@jfro. I can't comment on comparing the GH3 to a 5D MkII. The best camera I ever had was the GH1. From what I've seen so far, the GH3 is a much better stills camera than the GH1. That's about all I can say. :-)

It's nice having the jump in resolution from 12 MP to 16 MP and actually see an apparent increase in quantum efficiency? That's the only way to explain the better performance from what have to be smaller pixels. I'm very happy with the photo quality of the GH3 so far. But...I haven't really taken many photos.

But...as good as a 5D Mk II? I think that's impossible just because of the difference in sensor size. a u43 sensor can never match a full frame for sensitivity. The FF will always have much larger pixels. But, I believe that for my life, the photo resolution of u43 is "good enough". I'll never have photos blown up 10x life size hanging in a museum, so...for my purposes, it looks like the GH3 satisfies my desire for more pixels than a GH1 (for finer grain and ability to crop more aggressively).

tried to compare DR between GH2 and GH3. I used the Voigtländer 17.5mm @ f8 RAW processed with Lightroom RC4.3

GH2 setup: - WB 6400K - Nostalgic -2-2+2-2 - shutter 1000/sec

GH3 setup: - WB 6400K - Portrait c-5 sh-5 sat-2 nr-5  - shutter 1000/sec

1. Red indicating highlight clipping without adjustment (default development settings)
2. 100% crop with full highlight recovery (Highlights -100)
3. 60% cliped black

@Alex great test. I would like to see how they recover from both under exposure and over exposure files.

And why don't you just use the standard profile for both?

@Alex. Nice test. This might be a stupid question, but, why did you not include more of the area with the clipped highlights in the 100% Crop? I would also be curious to know the LR negative highlights value you needed to clear all clipping for each camera. Taking the highlights to -100 for both shots seems quite extreme? I'm assuming that you needed only a smaller negative highlight adjustment for the GH3, and probably a bit more adjustment for the GH2. It seems like overkill to go to -100 for both shots? Wouldn't that 'flatten' the highlights too much in both shots?

And, like tinyrobot. I wonder why the different profiles for the two cams? Did you do some experiments that showed these were the two 'closest' settings? The color balance is quite different.

Sorry if these seem like silly question. :-)

We all appreciate any testing done. I'm not trying to be critical, just asking some questions to learn.

I wish I could do some more testing, but..I can't do anything with my GH3 until the weekend, since it is dark when I go in to work, and it is dark by the time I get home from work. :-(

@gib what is the name of that function, "zoom focus"? There is "focus area set" as a assignable funktion and it requires SET tobe pressed to actually do the magnification. "Focus area set" only gives a box that can be resized. Do I miss the function that zooms in by the press of ONE button??

@alex Function button #3 is set to "AFmode"

@Alex Were those frame captures from movie files?

@gib awesome "AF Mode" is it! - cool, problem solved!

@stonebat no they were RAW stills

@alex The use of clipping colors suggests that these are to be viewed as quantitative (i.e. this has more clipping than that). I would note that your tests are qualitative rather than quantitative. The exposures have slightly different times to them. Particularly noting the clouds have different structures. On a cloudy day the exposure highlights in them will change from moment to moment as they take on different shapes and the amount of light they transmit or reflect will change also. Particularly for the overexposed portions and the underexposed amounts.

A better test would be a side by side. (I know hard to do if you don't have identical lenses).

muahaha MOIRE! at 0:47 on the blue part of the American flag! MOIRE!!!!

One thing I am on the lookout for in all the sample videos is the dreaded "banding". I've had way too many of my clips ruined by that ugly banding (typically in blue sky, but sometimes in Gray).

I once spent a couple days trying to 'fix' banding that ruined many of the clips of a boat trip that otherwise I could have pasted together into a nice overall review of the event. I read up on how to cure it (adding noise was the most effective, but it never was good enough).

My strong hope is that, even though we still only have 8 bit output, somehow the ugly banding will be gone with the GH3?

So far, have not seen any sign of it in the GH3 clips, but...we need to see many more clips to be sure it is gone. Any opinions on whether it will remain simply b/c the output is 8 bit?