I am about to enter the MFT world as I am eagerly waiting delivery of a Panasonic G9 II which I purchased yesterday from another FMer. I am sure there will be a steep learning curve at first, I am coming from the Nikon Z world. When you all switched, what was the hardest thing to learn with the new format?
There’s nothing hard about it if you come from any other system IMO. The only thing you need to remember is that you have got 2 more stops of depth of field over FF, so don’t need to stop down more than f5.6 and shooting at wider stops gives you plenty of in focus areas. This tends to remove the need to shoot at higher ISOs for much of the time.
There are quite a few things to like about m43 in my opinion, particularly if you're evolving from a full frame system. One big consideration for me is that you have a wealth of high quality lenses at your disposal, not only having excellent optics but very often being smaller and lighter than their FF counterparts. This is generally true with focal lengths from standard through telephoto, with the size and weight reduction becoming more dramatic as the focal length gets longer. Not so much the case with wide angle.
Makes a huge difference in kit size and carry weight.
My first m43 camera was a Panasonic G1, back in 2010. I had largely set photography aside to run my business, so it was my first digital camera. I was surprised how sharp the images were compared to my Nikon film bodies and lenses (I had no very high end Nikon lenses though). I do also use Sony, my latest body being an A7CR. I'm continuously tempted by the G9II, but would really prefer most of it's capabilities in a smaller, lighter body. I can imagine that my "last" camera may well be m43. I've been that satisfied with m43 output.
I think you will find Panasonic's menus very logical and straight-forward.
With the G9 (sold last year), I loved the three buttons on the top right, just behind the shutter release button. Direct shortcuts to some of the most used functions, WB, ISO and exposure +- .
Should your interests include landscapes, architecture or interiors, there are some "enhanced techniques" that can be applied to any format, but for which I happen to think m43 is perfectly positioned. The first is exposure bracketing, which will produce a final image file with extended dynamic range. The second is popularly called "Super Resolution", or for me, "Shaky Human Pixel Shift". This requires the use of Photoshop, but isn't difficult to do, assuming that you start out by shooting identical frames in a burst. (I recommend between 16 and 32 frames. Mostly I've used 16.) The process also removes most if not all noise, as a natural byproduct of the algorithm. I've done the same thing with my Sonys, it's just a bit easier with m43.
The link below is an example of Shaky Human Pixel Shift, I used the G9 with its' 20mp sensor and processed in PS, to output a file of 10513px x 7699px @300ppi. This is well in excess of the resolution of a single frame in my 61mp Sony. The file is uploaded to Flickr at its' full resolution.
G9 II is a great machine. I have the G9 which I enjoy using. Panasonic and Olympus have excellent lens offerings for MFT that, IMO, no other system can match. Compact size, high quality. One of the standouts is the Olympus 75 F1.8 with stunning IQ and can be had for fire sale prices if you look around. As you use your G9 II, you will see that with the right lenses it does not give up anything compared to FF.
