My full frame journey is mostly finished and looking back, I still have the unsettled feeling it was all based on mistakenly perceived real world needs, pandered a little to emotional wants and was justified by some lucky purchases. I have put a formidable two camera 7 lens cinema and still rig together for $8k new. Not bad, but well spent?

It started a couple of years ago when I rightly identified a hole in my video game. I had limited grading options and time and control limits using a pair of not-upgraded G9 Mk1’s. These are capable of everything I have actually needed up to now in quality (a non-LOG profile in 1080p/422/10bit), but the thirty minute limit was problematic.

Fixes were many, but due to the G9 being a hybrid camera recently empowered by a firmware upgrade to a limited video work horse, it was hard to spend upward of a $1000au on an off-board Video Assist or Ninja V unit with confidence and although that would upgrade both G9’s it could not run both at once.

A $2k budget set as a base, what else was there?

Cameras came down to several Panasonics and the M43 Black Magic. The BMPCC went in favour of a Panasonic compatible landscape and it felt aged. The GH5 II was the head choice, a decent filler that fixed all my needs at under $2k, the GH6 was a little dear, mainly because of it’s card needs was the heart choice, but the S5 Mk1 and kit lens at just over $2k won the day as the gut choice. Superior low light performance, although not called out as an actual need and a feeling of M43 being ignored pushed it over the top.

I bought a cheap 50mm and felt I had a decent video kit for interviews, the odd long performance recording and the possibility of going into a full LOG work flow.

So far, no harm, no foul, except the GH5 Mk2, possibly with the 10-25 f1.7 still nagged at about the same price.

The G9II dropped, surprising everyone with its capabilities. It removed all the limits of the original G9, upped the AF, stabiliser and general handling of the GH6 and added twin SD slots with SSD out recording (with Pro-Res to boot) with seemingly little lost. “Best in class” and “best in any class” statements were flying around and so far, nothing has been proven wishful hyperbole.

The GH5II and a pair of G9 Mk1’s would have been the idea backup for this camera.

At the same time that I picked up the G9 II, I got a decent tax return, which allowed me to shop for bargains over the holiday period. They were many, but they were all L-Mount. The super cheap pair of 7 Artisan Spectrum lenses which are consistently excellent (the Vision lenses for M43 are a mixed bag) and the IRIX 150mm macro was a one-off, so L-Mount or nothing.

A 35, 50 and 150 macro cinema lens kit for under $2k was a genuine bargain, seemed meant to be.

For some reason I felt the need to add two more Lumix lenses with a couple of decently priced primes. It felt like doubling up, it was doubling up, tripling if you count my M43 options.

Even now I am not sure what was the better option, super cheap true cinema lenses, some of which were cheaper than any decent lenses I have bought or a very harmonious set of Lumix lenses, perfectly capable of doing the job (I do not have the 24, but would have, all with follow focus rings and they are suitably “cinematic looking” and consistent across the range).

I also added a Sirui 24 Night Walker and 7Artisan Vision 12mm for M43 to round out the set where L-Mount had holes and give the G9 something cinematic to do. The 7 Art felt forced, the Sirui is excellent, only adding seeds of doubt to the move away from m43.

Things were getting silly now.

A set of lenses split over two formats? I could have easily made a more logical cinema kit (7 Art 12 and 35 Vision-the good ones of that set, 24 and 55 Sirui to match or an IRIX 21mm) or even a full anamorphic kit (24, 35 and 50 Sirui) in M43 for less. Sure the L-Mount lenses were cheaper, but not the overall kit, nor the logic of it.

I had the best everyday video option in the G9II, could have also bought both 1.7 Panasonic zooms, even empowered the lot with a BMVA 12G.

I now had one problem I wanted to fix, which was too many full frame lenses for the single S5 to service and another one I did not want to see, the missed opportunity of the more logical M43 path. The S5 is a great video camera and I rig it as such. This makes using it as a stills camera problematic, which also makes having a whole second set of stills lenses problematic.

The solution as I saw it was a second S5 cheap and one came up at $1700au with kit lens. This had issues. The S5 II did have a few more video options, but these were mostly out of my envelope of need and its AF and stabilising performance is behind the G9 II still.

Fate intervened and a long dragged out backorder overlapped with a S5 II sale, so I switched anyway. This has put things closer to right, making my Lumix kit a capable stills kit and giving me (ironically) a G9 II lite in the S5 II.

Where could I have been?

At this point I could have been well settled with a the GH5 II, G9 II, two G9’s one probably upgraded to V-LOGL, either a set of cinema or anamorphic cinema lenses and possibly the 10-25 Panasonic, the “problem solver”.

What would I be missing?

The very low light capability of the S5’s is limited a blessing, assuming I want lots of depth of field (the normal M43 advantage is off-set by the S5’s dual ISO settings*), or if I am shooting so dark, that the super shallow depth of a wide open full frame lens is actually needed (rare but possible). The quality, especially at my base of 1080/422/10 bit in Flat or Standard profile is excellent, but so is the G9 II’s, even the G9 I’s and all of these cameras upgrade with off-board recorders equally.

I could have gone without, I can use both.

No harm, no foul.

*In depth of field math ISO 800 at f1.7 in M43 basically matches ISO 3200 at f2.8 in full frame, but the S5’s second base ISO of 4000 gives it the edge with video. I am yet to see much value with stills as M43 is enough.