Could this be the perfect camera?

Panasonic carved out their own niche in the photography and video world with their GH series of cameras. The GH4 was awarded a Gold Award (with a score of 85%) by DPReview back in Oct 2014.  It's appeal for those who bought it was it size and weight (being a Micro Four Thirds camera) as well as it's ground-breaking video performance. It also had high speed burst shooting at 12 frames per second (AFS).

The GH5 followed earlier this year, with improved image stabilization, 4K from the full width of the sensor and a host of other features that were an improvement on it's predecessor, the GH4.

Now, within less than a year, Panasonic have announced the Lumix G9, not as a replacement for the GH5 but to sit alongside it as the camera of choice for those who primarily stills photographers not videographers. It has the same sensor as the GH5 (20.3 MP) but has better JPEG performance (as to be expected as it's newer). It's OLED viewfinder has a 3.86 MP (equivalent) resolution with a magnification of 0.83 (full frame equivalent).

It has a standard frames per second of 9fps but is capable of up to 20fps with it's electronic shutter. You can even use the electronic shutter with focus locked at 60fps!

Like a professional camera should be, it comes with two UHS-II standard card slots. As for video, well the G9 isn't a replacement for the GH5 and doesn't offer the same level of professional features. It is still a very capable camera for video though (at least it's specification promises) with 4K/60p video at a maximum bitrate of 150Mbps as the headline feature. It also comes with focus-peaking, zebra stripes and flicker reduction. All in all, a very capable feature set that should satisfy the occasional videographer amongst us.

It also comes with the 6K and 4K photo modes allowing you to capture high resolution images by, in essence, capturing 6k video at 30fps or 4k video at 60fps. The images are captured at 18MP and 8MP respectively.

The G9 also comes with a 80MP mode courtesy of it's sensor-shift feature. It achieves this by moving the sensor half a pixel eight times to achieve a high resolution by combining the resulting eight images into one. This should be of interest to studio photographers who shoot product shots or still lifes.

Another feature that should interest many photographers is the 6.5 stops of image stabilization.... yes 6.5 stops! Can't wait for the test results from the reviewers at DPReview amongst others.

Panasonic claim that they have improved their Depth-from-Defocus (DFD) technology beyond what the GH5 offers, so much so that it's auto-focus and tracking capabilities are the best yet. If it's true then the G9 is looking like it could give other recent cameras a run for their money. Whether it can compete with the likes of Nikon's D500 or even the Fuji X-T2 with it's speed booster grip remains to be seen.

The camera continues the tradition of Panasonic's top of the line cameras with robust weather-sealing and build quality. It can operate down to -10 degrees C (-14 degrees F) and it's shutter performance is in excess of 200, 000 activations.

In terms of size the G9 measures 136.9 x 97.3 x 91.6 mm/5.39 x 3.83 x 3.61 inch (excluding protrusions) and weighs Approx. 579g/1.28 lb (Body only).

Price wise, the DC-G9 will ship in January 2018 for $1699 body only. The DMW-BGG9 grip will arrive at the same time for $349. UK/Euro/Canadian prices TBC.

You can read the full specification on Panasonic's site here.