Less is more?
A year after introducing the Micro Four Thirds concept to the world, Panasonic has delivered its first truly compact camera based around the design standard. But, asks Jonathan Eastland, what has it sacrificed in the process?
In the days before digital you could buy a relatively sophisticated, compact sized camera that came with an absolute minimum number of operating controls. The lens incorporated a focusing ring, and another to set the f stop. Shutter time was dial set and a lever enabled film advance and shutter arming. The settings before releasing the shutter were straightforward and quickly executed.
Step forward into the world of electronics and you find a completely different mindset that attempts to resolve the problems of device and user interaction. It's a conundrum made all the more complex because the nature of the beast means its possible to install a far greater array of features.
This isn't a bad thing, it's just different. But in the process of being so, it seems to me some designers have unwittingly or deliberately skirted around the issue of ergonomics. In the ever-higher frequency rush to bring new product to market, they make silly mistakes, adding too much or too little and relying on the modern culture of youthful dexterity to overcome what can only be described as irritating design faults. There seems to be less and less understanding in R&D departments that operating a camera in real time is very different to seeing how it could work while viewing it with sophisticated autocad tools on a computer monitor.
In embracing the Micro Four Thirds system and moving smartly away from the problem of sourcing or perfecting the ideal optical reflex mirror box viewing systems common to DSLRs, Panasonic has dodged around the whirlpool of retro styling. Its new GF1 boasts a smart modern appearance similar to the Lumix LX3.
From a practical perspective, both the G1 and the GH1, Panasonics first Micro Four Thirds cameras, work well. But the GF1 falls into a different product class, offering some of the features of the two earlier models without quite reaching their level of operational sophistication. I think it's an attempt to seduce a segment of the fixed lens Ricoh or Sigma compact market.
Step by step
In my first review of the G1 (BJP, 28 January), I noted the weak tension of some operating controls; top-plate dials and switch positions could be inadvertently changed easily. On the new GF1 the issue has been addressed; the mode dial and frame sequence switch are much stiffer. The shutter release button is also improved, featuring a flatter shape and more positive pressure system but still not having quite enough depth of travel and thus increasing the opportunity for capturing unwanted frames.
Different tools appeal to users for different reasons but if we stick for a moment with ergonomics, Ricoh's GR and GX models probably have the best body shape, size and layout of all the recent high-end compacts. My GR II - which I use more or less daily - is a perfect fit, and its controls can be operated single-handed. And whereas the GR comes with only three-press buttons and a rocker switch (excluding the cursor cluster), the GF1 offers six and a wheel.
These models' physical sizes can't really be compared because they house such different sensor sizes, but the GF1 does fit quite neatly in the hand. It could have been so much better though with just a little more attention paid to the body shape and control layout. On that level, the Olympus EP-1 scores much better, although its designer Yasuo Funakoshi admitted the clever and workable little mode dial was an accident born out of his quest for aesthetic perfection.
The front of the GF1 has a narrow finger grip decorated with a chrome metal strip. The moulding affords a positive feel but combining it with the same silky rubber body covering of the G1 and making it slightly larger would have been better. The chrome strip is pure branding decoration; it adds nothing to the styling of the camera.
The top right of the back of the camera - as seen from the rear - incorporates a small thumb stop with a serrated wheel nestling just above it. The idea is that the stop provides some extra body grip while the thumb operates the wheel without having to move its position. All good in theory, but practicably almost unworkable unless you have a very slender thumb.
Both the stop and the wheel are too small and therefore do not operate well. The longer serrated wheel of the Olympus EP-1 in more or less the same position is better, though even that proved imperfect on occasion because it's just a tad too thin. But the GF1 wheel, which also needs to be pressed to switch between aperture and shutter speed settings, for example, is simply too small. Standing more proud from the thumb stop, which also needs to be larger, and adding a rubber coating, might have solved this problem without detracting from the designer's neat aim.
Pros and cons
The GF1's biggest failing is that its physical size prevents it from being easily pocketable. Its greatest advantage is that a vast range of different focal length lenses can be mounted on it. But if you intend to interchange more than a couple, you'll need a bag to carry all the bits - partially defeating the whole point of its supposed portable convenience.
Nonetheless, the ability to switch lenses is appealing and as I've shown in the past with other models in the Micro Four Thirds category, image performance can be increased by employing non-standard brand objectives. The GF1 does not feature the very useful large, articulating LCD screen of its older siblings but it is fitted with a working accessory shoe for the optional extra DMW-LVF1, a 90 degs swivelling eye-level electronic viewfinder which, at the press of a button, replicates everything normally viewed on the camera's fixed and unprotected three-inch, 460,000-dot TFT LCD screen.
Small electronic viewfinders have been around for some time now and while they do not live up to the expectations afforded by optical finders, they are efficient, allowing you to seamlessly monitor settings. Epson recently launched a new colour filter-incorporated Ultimicron EVF LCD panel, offering increased resolution and fidelity, so new and perhaps smaller versions of the LVF1 may soon appear. In the meantime, the current device, with its adjustable dioptre correction feature, works. Frequent usage quickly adjusts the mind and eye to practicable applications, and, as I found with a similar EVF on the Ricoh GX 100 and 200, the swivelling feature earns high marks. The device does what it says on the tin. In the field I found it very useful for low-angle control, but I was also constantly aware it could very easily slip unnoticed out of the accessory shoe. It needs a lock to keep it in place.
Cost effective
For me, and I suspect many other users still struggling to earn a crust selling stock and editor-ial photography, high technical quality is a priority. You rarely know who will ask or for what purpose, but from time to time clients come along with requests that place high demands on the quality of original data.
Recently one of my clients ordered a 3m wide print for a trade exhibition, from an image made on 35mm reversal stock. The image selected from my web database had been digitalised on a Braun scanner, and I had never envisaged it might one day need be used so large. The TIFF file made for A4 repro therefore needed careful upscaling.
It was fairly easy to achieve with reasonable resolution for the print viewing distance and although less grain would have been visible from a medium format negative, the client was happy and the print was far superior to anything produced in the internegative days. But I wondered how far I would be able to go with the original Fine JPEGs made with the Micro Four Thirds format.
The G1 produces very good quality JPEG files - at more modest magnification levels they display edge sharp and slightly film-like images. At all ISO settings there is evidence of image noise, and this is perhaps more pronounced by colour filter speckling and crossover colour bleeding when images are captured in raw and JPEG modes. A weak anti-aliasing filter also obtained occasional random Moire effects, but overall the images are contrasty, sharp and finely detailed. GH1 images, using later firmware, show less noise, but JPEG images are softer at the edges of tone separation.
Using similar settings to capture Fine Jpegs on the GF1 with its Lumix G f/1.7, 20mm ASPH lens (equivalent in 35mm format to 40mm), the images looked softer at higher magnifications. Apart from default colour palette differences, the results were similar to those captured with the Olympus EP-1.
Either way, the relatively small 17.3x13.5mm LiveMos sensor used in all the Panasonic Four Thirds cameras delivers a high image quality. This is not yet at a level where overall sharpness and detail-resolving capability would warrant my switching digital systems downwards from APS-C formats, but it does present an option going the other way - up from the much smaller sensor size used in compacts such as the Ricoh GR.
While not even close for an objective like-for-like comparison, the latest Ricoh GR III nonetheless remains a contender in the small-is-beautiful, similar £550-£650 price stakes. On size and ergonomics it is ahead of the competition by a wide margin. Fixed 28mm (equivalent) focal length glass quality is excellent and image quality will just stretch to my A3 benchmark. For a lot of what might be described as second tier imaging - small details, headshots, micro-stock - the GR III is hard to beat.
Conclusions
The GF1 steps up versatility at the cost of overall size increase and convenience. Using Lumix G lenses meets the good quality and excellent tonal range required for serious work and files stretched to 3m wide looked less grainy and cleaner to similar-sized images originally captured on miniature format film.
The compact f/1.7 20mm supplied for the review proved a worthy performer. Other useful lenses in the Micro Four Thirds range include the 14-45mm Lumix G Vario f3.5-f5.6 Aspheric zoom, a Lumix G Vario f/4.0-5.6, 45-200mm (90-400mm) with 16 elements (including three extra low dispersion glasses) in 13 groups weighing a mere 380g and the rarely seen but excellent Lumix G Vario f/4, 7-14mm super wide zoom. All of these will fit comfortably in jacket cargo pockets but Leica, Voigtlander and Zeiss Ikon rangefinder film users dipping a foot in the digital minefield for the first time may benefit from the technical quality their branded lenses can lend to GF1 images. Come to think of it, if you already own the glass, there probably isn't a cheaper, more compact route into a quality digital system.
