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Quantaray 70-300 4-5.6 LD

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TTArtisan 35 1.4

FINAL NOTE: I don't recommend this lens for professional work. At first, I was guessing the f/1/.4 maximum aperture and the fact that it's a prime lens would make this lens a good option (at the low price it comes in at). However, after testing it and working with custom settings for a few days, I can say I do NOT recommend this lens, as it has a number of different optical problems that make it very difficult to capture a realistic, professional-looking image. I could go into more detail, but of the 50+ lenses I've tested, it is one of the top 5 worst (and I would never take it on a professional shoot...which is the requirement for each of the lens-sensor settings recommendations on this website).

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Nikon 50 1.8 D + Vivitar 2x MACRO

Wow...the final results on this lens-sensor (and speed booster) combo are great! All of the properties of contrast, sharpness, noise and color all look REALLY good (even though they're not perfectly realistic). Since the color from this camera is almost always more saturated than my other cameras (currently testing GH4, G85, GX85) I knew it would be a bit on the vivid side and turning it down any more can leave too much work for the LUT to do accurately (in post-production). Another thing I'm considering, is that while the Panasonic G7 seems to produce a lot of color saturation, it may be good to leave my settings a bit on the colorful side if you're going to upload straight to YouTube. However, most of the time I would have to run these through Davinci Resolve (to assemble multiple clips) anyway, so I could easily just add a LUT (or my "YouTube color bump" settings) to deal with the color saturation.

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Leica 25-400 2.8-4.0

I’ve been working on getting my FZ1000 to look realistic, using SOOC (Straight Out of Camera) settings, and I’m pretty happy with what these settings now (and it’s REALLY EASY TO REMEMBER). These settings are mostly for 4K PHOTO mode use, so I'm also doing this so I can either use 4K PHOTO mode to grab stills, or to shoot video and be able to use it without doing color grading (though it may need a little sharpness adding in Davinci Resolve, my video editing software of choice…also super good for color grading). Note that the smaller sensor on this camera produces a little bit more NOISE than I would consider perfect, but it's not bad if you look at it as kind of an organic "film look". IMPORTANT NOTE: One setting that you have to be careful to not forget, is to set the "Luminance Level" to 0-255 (not the default setting of 16-255). The easy way to set it to 0-255, is simply to switch to 4K PHOTO mode (which will default to 0-255). You can set it without doing that, but it's a lot more difficult (I don't remember the exact sequence). I should also say, I've found ISO 200 to create the most real-looking image on this camera (maybe it's the "native ISO"?) So, if you can use ISO 200, I do recommend it even over 125 and 160, even though they're lower. The image degrades noticeably above ISO 400, and I sometimes go up to ISO 800 when needed, but be aware that it's going to look like it has more "film grain" (which isn't always bad, but it won't match your other footage, if the other footage was shot at a lower ISO). Another thing to note, is this camera doesn't work with a VND (variable ND) and so if you need to use a ND filter outdoors (to follow the 180-degree shutter rule, which I sometimes do not) the only option is using a straight ND filter (ND8 has been the best strength in my experience). This is both interesting and somewhat distressing, and the inclusion of internal ND filters in the FZ2500 seems like an admission of this issue. What happens is, at the longer telephoto focal lengths, using a VND filter makes the image look really bad; so bad, you would have to try it yourself to believe it! It's interesting that a similar thing happens with a lot of the 70-300 lenses I've tested (also at and near the long end of the zoom range). My theory is it has something to do with the enormous amount of space between the optics when the lens is in the extended telephoto position.

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Panasonic 12-32 3.5-5.6

IMPORTANT NOTE: I may go back to figure out the custom settings for this lens, but I don't recommend this combination FOR VIDEO use because the GX85 body does not have a manual focus dial, or an autofocus/manual focus switch (like the GX9) so you can quickly turn off AF. The reason you need this for video use, is that the AF is not reliable so it will "hunt" if you leave it on while recording. For instance, if you're in a documentary/interview/talking head situation it may switch from foreground focus to focus on the background, and that can ruin an interview (because you can't just make a person say something over, etc.) The workaround is to set the focus (on a person's nearest eye, typically) and then turn off AF. However, to do this on the GX85, you have to use the menu system instead of a physical switch (as on GX9). This takes too long and doesn't work in real situations. So, because the lens doesn't have a manual focus dial (or an on/off switch, I don't recommend this specific (lens-sensor) combination for video/filmmaking use (it's decent for still photography).

WSFX2

Panasonic 12-60 3.5-5.6

IMPORTANT: This test is being done for a friend, for still photography use only (and I don't recommend it for video use).

UC1

Panasonic 12-60 3.5-5.6

NEW NOTES: ... (BELOW IS FROM TIFFEN BPM18): (These new settings are for using the lens with the Tiffen Black Pro Mist 1/8.) I started this test because I wasn't able to get this lens-sensor combo (or with G85) to work very well UNFILTERED (see my older notes below). So, while testing I noticed a number of interesting things, including that this filter (with the specific settings I use) is reducing the compression artifacts that were occurring in video (when using it UNFILTERED). Also, no surprise, but using this filter makes this lens more prone to flare (need a lens hood or matte box) and though this can reduce the contrast in certain lighting situations (i.e. pointing toward a light source) the flare doesn't look that bad. So, while I didn't like the results of this lens UNFILTERED, I now feel pretty good about using it with these settings (which include the Tiffen BPM18/Black Pro Mist 1/8). OLDER NOTES (from UNFILTERED test): When I started this test, I was surprised, as I had heard so many people say good things about this lens, but when compared with a lot of the vintage lenses I've been testing, this thing isn't very good...so let me explain. When I started this test (at -0-0-0-0 using the Natural profile) what immediately jumped out at me were the outlines on the edges of objects, which I'm pretty sure is due to over-sharpening...yet at the same time, the image was soft and needed sharpening! This is a problem, because to remove the outlines on the edges of things, you have to REDUCE the SHARPENING...but doing that will mean the image needs even MORE sharpening during post production, so I may have to see how far I can take the sharpening in post production (using Davinci Resolve).

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Novoflex 105 4 AUTO BELLOWS

DAMAGE WARNING: The copy of this lens I tested had fungus on the inside of the second element. So, these settings may not work on your copy of the lens (unless your fungus is identical...but does that ever happen?) Even with the fungus, I can see this lens had (even in a clean state) trouble with chromatic aberration, though it's not too extreme, and mainly shows up as RED and YELLOW fringing (and not the super-distracting, yet 3-D looking blue and red of some other lenses).

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Novoflex 105 4 AUTO BELLOWS

DAMAGE WARNING: The copy of this lens I tested had fungus on the inside of the second element. So, these settings may not work on your copy of the lens (unless your fungus is identical...but does that ever happen?) Even with the fungus, I can see this lens had (even in a clean state) trouble with chromatic aberration, though it's not too extreme, and mainly shows up as RED and YELLOW fringing (and not the super-distracting, yet 3-D looking blue and red of some other lenses).

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Minolta MD 50 1.7

(Sold GH4, so only did a preliminary test...if you try, let me know what you think!)