Gear Panasonic Lumix GX-85 Process Software

As I have stated before in this blog, I am not your normal nature photographer. When it comes to bird photography this is especially true. I don’t stake out areas or otherwise stalk birds to get my shots. Rather, I walk a set route as close to daily as circumstances allow and shoot what comes my way. Nor do I lug around a mammoth 500mm lens capable of seeing a given bird’s teeth. Since I am usually also walking my dog, thus giving me only one hand with which to shoot, I have to travel light.

This need for portability was a major factor in deciding to go with the Panasonic Lumix GX-85. It is small and came with a nice 45-150mm zoom. When it comes to photographing birds that max length of 150mm seems a tad short. Keeping in mind that the camera has a micro 4/3 sensor, this “short” lens is equivalent to a 300mm full frame lens. Combine this with the built in “in-body stabilization” and the in-lens stabilization and the fact that I shoot raw images which allows me to crop my output heavily, it turns out that this setup is darn near adequate.

But I still wanted to push this camera as far as it would go. So I got out the manual and dug in. Based on my research here are the settings I decided to try.

This feature is an enhanced Auto ISO function. It is supposed to be better than the standard in that it tries to select the best shutter speed and provide the lowest ISO possible to help control image noise. Here is how it is explained in the manual:

  • The camera detects movement of the subject and then automatically sets the optimum ISO sensitivity and shutter speed to suit the movement of the subject and brightness of the scene to minimize the jitter of the subject.
  • Maximum [ISO3200] (With the flash on [ISO1600])
  • The shutter speed is not fixed when the shutter button is pressed halfway. It is continuously changing to match the movement of the subject until the shutter button is pressed fully

This setting is alleged to allow the camera to balance contrast and exposure in situations where the background and foreground are at odds with one another – such as shooting a bird in flight or perched on a tree against a clear sky.

This is the function that really caught my eye. Turning this on allows the camera to use the sensor area a little differently to effectively increase the apparent focal length of your lens. There are some trade-offs that you make when going with this setting. First you can’t shoot Raw. Not only that but you are limited to either the “Medium” or “Small” jpg choices (though you can choose between a higher and lower resolution setting in either.) But here’s the deal. Choosing “Medium” gives you a focal length boost factor of 1.4. Choosing “Small” kicks that up to a 2x factor. So by choosing “high” resolution “Small” I am effectively shooting with a 600mm lens without adding any extra weight! It was worth a try.

With all of the above mentioned settings activated I set out on April 28th to give it a go. And as I could have predicted the park was devoid of anything worth photographing. I was about to fire of a shot or two of nothing spectacular when I happened to notice an Osprey perched on top of a topless tree at least 75 yards distant. This turned out to be a terrific test of my “exotic” camera setup.

Once I returned home and transferred the image to my home network I got to work editing the image with several different sets of hardware and software so I could see what would render the best results. My results are presented below. I have to admit that none of them are spectacular.

  • Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado
    Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado. Original image right out of the camera. Panasonic Lumix GX-85
  • Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado
    Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado. Cropped, adjusted and sharpened with Google Snapseed editor on my Samsung Tab S3.
  • Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado
    Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado. Cropped, adjusted and sharpened (unsharp mask) with Affinity Photo .
  • Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado
    Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado. Cropped and adjusted with Affinity Photo Sharpened with Topaz Sharpen AI in stabilize mode.
  • Osprey and Catch Lake Pueblo State park, Colorado
    Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado. Original file Upsized by factor of 2 with Topaz Gigapixel AI then Cropped and adjusted with Affinity Photo Sharpened with Unsharp Mask.
  • Osprey and Catch Lake Pueblo State park, Colorado
    Osprey with Catch Lake Pueblo State Park, Colorado. Original file Upsized by factor of 2 with Topaz Gigapixel AI then Cropped and adjusted with Affinity Photo Sharpened with Unsharp Mask and then sharpened with Topaz Sharpen AI.

Conclusions:

The major issue with this shot is that the subject came out with some motion blur that forced me into trying to save the image with either Topaz Labs Sharpen AI product or Topaz Labs Gigapixel AI (or in one try both.) The problem, I think, was using the iISO feature instead of either straight Auto ISO or setting a high ISO. The iISO algorithm “saw” that the subject was not moving so it went with an ISO of 500 which resulted in a shutter speed setting of 1/500 second. Since I was shooting with a lens of a theoretical length of 600mm I feel that 1/500 was too slow and it allowed for camera shake. If I try this set up again I will not use iISO.

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