Micro Four Thirds Photography in 2021

Automatic transcript by Descript.com.

Tony: Hello and welcome to the three techs. I’m your host, Tony Tang. And tonight I’m joined by the other two techs. Bob Fairburn. Hey Bob 

Bob: Good evening.

Tony: and Steven Branson. Hey Steven. 

Steven: Hi, dad.

Tony: Tonight, we’re going to talk about micro four thirds photography and whether or not it makes sense to keep buying or. Investing in micro four thirds in 2021, all three of us have some form of micro four thirds cameras.

Tony: I personally own a Panasonic GH-4 and a GH-5, which I actually use more for video shooting rather than still photos. Bob, I know you own some Steven. You own some as well. Bob, what cameras do you own that are micro four thirds. 

Bob: Primary ones EM-1 mk II and an EM-5 mk II is the second one. And I have a couple of the originally EM-1s, which I don’t use very often, but they’re still very functional. Good cameras. 

Tony: And those are Olympus. 

Bob: All Olympus. Yes, sir.

Tony: How about you, Steven? What? Micro four thirds cameras do you own? 

Steven: so I’m all Panasonic and there’s cameras I haven’t u sed for a long time, they’re just pensioned off. So GH-2s, GH-3s use a GM-5, the tiny little ones, and then a mix of GH-4s and GH-5s. Sometimes they use the -4 because it’s lighter. Sometime use sometimes I use the GH-5. 

Tony: What I’d like to ask you guys today is. Would you still invest in micro four thirds if you were just starting off right now in 2021, given what we know about what’s happened in the industry, and maybe we can give a little background on that. And then would you consider other options besides micro four thirds?

Steven: The big thing was maybe it’s a year ago. Now that Olympus one of the two key partners for sure are Olympus and Panasonic. So Olympus announced they were getting rid of their still camera business. So the company itself is still going. There are other types of products they’re still making, but their cameras they seeded to a company called OM Digital.

Steven: But the interesting thing is, you could still buy Olympus cameras. And O M digital have not yet announced a product but you could still buy all of the Olympus camera and lens range. 

Tony: Okay. So nothing has really changed from a consumer perspective. You can still access and buy all the cameras, but there’s just been a change of hands as far as who owns the Olympus, still photography camera business. 

Steven: And I think you know, the other thing to note is that, you know, Panasonic announced a full frame. Line and they’ve released a number of full frame cameras. And what’s been missing with a couple of exceptions is new micro four thirds cameras. Panasonic they’ve released the GH-5 mark II which is a very minor update.

Steven: To the GH-5 and everybody’s waiting for an expected announcement of a GH-6, but really there’s been no impacting new camera appeared yet in micro four thirds.

Tony: Right. And maybe we should back up just a little bit and talk about micro four thirds in general and what it is and why both of you have chosen to use it. Bob, would you like to give your, take on it on micro four thirds.