Panasonic G1 Adapted Lens/ISO Test

[Avotius]

Since I got myself a Panasonic G1 I thought I would give it a quick little test to see what it could do. This rainy day test covers how it compares to my ailing Ricoh GR-Digital and how M-mount lenses using the jinfinance adapter fare against the Panasonic 14-45mm kit lens.

I bought the G1 in part because I wanted a digital camera to use my collection of M-mount lenses on and did not want to pay for a Leica M8. The other reason to buy the G1 is because my faithful Ricoh GRD is nearly unresponsive, in fact it took a little time to get it running to do the ISO comparison test. The G1 though a lot larger than the GRD is still a lot smaller then the Canon 5D I have been using lately so it is very welcome as my walk around digital.

I was very surprised to see how well the Panasonic kit lens compared to my M-mount lenses with little or no difference to be seen which makes me wonder three things…either the lens is really spectacular, the camera cannot exploit any of the quality from the lenses so they all seem the same, or as I hear the raw files are pre tweaked and maybe it does not matter which lens is used as the camera’s software is too influential on the resulting image even in the raw file.


Take a look and decide for yourself.


Warning huge image!

 

[dovevadar]

thank man. this could just be the info I need. 😱

 

[dazedgonebye]

I'm not seeing the G1 iso 800 image.

 

[Tuolumne]

I was surprised to find much the same in my informal photo comparisons. It has me scratching my head. As far as the kit lens goes, it does seem to perform spectacularly in some of the most difficult situations, as seen below.

/T

 

[Avotius]

I'm not seeing the G1 iso 800 image.

There was no G1 ISO 800 image because I was trying to show off the low, middle and max ISO's of the cameras. As 800 is the highest the GRD will go in RAW that is what I had. I would have just used the ISO 3200 image from the G1 but the difference between the 1600 and 3200 was so big that it needed to be shown. ISO 3200 has so many processing artifacts in the noise as well so I decided to add those together.

I was surprised to find much the same in my informal photo comparisons. It has me scratching my head. As far as the kit lens goes, it does seem to perform spectacularly in some of the most difficult situations, as seen below.

/T

I have seen the kit lens work really well in some bad lighting situations too, I have been very impressed and tomorrow I will use the G1 and kit lens to shoot a more serious set of commercial images for a friend. So confident in the camera I am that I don't have many reservations doing so.

 

[dazedgonebye]

There was no G1 ISO 800 image because I was trying to show off the low, middle and max ISO's of the cameras. As 800 is the highest the GRD will go in RAW that is what I had. I would have just used the ISO 3200 image from the G1 but the difference between the 1600 and 3200 was so big that it needed to be shown. ISO 3200 has so many processing artifacts in the noise as well so I decided to add those together.

So, what are your conclusions? Are you going to be happy with it?

 

[Avotius]

So, what are your conclusions? Are you going to be happy with it?

I wont be able to say 100% until I see some printed results which I will have in the next few days. I am curious to see how much the 400 and up ISO's influence the print vs screen quality.

So far, I am happy as far as it is for a compact high image quality camera compared to my old point and shoot but the biggest reason for me to have one was the M-mount lenses...and as it seems the characteristics of those lenses might be overwhelmed by the cameras processing....sort of a let down.

Buyers regret? Maybe a little, the Leica M8 is so much better at bringing out what those M mount lenses can do but that is a lot of extra money that I don't have.

 

[nemjo]

Hi,

that f8 test is interesting, but what about to compare the lenses other way?
Lets say at 35mm f2. Or 28mm f2. Not to mention other f numbers such as 1,4 for example.
What I'd like to say, the G1 kit lens seems work quite well, but has limitations. First - at least to me - it is slow. But the ability to use fast primes solves that problem. In my bag there is the cv 28/2, 50/1.5 and the 90/3.5 beside the kit. I intend to use the cv lenses not to triumph the kit, but complement it.

Regards,

nemjo

ps.: the attached pic was made with a cv50/1.5

 

[Praxis Unitas]

It's difficult to make a comparison about the lens quality when the images are just comparing two small crops at the center of the lens. that both lenses seem sharp at a small f-stop says very little to me about which lens is 'better' under most circumstances.

I'm not trying to be contrary, but this post seems to suggest that the kit lens is an adequate replacement for serious Zeiss or Leica lenses, which makes me a bit skeptical.

Thanks for the studious ISO comparisons, though! I appreciate your thorough methodology in that test!

 

[Pickett Wilson]

Or it may be that the absolute advantage of really expensive lenses is just far less than you thought. Most people at any reasonable print size can't tell the difference between a very good lens and a great lens. There are too many factors in the equation.

 

[Avotius]

Hi,

that f8 test is interesting, but what about to compare the lenses other way?
Lets say at 35mm f2. Or 28mm f2. Not to mention other f numbers such as 1,4 for example.
What I'd like to say, the G1 kit lens seems work quite well, but has limitations. First - at least to me - it is slow. But the ability to use fast primes solves that problem. In my bag there is the cv 28/2, 50/1.5 and the 90/3.5 beside the kit. I intend to use the cv lenses not to triumph the kit, but complement it.

Regards,

nemjo

ps.: the attached pic was made with a cv50/1.5

Indeed, later I will try a test with a real persons face to see things like color representation and bokeh and other things. This being a rainy day test however I was stuck indoors with the gloomy weather so did not have that chance yet. I am also a little curious to see if there would be any black and white variation with the adapted lenses too.