This is a companion blog post for my Youtube video here : Panasonic S5 II Review (10-days)
Preamble
Alright, I know a S5 II review in August 2024 is late to say the least. Welp, the reason this being so late are many:
- I can’t get hold of a S5 II for review earlier
- It’s kinda first generation Phase-Detect enabled S-series from Panasonic, so it has time to mature (now in firmware version 1.30)
- It’s still a current model
- This will also be as thorough as I can make it
Besides focusing on the camera, I am testing these lenses on it Lumix S 24-105mm F/4, S Pro 70-200mm f/4, S 18mm f/1.8 and last but not least the S Pro 50mm F1.4. For flash photography, I am using the Godox TT685 II Olympus mount.
This review will be focussed a lot more on photography and specifically people photography as it is what my specialty is and I believe I am more qualified to test & comment on.
Also, I believe photographing people is still the most common type of professional work for photographers around the world.
Before we begin, unless stated otherwise, the camera is set to M mode; a suitable shutter-speed to freeze movement, mostly at wide-open aperture; auto ISO for most of the tests & reviews. Put an asterix on auto ISO, there are some interesting issues I found with that.
One more thing, this review is based on about 10-days of testing of the camera and lenses; which is barely enough to do a proper review. I wish I had the money to purchase this set and give it a proper 6mths test but alas, I do not.
First, let’s begin with the physical and tangible aspect of the camera and the associated lenses.
S5 II Body
S5 II body is well-built and inspires confidence. It’s not too heavy and the grip is comfortable and ergonomic especially when compared to the cameras I currently use which is from the S brand
Let’s talk about the highlights of this body. First of all, the On-Off button, its thoughtfully placed and designed. Easy to locate but nearly impossible to accidentally actuated, which again is not true for designs of other camera bodies.
These 3 quick select buttons to change white balance, ISO and exposure compensation is also great for fast moving situations.
And I call this the “Speed” dial, quick-easy and sure way of changing from single shot, burst, high-speed electronic burst and timer.
The fact that this and the other dial is non-programmable & physical is great for checking my settings when I need to be sure.
The best thing about the body however is actually this AF mode dial and switch. Its tactile and sure; and easy to actuate. I can actually activate this blind-while looking through the EVF and yes, this is after using the camera for 2-3 days.
Oh ya… before I forget, the S5 II has a built-in fan. Have a look at the R5C and compare it to this. The S5 II is definitely amazing for this size and cost.
The Lenses
Next, let’s talk about the lenses. These 4 lenses are generally well-built. The lightest and smallest is this 18mm but it is by no means feels poorly built. The 24-105 is much better built, heavier and feels like as good as any other 24-105 I have ever tested or used.
The final 2 lenses, from the S Pro line, are definitely deserving of the Pro line. Solidly built, rings dampened just right and feels bomb-proof.
One thing I love in particular about the Lumix S lens is this white line, just align this a little to the right of the viewfinder and turn-click, it’s locked on. The other lenses I have used all have a tiny dot to help with lens mounting, those are barely visible in low-light which I shoot in often.
Auto Focus
OK, its time to talk about the most important improvement of the S5 II; the auto-focus.
I have tested the AF in quite a few conditions and here are my conclusions:
- The subject-tracking is passable and not class-leading in both good and low-light with a small caveat which I will talk about later.
- Accuracy and speed seems to be reasonable but do sometimes miss the eyes
- Human recognition works but is easily confused with a passable recognition rate if the subjects are moving and not actively posing for the camera.
I noticed something rather alarming during my AF testing in low-light conditions.
There can be an extreme viewfinder / LCD scene display darkening after focus is locked during AF-S or AF-C on F/4.0 lenses. The same issue does happen but is much less of an issue with f/1.4 or f/1.8 lenses.
For AF-C (subject tracking or otherwise), sometimes it can be as bad as making the camera lose focus lock immediately after locking to a subject.
Again, I would stress this *only* happens in low-light and is an issue when using the F/4.0 lenses, I had no trouble shooting in the darkest conditions I wanted to shoot in with the F/1.4 and F/1.8 primes.
Image Quality
Image quality as far I can see is great, although I didn’t test the high-resolution mode.
It handles skintones well, has very pleasing color rendition and even works well in high ISO-low light conditions.
What I did observe is however, the F/4.0 lenses don’t appear to be that crisp but both the primes were great, especially the 50mm F/1.4. 50mm is my favourite focal length and this lens on the S5 II takes as good an image as any I have tried or used.
And yes, I count the M9 with a Noct among the lenses I have tested… so take that what you will 😛
Issues
Alright… time to talk about some negatives.
Just a gentle reminder, the image darkening in low-light with F4 lenses is somewhat of an issue, I am not sure if it also happens with F2.8 lenses but that can be a deal-breaker and I would test it further before I commit to buying a S5 II.
Secondly, I noticed a strange behaviour that the camera always shoots at lowest minimum ISO on AUTO ISO when using a Godox flash. It always does that and seems to be a bug or communication error. This can be circumvented by using manual ISO for flash photography, not a big deal but something to be aware of. I have already noticed Panasonic Malaysia of this and I haven’t heard back from them about this yet.
Auto ISO with Flash
Thirdly, I would, it is a custom setting called Constant Preview. As you can see, it’s rather difficult to understand what it actually does from the user manual. This is the setting when set to ON that makes the S5 II Liveview for both LCD and EVF work like any smartphone’s camera app or other mirrorless cameras : It shows the exposure & colors based on your settings all the time, so when you press the shutter-button or press record, you record the shown image on your memory card.
Constant Preview
If Constant Preview is OFF, it shows a perfect exposure ALL the time on the EVF/LCD regardless of setting and that includes the histogram if you enable it. So, if you were to say set ISO 25600 in broad daylight, it will still show a normal exposure on display BUT record a completely over-exposed photo if you press the shutter button.
Now, this setting is OFF by default. As to why, I can only make a guess based on the S5 II behaviour when I tried to shoot a long-exposure in low-light. During such conditions, if Constant Preview is ON and you set a 5sec exposure, the camera will TRY to display on the viewfinder a 5sec exposure, this makes the display update extremely SLOW and renders the auto-focus useless.
Regardless of that, I recommend anyone using a S5 II and possibly the S5 & S1s; ALWAYS SET THIS TO ON. This OFF setting has caused me so many over-exposed images during testing I wish it is always ON and there was no option to turn it OFF.
Other Issues
There are also a couple of small things I do not like.
Battery charging. Once the battery is fully charged, LEDs goes off completely on the charger or camera body. There would be no way to be sure your batteries are fully charged until you put them into a camera and even then, the S5 II only displays battery level in bars and not percentages. And also, the battery charger, model DVLC1005Y seems to be very temperamental too, picky with the USB C charger/power-bank that you couple it with.
Both of these are a little annoying and not good for insecure photographers like me. LOL
A final note worth mentioning is some buttons seem to be not built very well, the shutter button on my review unit seems to be a little stuck but it might be due to a year plus of abuse as a demo unit.
Summary
I think this is the way for all of my reviews from now on. There will be no Conclusions drawn on this review, that is for you to draw after I have given you all the facts and seen all the photos & videos.
What I will provide is a summary of my findings, the S5 II has good image quality in general, good build quality, great ergonomics and is a very practical camera. It has a built-in fan for longer record times. In addition to that, during launch and even so, as of now, it is reasonably priced in Malaysia and AFAIK, in most other countries as well.
In terms of issues, the AF is not the greatest, although it is good enough for most uses including professional usage. It does have some issues for photography though especially flash photography with AUTO ISO, screen darkening after AF lock with F4 lenses and the problem with Constant Preview.
Alright, that’s all for the S5 II. If you have any questions or comments, please leave them in the comments below and I will try to answer them as soon as possible.
Thank you and goodbye.
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