I did a little follow-me shoot yesterday, mostly a stills day, but some video with the old G9.
The G9 was my main video camera, but now it sites at the bottom of the pile;
G9II: Highest bit rates, Best AF, Best Stabe, a few time but no crop or format limits.
S5II: Second best AF and Stabe, few time limits, some crops, no format limits.
S5: Probably even stabe to G9, ok AF, no format limits, but more time and crop limits than the S5II.
G9: Decent stabe (see sample), no crops, time limits applied to limited formats and ok AF with selected lenses. It can still offer 4k/60p/10 bit/422 for short clips and RAW out, so better than many.
So, basically the G9, a solid video option, has lots of in-house competition. The Stabe Boost mode (tripod-like lock) is good on all of them, hard to split, but movement stabe is a clear 1-4 ranking.
Having said that, this footage was a spontaneous grab with the old G9, 10 bit/422/1080 in Standard, with high movement (E-stabe), the 8-18 in MF, shot at 50p so I could slow it by 50%, “optical flow” and mild post processing stabe added. No rig, no handles, just a stills cam pushed into video role.
The footage has suffered at some point, likely upload compression or similar or maybe the applied processing (me) and there are two clear shift points, also down to me.
I guess the big question is, if I had taken the G9II and a gimbal, would I get noticeably better results for this, a very normal situation and would that extra gear and set-up possibly loose me more in stills missed, or changed my video/stills thinking? Would just the G9II or S5II with a stabilised lens be noticeably better?
For these jobs, I carry two cameras, one (G9) with the 8-18 in a small shoulder bag, one (EM1.2) with the 40-150 f4 and shoulder strap. Adding a gimbal and another camera would be quite a different proposition.