A few of my readers have asked me to do a review on the Lumix FZ1000 as I use it as my main camera to film blog interviews and many of you have been more than impressed with the results.
I bought the Panasonic FZ1000 a week before filming at Edradour, a whiskey distillery in Perthshire. I needed pictures for my blog and some video as well.
Why not use the Panasonic GH4 or the Sony A7s, tempted but we needed a run and gun camera, pick up and go, unfortunately both the GH4 and A7s are far from quick and easy.
The FZ1000 has one major omission that Panasonic can hang their heads in shame…no headphone output. Why on earth did they bother giving the camera 4K-HD video and no headphone output, lazy designers in my opinion !
The way I kind of get round this is to use Sony’s UWP-D16 radio mic system, having a headphone output lets you monitor the sound for breakup etc. As for the sound going into the FZ1000…your guess is a good as mine.
The FZ1000 does have audio indications on the LCD screen but you are relying on the audio limiter to make sure your sound is not distorting.
I have found this to work fairly well and using the RODE NTG-4 gun mic with the Sony radio transmitter keeps a lot of stray background sound to a minimum.
Photographically its not a GH4 but the 12fps using fast Class 10 speed 3 SDXC media allows you to track these children running up a hill.
This picture of Scott is shot at 25mm f3.2 @ 1/125 at lowest ISO 125
Video modes are AVCHD or MP4…AVCHD is the choice for me along with 1920 x 1080 50p at 28Mbps though on the occasion MP4 as its the only codec to allow 4K 3840 x 2160, 25p at 100Mbps.
I have investigated AVCHD v MP4 without any success but at 28Mbps on both codecs I doubt there is much difference plus the camera tells you that AVCHD is better for HD footage.
The success of this camera is keeping the ISO to a minimum, the lowest is 125 ISO, keeping the ISO down certainly helps the quality of your video footage. I don’t use it in low light conditions as it was never bought with this in mind but having a 1″ sensor helps keep the grain to a minimum.
The CAMBO loupe with Schneider optics is great for outdoor sunny work and keeps your head away from the leads coming out from the Sony receiver.
Unfortunately the CAMBO loupe uses a base unit that partly covers the battery compartment as seen above but if you start the day with a fresh battery and a 64G SDXC U3 card its not a problem. You only have to unscrew one bolt to change the battery.
Anyone who watches the footage I get out of this camera are blown away and some have commented they are more pleasing and less electronic than a GH4 !
On the whole I am delighted with my Panasonic FZ1000 with its 25-400 Leica f2.8-4 lens its a great blogging camera, 3 of us now own this camera, Allen (above) as you can see, myself and my ex boss Chris from Arran.
The behind the scenes video we produced at Edradour was shot using the Panasonic FZ1000…
Hi
Thanks for the review, does the Panasonic FZ1000 do 4k in 50p?
HDW : UHD 16:9 is 50p, True 4K is only 24p, most of us use UHD 16:9 as it edits better on an HD timeline.
Thanks for posting this Philip.
Attention: UHD is only up to 30p!!! FHD can be done in up to 60p.
You can simply find this in the specs on the Panasonic site. Also to mention that UHD is done using a sensor crop, WA is only 37mm instead of 26mm using FHD.
Phil, I wonder where your PXW-X70 “run&gun” has gone ;-)!? Still enjoy mine, even much more with the UHD upgrade!!
Ok thanks excuse the dim question…if I am shooting for DVD – and want to record in 4k to edit on a HD 1980×1080 50i timeline can I shoot in the 25p mode?
HDW : Like most 4K cameras you are restricted to 25p, very few offer 50p, my question is why edit on a 50i timeline if you are filming 25p why not edit on a 25p HD timeline and bypass interlace altogether.
Hi thanks for your responses.
As the final output is for Dvd I thought it had to be interlaced?
I have the sony pxw-x70 am thinking of doing the udate to 4k but wondered if I will see the benefit. I use for corporate web stuff and then the odd weddings dvd. Many thanks again.
spectacular footage 29 minutes at the time. does the remote port work with a libec for panasonic (like the GH4 does)? or any other lanc-like for panasonic?
HDW : Dont know yet
Suzanne, you can also record 25 or 23,98 progressive on DVD.
If you already have a PXW-X70 I would stay with it. Using “right” settings makes this a really stunning camcorder (stay away from ITU color matrix since it clips ugly in the highlights, instead try “standard”).
I guess mastering in UHD is of hardly any use if your output is DVD. This would be 4 times oversampling. Better use FHD 50p as recording format and convert to 50i or 25p for DVD.
But, why not producing BluRays?! Then the X70 UHD upgrade brings you a large gap forward in regards of detail and resolution, but you stick with lower framerate (only up to 30p). I mostly use 23,94p for BluRay, but you must get used to the low frequency or your videos should not contain to much “action”. I would stick with the X70, perhaps get a FZ1000 as B cam (multicam…).
Thanks so much for your advice. I will try the standard setting as I do get clipping here and there.
If I film in 25p 4k would I still have some improvmeny in quality and be able to crop in. I thought 25p would be leas quality.
Also is it a different look? I know I can’t pan around much as it would look jumpy.
Guess I am trying to see if its worth it to take the 4k upgrade. I do shoot more for the web than dvd.