)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72157714525273607
2008 Birth of a killer

Sony Alpha 700 (2007) / Lumix G1 (2008)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72157699446254451
DSLR/MIRRORLESS

Lumix G1 (2008) / Samsung NX10 (2010)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72157669081030602
Hybrid ( mirrorless )

Lumix G1 (2008) / Olympus E-P1 (2009)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72157668140405247
1° µ4/3

Lumix G1 (2008) / Fujifilm X-T5 (2022)
www.flickr.com/photos/maoby/albums/72177720309680458
1st mirrorless and the X-T5, 14 years apart

Meditation by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

Yes, an anniversary worthy of celebration. MFT was undoubtedly a thorough improvement on the former volumetric monsters. just like half-frames for 35mm were much smaller thanother 35s excepting that later Heinz Waaske creation .

I found that the MFT picture quality was satisfactory, Better than FP3 in Microphen and much more convenient. Although (with my Olympus Pen ) only the high resolution option (with obligatory tripod use) was the only one enabling brutal cropping (to avoid carrying long focus optics).

In the end I gave up and gave it away because the unruly focus point could not be tamed. My substitute Nikon Z7 was no better; a monstrous SLR-imitating bulge on top, excessive buttonry and unmanageable focus point, but far better manual focussing ability and quite good stabilization and sensor allowing tripods to be neglected.

The panasonic "fake SLRs" as well as their "fake Leicas" never tempted, but the Leitz small-sensor devices used with pocketable optics might be useful even if not the same size as MFT.

p.

Interesting, thank you for your feedback, and good luck in the future 😇

As to luck with subtituting for the MFT, as mentioned above, I did not escape focuspoint disobedience when replacing it with a Nikon Z; its spotmetering and focus enlargement point keeps moving erratically and when I take a snap I tend to be more concentrated on the motive than on "irrelevant" distractions in the viewfinder, so results were occasoionally both focussed on the wri\ong spot and badly exposed. Like with the Olympus, the offdending buttonry cannot easily be fixed in place with superglue without losing the ability to use the menu. (Although I very rarely acess it, the menu has some sensible functions). So the size of MFT and APS is preferrable although the Z´s larger sensor does enable more cropping thus avoiding added bulk and weight.

And it's for all these reasons that I recently opted for the X-T5 (APS-C and 40MP)

X-T5 / Laowa 65mm f/2.8 by Marc Aubry, sur Flickr

further to my remarks above; I tried a Leitz X2 for a while and although it is as easily pocketable as the IIIc with the collapsible summicron or the original CL with a suitably small lens AND has a far less flare-prone lens, its lack of sunshade option , its screen viewing with only an external real viwfinder (and autofocus) was annoying, so I gave it away. The current CL might be more tempting providing that it will work properluy with my M -glass without having to push buttons or leave fingerprints on the screen unlike the TL which was hopeless. Again; the whole purpose of technical equipment is to use it.

p.

And if possible, financially affordable 😉

yes, affordability is the great advantage of avoidiing new equipment and resuciating or restoring older stuff.

As a bonus it might also be interesting from a history of science and technology point of view if you are nerdy enough. Snaps with wides and long lenses that you might never have obtained with ordinary limited funds will also be possible. As time goes by, all manners of new inventions will become old and some might actually be worthwile using , such as close focus corrective element motion or merely one element staying put (such as in my 100mm elmarit).

My neo-luddite tendencies have also been reinforced by electronic improvements breaking down or proving to be less useful so after a while one can discern utility from junk withouth having sunk cash into it.

AND with avoiding buying new, technological and museal vandalism such as modifying equipment (like extracting lenses from an old camera or changing mounts) will also become an option.

This is rather like when in a search for perfection one exchanges tone arm and pickups on an old Linn Sondek turntable , takes a soldering iron to speakers with inferior drivers hosting lots of parasitic frequencies, recalculate , remove or resize and damp their resonating ports plus rewiring a nest of old amplifiers with more substantial power supplies for those powering the low frequencies . And later switching on the noise generator and trawling the room with an octave filter device to see whetrher the result was worth the effort.

p.