Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX7

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX7 announced in August 2013, is a Micro Four Thirds compact mirrorless interchangeable lens camera. It was Panasonic's first Micro Four Thirds camera with a built-in in-body stabilization system (IBIS) and has a built-in EVF (add-on EVFs are no-longer supported). Panasonic uses 2-axis in-body stabilization allowing the use of shutter speeds 1 to 2 stops slower than without stabilization, compared to the 4 to 5 stops of improvement offered by Olympus' 5-axis stabilization.

Features include:

Lumix

Lumix is Panasonic's brand of digital cameras, ranging from pocket point-and-shoot models to digital SLRs.

Compact digital cameras DMC-LC5 and DMC-F7 were the first products of the Lumix series, released in 2001. They are equipped with Leica lenses.

Indeed, many Lumix models are fitted with Leica lenses (e.g. Nocticron or Elmarit lenses), designed by Leica's German optical engineers, and are assembled in Japan. Others are rebranded as Leica cameras with different cosmetic stylings. Leica had a similar relationship with Minolta in the past, where late model Leica SLRs (and some 35 mm point-and-shoot models) were strongly based on Minolta bodies.

Most Lumix cameras use differing releases of the Panasonic Venus Engine for digital image processing; the original version (2002) was followed by II (2004), Plus (2005), III (2006), IV (2008), HD, V (2009), and VI, HD II, FHD (2010).

Panasonic produces most of Leica's branded digital point and shoot cameras in Japan, but not film cameras, the Leica M8 or Leica M9 digital rangefinder cameras, the X1 and X2 digital cameras or the Digital Modul R digital camera back for the Leica R9 film SLR.

Panasonic

Panasonic Corporation (パナソニック株式会社, Panasonikku Kabushiki-gaisha), formerly known as Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. (松下電器産業株式会社, Matsushita Denki Sangyō Kabushiki-gaisha), is a Japanese multinational electronics corporation headquartered in Kadoma, Osaka, Japan.

The company was founded in 1918 and has grown to become one of the largest Japanese electronics producers alongside Sony, Hitachi, Toshiba and Canon Inc. In addition to electronics, it offers non-electronic products and services such as home renovation services. Panasonic is the world's fourth-largest television manufacturer by 2012 market share.

Panasonic has a primary listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the Nikkei 225 and TOPIX indices. It has a secondary listing on the Nagoya Stock Exchange.

Name

From 1935 to October 1, 2008, the company name was "Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd." On January 10, 2008, the company announced that it would change its name to "Panasonic Corporation", in effect on October 1, 2008, to conform with its global brand name "Panasonic". The name change was approved at a shareholders' meeting on June 26, 2008 after consultation with the Matsushita family.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX8

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-GX8 is a digital rangefinder-styled mirrorless interchangeable-lens camera announced by Panasonic on July 16, 2015. The camera features a newly developed 20 megapixel sensor - previously the highest resolution in Micro Four Thirds cameras was 16 megapixels. The camera's ISO range touches 25600 and it can capture continuous frames at up to 8 frames per second. One major new feature introduced in the camera is “Dual IS”, the camera 5 axis image stabilisation gets synchronised, when available, with lens based image stabilisation. The camera also records 4K video.

The manufacturer has indicated the time to acquire auto focus as 0.07 seconds. The electronic OLED viewfinder has a resolution of 2.36 million dots and, as in the predecessor, is tiltable. The 3″ OLED touchscreen rear display is fully articulated and can display 1.04 million dots. The camera is splash proof.

Gallery

References

Four Thirds system

The Four Thirds System is a standard created by Olympus and Eastman Kodak for digital single-lens reflex camera (DSLR) and mirrorless camera design and development.

The system provides a standard that, with digital cameras and lenses available from multiple manufacturers, allows for the interchange of lenses and bodies from different manufacturers. U.S. Patent 6,910,814 seems to cover the standard. Proponents describe it as an open standard, but companies may only use it under a non-disclosure agreement.

Unlike older single-lens reflex (SLR) systems, Four Thirds was designed from the start to be entirely digital. Many lenses are extensively computerized, to the point that Olympus offers firmware updates for many of them. Lens design has been tailored to the requirements of digital sensors, most notably through telecentric designs. The size of the sensor is significantly smaller than for most DSLRs and this implies that lenses, especially telephoto lenses, can be smaller. For example, a Four Thirds lens with a 300 mm focal length would cover about the same angle of view as a 600 mm focal length lens for the 35 mm film standard, and is correspondingly more compact. Thus, the Four Thirds System has crop factor (focal length multiplier) of about 2, and while this enables longer focal length for greater magnification, it does not necessary aid the manufacture of wide angle lenses.