Backscatter reviews the Panasonic LX100. Jim from Backscatter shot the camera in the Nauticam NA-LX100 housing, and wrote this review, excerpted here:
4K video from the LX100 is stunning, with great color rendition in ambient light with a custom white balance or when lit with video lights. 4K footage down sampled to 1080p looks sharper than if it was originally shot in 1080p and is a great reason to shoot 4K now even if you don't have a 4K display yet.
By Jim Decker
I was super excited to get my hands on thePanasonic LX100. It's a revolutionary camera! Being the first compact camera with the ability to shoot 4K video and also great stills. I wanted to see how it stacked up against other top compact cameras such as the Canon G7X and the Sony RX100 II and III.
4K Video Recording
Of course the #1 big draw to this camera is the 4K recording capability. The LX100 shares the same 4K specs as the GH4, recording 4K 30p at a data rate of 100 mbps. The video looks fantastic. The exposure meter can be set to remain active during shooting, making it easy to monitor exposure in addition to zebra striping to show highlight areas that are starting to get a little hot. Video can be shot completely in manual exposure mode. These features combined, rival or exceed the capabilities of video modes in most other mirrorless or compact cameras. The LX100 makes an excellent primary video capture device especially if one shoots a little bit of stills too.
Excellent Custom White Balance
One of the problems with Panasonic in the past has been poor custom white balance execution. Previously, it had been so bad as to require a red filter or lights, with no chance of a decent white balance without either of those items. I was pleasantly shocked to find the LX100 execute a perfect white balance at 50 feet on my first dive. I even had a great custom white balance executed at 70 feet. Until now, I haven't seen cameras other than Canon execute such a great custom white balance. I hope this is an indication that the next generation of GH4 will also get this great custom white balance color.
The procedure for executing a white balance is simple. Press the white balance button, press up to activate custom white balance, then the center button to execute. There are 4 white balance banks available making it easy to save favorites for different depths or with lights.
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