Does the Panasonic GH5 Improve on ISO Performance? From What I See.. YES!

During a trip to Japan with Panasonic back in November/December of last year I was lucky enough to get a hands on with a pre production model of the new Lumix GH5. After leaving Panasonic in Osaka I travelled around Japan with Ross Grieve and Jacob James and we took the GH5 along with us on a road trip up to Fukushima via mount Fuji and Tokyo.

I wish I had filmed a lot more during the trip, spending more time setting up shots, testing out all the shooting functions of the GH5, however I was super excited to be in Japan and also wanted to take in as much as possible without having a camera glued to me 24/7.

This video was shot entirely on the GH5 mostly in 50/60p, I think there’s two shots in 25p, all the 60p footage was shot in the variable framerate mode and conformed to 25p in camera and the 50p footage slowed down by 50% in post.

I didn’t have a variable ND with me on the trip so I was having to control the light by using the shutter and aperture, sometimes having to bump the shutter speed up way to high causing some of the footage to look a little jerky.

Mostly shot hand held but I did use a glidecam for some of the sweeping shots. The 5 axis stabilisation in this camera is incredible.

The low light footage shot in Tokyo was shot at ISO 3200 and 6400.

All footage shot by myself, Jacob James & Ross Grieve

Edited and graded in Adobe Premiere on Microsoft Surface Book

Here is a low light ISO test of the GH5 by Luke Neumann I shows the noise pattern and color. Looks much better than the GH4 does. Much less color in the noise and seems to clean up very well. He shot this in V Log L which is noisier on the GH4. I do wish I could see ISO 1600 in full frame as opposed to a 400% crop but I think I get the idea enough.

This footage is just plain beautiful! I don’t know if Luke used any Denoiser on the darker shots. Some of these images look 3D. Very impressive.

With these samples I think it’s safe to say that Panasonic has improved the GH5 a lot in ISO noise and the levels of usable ISO as well. Nice job Panasonic!

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