**The Panasonic GH4: A Pro-Level Camera at a Reasonable Price**

We've had a little bit of a nomenclature change here on The Everyday Dad, where instead of "fiddling with ugliness," we're now going to consider how easy or hard it is to use the camera body itself. Business time is after you hit record, so let's dive into how easy it is to use the Panasonic GH4 after you've started recording.

**Ease of Use**

The Panasonic GH4 is actually pretty darn easy to use, even for those who are new to camera operation. Like all of Panasonic's cameras, the big one still runs into some issues with autofocus, but if you're going to be doing something like talking at the camera, you can simply touch the screen focus that way. This approach works incredibly well, and you don't have to worry about the autofocus not working if you just don't use it. When you're in a studio setting, like we've seen earlier, you can connect to the Panasonic app using your phone or tablet, and it just works incredibly well to make sure that you're in focus.

**Accessories and Upgrades**

One of the biggest selling points of the GH4 is its accessories ecosystem. Like all Panasonic cameras, the GH4 uses the same batteries and lens mount as the GH5, so if you do end up getting a GH5, you'll already have access to a very mature native lens ecosystem. The good news is that the accessories for the GH4 are numerous and very cheap, which is not always the case with cameras on the cutting edge of technology.

**Pros and Cons**

The Panasonic GH4 has some pros and cons. On the one hand, it's incredibly easy to use once you've started recording. On the other hand, its autofocus can be a bit of an issue, especially if you're doing something that requires precise focusing. However, there are workarounds to this problem, such as using the touchscreen focus feature or connecting to the Panasonic app using your phone or tablet.

**Why You Should Get a GH4**

If you're looking to get into 4K camera with actual pro-level video features and don't need the stabilization of something like the G85 or the autofocus of something like the Canon M50, then the GH4 is a really strong camera. It's seriously like I said in the beginning of this article if a camera was announced today with these video features we'd be calling this one of the best of the last six months. The GH4 holds up incredibly well, even though it's five years old and was released during a time when cameras were still trying to figure out what 4K meant.

**Accessing Pro Features**

One of the biggest advantages of using the Panasonic GH4 is access to pro-level features through its app. This app allows you to check everything without having to physically touch the camera, which is a huge advantage for online creators and videographers who need to be able to focus on their content rather than fiddling with settings.

**Conclusion**

The Panasonic GH4 is an incredible camera that should be seriously considered by anyone looking to get into 4K video production. It's not perfect, but it has some major advantages over its competitors, including a user-friendly interface and access to pro-level features through the Panasonic app. If you don't need the stabilization of the GH5 or the autofocus of something like the Canon M50, then the GH4 is a fantastic camera that I can wholeheartedly recommend as an online video camera for 2019.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: entoday we're talking about a camera that can record in up to 4k 30 frames per second can do 96 frames per second 1080p slow motion video and can record 4k 10 bit 4 2 2 2 an external recorder not only that but it has a fully articulating touchscreen Wow with those specs this must be some cutting edge super-secret very expensive camera that's about to take the video world by storm right well you've already seen the title so no it's not it's actually the almost five year old gh4 and is it still worth it going into 2019 let's find out what's up everyone I'm the everyday dad and if I can figure it out you can figure it out I am legitimately shocked at how good the specs of this darn camera are seriously did you hear what we just said if they camera released with those specs today it would be one of the top video cameras of the year instead of a 5 year old hybrid camera that has kind of fallen out of the limelight I mean we're currently recording on a GH 5 and minor full disclosure I'm a bit of a panasonic fanboy and a much more big disclosure thanks to my friends over B&H photo for sending this to me to check out if you'd like to get your very own and spoilers for the rest of the video this is still a darn strong camera even in 2019 there will be links in the description below there are four main things that I think a camera needs to do to be considered as a serious contender as an online content slash YouTube / Facebook slash whatever new social media is currently happening that I don't know about because I'm old any of those you got to do these four things and another okay last last and least and one last quick disclaimer I'm not a photographer nor am i a professional videographer so we'll only be covering these specs and features that matter to the online content creator woo that's like too many disclaimers for one video but we're all now fully up to speed so the four things that we're talking about our video quality image and audio quality combined fiddly Nisour how easy is the body of the camera to use how does the camera handle when it's business time or that means how easy is it to get the footage you want after you hit the record button and last but certainly not least what does the upgrade path ecosystem look like let's just get into it first up quality the gh4 has a 16 megapixel micro 4/3 sensor like we already mentioned it can record in up to 4k 30 frames per second internally into the camera and what's really kind of surprising to me as a camera that's this old is it can record up to 96 frames per second slow motion one of the big features of the gh4 is when paired with an external recorder like my animus ninja 5 that's up there somewhere it can do both 8 and 10 bit 4 to 2 out which is something that Canon and Nikon only just started getting around to in like the last 3 month like no kidding I think the image quality is fantastic coming out of this thing but again I think most Panasonic cameras have great image quality the GH line of cameras is their Pro line of video specific cameras and you'll get more Pro features inside of this as opposed to something like the g 85 or the Lumix G 7 both fantastic cameras and both cameras that we have videos for if you are interested in seeing them out the channels got all sorts of videos about those one of the things about the gh4 is it does have a micro 4/3 sensor for better or worse I personally really like micro four-thirds and I hope that moved towards bigger and bigger sensors doesn't derail companies from continuing to pursue this as a technology I think there's a lot of really big benefits from having smaller sense I do find that the low light on the gh4 doesn't work as well as on my GH 5 which is also notorious in the camera room for having poor low-light capabilities but for me personally that's not as big of a deal since I either light my videos like right now or I record outdoors in the day lights like I've never liked in a super low lit situation one of the negatives about the gh4 and a legitimate negative for me well maybe again another potentially use case negative for everyone else is it's a generation before Panasonic started implementing their awesome stabilization you can still get lenses with oh is optical image stabilization built-in but don't expect handheld performance like the gh 5 and we'll see this in just a second because don't take my word for it let's hop outside for a quick video slash vlogging test ok welcome to the vlogging test of the Panasonic gh4 now as we've already mentioned it has some serious features that cameras that like release now don't have so let's get straight to it so what we're gonna do we're gonna do the vlogging test we do have the stabilized lens on because unfortunately the gh4 does not have built-in in-body stabilization but let's to the test test begin whoa okay so here we are with the gh4 which was again a camera released back in 2014 now you will have to so again there is no stabilization built into the camera but if you notice like a weird wobble what it looks like I'm stepping on my right foot I still have a broken toe so yes the stabilization is gonna be off but some of that might be you know my fault we do have whoo there's the backlight can we actually can you still see me even though we're being backlit right now I do have it set to manual focus one of my favorite things about the Panasonic cameras is the flip screen but also having the manual folks you can manual focus while actually using the screen so you don't actually have to use the focus ring on the camera itself which helps out so much but yeah vlogging test I think it looks pretty good you know any good vlogging camera is gonna have to need that flip screen so you can see I mean it's incredibly bright out here I guess that's better then how rainy it's been the last couple of days so it's nice that it's bright but it makes it a little hard to see the screen you can still see it though can you guys you guys see over there like I can still see the screen and I know that everything's exposed ish we're an aperture priority mode so the shutter speed is gonna be a little too fast as per normal because I didn't bring Indy I brought the wrong ND filter out here same with this camera this is the arcs 100 mark 5 I have the built-in and the filter on it but that's not that's the sun's too bright today okay so this has been the vlogging test of the Panasonic gh4 back to the video back to the video okay and welcome to the indoor slash studio test of the Panasonic gh4 now something you probably will have noticed is it's a little tighter than it was when we were recording on the GH five so the gh4 has more of a crop in 4k then the gh 5 does the gh 5 actually doesn't have any additional crop on 4k because we're using the exact same lens it's actually I I put it on the battery grip so that it's in the exact same spot it's not designed to work with the battery grip as the gh4 is not designed to work with the battery grip for the GH 5 but I kind of have it just set on there for the purposes of this video so it'd be everything's the exact same the same lighting the same everything in the studio oh I guess it turns these lights off okay so almost the same stuff except those lights are off the audio is being recorded through a rode videomic pro plus going into the gh4 with the internal cameras audio set to negative 12 decibels what I do wish though and what I thought was that the XLR adapter for some reason I thought the Panasonic XLR adapter would work with the gh4 it doesn't man if it did the gh4 would be such a powerhouse of a camera like half the reason I think the GH 5 is so good is this the audio coming out of this thing is next-level good but enough about the gh 5 this is the video quality coming out of the gh4 and again we're controlling it with the Panasonic app on my iPad because that's like one of the most impressive things about the whole Panasonic eco system is this app and being able to use the same so we're on the 25 millimeter 1.7 lens at 1.7 good stuff looks like we're in focus ready to go this is what you can expect if you wanted to use this as a studio camera and darn it I think it actually looks pretty I think looks pretty good okay back to the video so we've seen how the video quality is but how easy is it to get the camera set up to obtain all those exceptional pixels much like every other Panasonic camera I've used it's incredibly easy to set this camera up it has almost the same number of customizable buttons as the gh 5 and can do much of these same features minus the stabilization options obviously the big thing on the body that you're missing is on the gh 5 you have a joystick to like move around the menus and select your focus and on the gh4 you're missing that something I do like better on the gh4 then on the gh 5 is the placement of the record since Panasonic cameras can also use their shutter button for video recording I like the main recording button being more comfortable for my thumb instead of happy like on the Jake's 5 you gotta like reach around here where you never I literally never use the record button on the gh 5 because I just used the shutter button so having one back here is pretty good the body of the camera also continues does it is it continuing if it's if it's actually ordered it pre-tin use the awesome feeling nasaan ik cameras though it is sold at a fantastic price right now as of the recording of this video you can get it for $700 this camera is way better than that price tag suggest another big benefit for setting up the cameras it's got that fully articulating screen with full touch functionality and on the screen you can set up some series pro level assist features such as focus peaking histogram audio levels I really wish all camera had these features like it is so useful but we can take all the time in the world to set the camera up that's not nearly as important as once the heat is on it's business time yeah we've had a little bit of a nomenclature change here on the everyday dad where instead of fiddling it uglyness we're now gonna consider how easy or hard it is to use the camera body itself whereas business time is after you hit record so how easy is the panasonic gh4 after you hit record you you know you want to get some good online content video and it's actually pretty darn easy just like all of Panasonic cameras the big- will still run into when it comes to any of the Panasonic cameras at least the ones currently on the market is the autofocus is not good but if you're going to be doing something like talking at the camera you can only just touch the screen focus that way that's the way I've been doing it and it works incredibly well you don't have to worry about the autofocus not working if you just don't use it and then when you're in something like a studio like we've seen earlier you can just use your phone or tablet to connect to the Panasonic app and then it just works incredibly well to make sure that you're in focus so don't worry so much about the auto focusing system on the GH line of cameras because it's because there are workarounds to it but once you record again you can see what's going on you can change the settings way in front of the camera you can get everything going while it's in use so it's just like it's incredible like the Panasonic cameras are some of I'm not sponsored by Panasonic I've never even talked to anybody that works at Panasonic they make a heck of a camera and what's really impressive to me is how well the holds up even though it's so old like we said we let off this video with a if a camera with these kind of specs were announced today would be like whoa it's shattering everybody's preconceived notions of what a camera can do Olympus just announced a camera a few days ago that can barely do what this thing can do I mean it has better stabilization yes but it's just so good and once you hit record it's still incredibly easy I'm still sick it's freezing out here let's go back to the video inside so I can warm up see you there oh and we're back again we've seen what it can do set it up to do it and use it to varying degrees of success if you do end up getting a gh4 what is the upgrade path slash ecosystem well the good news is is that it uses the exact same batteries and the lens mount as the GH five so it comes already with a very mature native lens ecosystem we've been saying this for dang like almost two weeks now january kind of turned into like micro four-thirds a month maybe we should get the gh 5s next but either way the gh4 gets the benefits of the rest of the months statements of Nativity unlike half I'm half delirious right now from a sinus infection another big benefit of being a five year old camera is it's really good quality but the accessories both first party and third party are numerous and very cheap right now one of the problems of being like on the cutting edge of technology is accessories are gonna be hard or very expensive so there exists battery grips cages microphones the fact that you can get these for the gh4 at a very reasonable price point is one of the biggest selling points of this camera and not just that but you can find a plethora of used items that are severely discounted just like the camera itself you can get one of these even used for even better you can go on eBay and get like a whole kit for almost nothing of accessories so what right so after all of that should you get a Panasonic gh4 in 2019 if you were looking to get into a 4k camera that has actual pro level video features and you don't need the stabilization of something like the G 85 or the autofocus of something like the Canon M 50 spoilers we'll be comparing those on Wednesday I think the gh4 is a really strong camera seriously like I said in the beginning of the video if a camera was announced today with these video features we'd be calling this one of the best was in the last six months like it's seriously good I'm just I'm really shocked at how good this is for the price you can get it right now and then it's like five years old this was really ahead of its time plus again something we haven't mentioned yet but having access to the Panasonic app like we're doing right now um you can check everything without having to physically touch it and that places it up really highly on the hierarchy so if you don't need the stabilization of the GH five the gh4 is a fantastic camera that I can wholeheartedly recommend as an online video camera for 2019 thanks for watchingtoday we're talking about a camera that can record in up to 4k 30 frames per second can do 96 frames per second 1080p slow motion video and can record 4k 10 bit 4 2 2 2 an external recorder not only that but it has a fully articulating touchscreen Wow with those specs this must be some cutting edge super-secret very expensive camera that's about to take the video world by storm right well you've already seen the title so no it's not it's actually the almost five year old gh4 and is it still worth it going into 2019 let's find out what's up everyone I'm the everyday dad and if I can figure it out you can figure it out I am legitimately shocked at how good the specs of this darn camera are seriously did you hear what we just said if they camera released with those specs today it would be one of the top video cameras of the year instead of a 5 year old hybrid camera that has kind of fallen out of the limelight I mean we're currently recording on a GH 5 and minor full disclosure I'm a bit of a panasonic fanboy and a much more big disclosure thanks to my friends over B&H photo for sending this to me to check out if you'd like to get your very own and spoilers for the rest of the video this is still a darn strong camera even in 2019 there will be links in the description below there are four main things that I think a camera needs to do to be considered as a serious contender as an online content slash YouTube / Facebook slash whatever new social media is currently happening that I don't know about because I'm old any of those you got to do these four things and another okay last last and least and one last quick disclaimer I'm not a photographer nor am i a professional videographer so we'll only be covering these specs and features that matter to the online content creator woo that's like too many disclaimers for one video but we're all now fully up to speed so the four things that we're talking about our video quality image and audio quality combined fiddly Nisour how easy is the body of the camera to use how does the camera handle when it's business time or that means how easy is it to get the footage you want after you hit the record button and last but certainly not least what does the upgrade path ecosystem look like let's just get into it first up quality the gh4 has a 16 megapixel micro 4/3 sensor like we already mentioned it can record in up to 4k 30 frames per second internally into the camera and what's really kind of surprising to me as a camera that's this old is it can record up to 96 frames per second slow motion one of the big features of the gh4 is when paired with an external recorder like my animus ninja 5 that's up there somewhere it can do both 8 and 10 bit 4 to 2 out which is something that Canon and Nikon only just started getting around to in like the last 3 month like no kidding I think the image quality is fantastic coming out of this thing but again I think most Panasonic cameras have great image quality the GH line of cameras is their Pro line of video specific cameras and you'll get more Pro features inside of this as opposed to something like the g 85 or the Lumix G 7 both fantastic cameras and both cameras that we have videos for if you are interested in seeing them out the channels got all sorts of videos about those one of the things about the gh4 is it does have a micro 4/3 sensor for better or worse I personally really like micro four-thirds and I hope that moved towards bigger and bigger sensors doesn't derail companies from continuing to pursue this as a technology I think there's a lot of really big benefits from having smaller sense I do find that the low light on the gh4 doesn't work as well as on my GH 5 which is also notorious in the camera room for having poor low-light capabilities but for me personally that's not as big of a deal since I either light my videos like right now or I record outdoors in the day lights like I've never liked in a super low lit situation one of the negatives about the gh4 and a legitimate negative for me well maybe again another potentially use case negative for everyone else is it's a generation before Panasonic started implementing their awesome stabilization you can still get lenses with oh is optical image stabilization built-in but don't expect handheld performance like the gh 5 and we'll see this in just a second because don't take my word for it let's hop outside for a quick video slash vlogging test ok welcome to the vlogging test of the Panasonic gh4 now as we've already mentioned it has some serious features that cameras that like release now don't have so let's get straight to it so what we're gonna do we're gonna do the vlogging test we do have the stabilized lens on because unfortunately the gh4 does not have built-in in-body stabilization but let's to the test test begin whoa okay so here we are with the gh4 which was again a camera released back in 2014 now you will have to so again there is no stabilization built into the camera but if you notice like a weird wobble what it looks like I'm stepping on my right foot I still have a broken toe so yes the stabilization is gonna be off but some of that might be you know my fault we do have whoo there's the backlight can we actually can you still see me even though we're being backlit right now I do have it set to manual focus one of my favorite things about the Panasonic cameras is the flip screen but also having the manual folks you can manual focus while actually using the screen so you don't actually have to use the focus ring on the camera itself which helps out so much but yeah vlogging test I think it looks pretty good you know any good vlogging camera is gonna have to need that flip screen so you can see I mean it's incredibly bright out here I guess that's better then how rainy it's been the last couple of days so it's nice that it's bright but it makes it a little hard to see the screen you can still see it though can you guys you guys see over there like I can still see the screen and I know that everything's exposed ish we're an aperture priority mode so the shutter speed is gonna be a little too fast as per normal because I didn't bring Indy I brought the wrong ND filter out here same with this camera this is the arcs 100 mark 5 I have the built-in and the filter on it but that's not that's the sun's too bright today okay so this has been the vlogging test of the Panasonic gh4 back to the video back to the video okay and welcome to the indoor slash studio test of the Panasonic gh4 now something you probably will have noticed is it's a little tighter than it was when we were recording on the GH five so the gh4 has more of a crop in 4k then the gh 5 does the gh 5 actually doesn't have any additional crop on 4k because we're using the exact same lens it's actually I I put it on the battery grip so that it's in the exact same spot it's not designed to work with the battery grip as the gh4 is not designed to work with the battery grip for the GH 5 but I kind of have it just set on there for the purposes of this video so it'd be everything's the exact same the same lighting the same everything in the studio oh I guess it turns these lights off okay so almost the same stuff except those lights are off the audio is being recorded through a rode videomic pro plus going into the gh4 with the internal cameras audio set to negative 12 decibels what I do wish though and what I thought was that the XLR adapter for some reason I thought the Panasonic XLR adapter would work with the gh4 it doesn't man if it did the gh4 would be such a powerhouse of a camera like half the reason I think the GH 5 is so good is this the audio coming out of this thing is next-level good but enough about the gh 5 this is the video quality coming out of the gh4 and again we're controlling it with the Panasonic app on my iPad because that's like one of the most impressive things about the whole Panasonic eco system is this app and being able to use the same so we're on the 25 millimeter 1.7 lens at 1.7 good stuff looks like we're in focus ready to go this is what you can expect if you wanted to use this as a studio camera and darn it I think it actually looks pretty I think looks pretty good okay back to the video so we've seen how the video quality is but how easy is it to get the camera set up to obtain all those exceptional pixels much like every other Panasonic camera I've used it's incredibly easy to set this camera up it has almost the same number of customizable buttons as the gh 5 and can do much of these same features minus the stabilization options obviously the big thing on the body that you're missing is on the gh 5 you have a joystick to like move around the menus and select your focus and on the gh4 you're missing that something I do like better on the gh4 then on the gh 5 is the placement of the record since Panasonic cameras can also use their shutter button for video recording I like the main recording button being more comfortable for my thumb instead of happy like on the Jake's 5 you gotta like reach around here where you never I literally never use the record button on the gh 5 because I just used the shutter button so having one back here is pretty good the body of the camera also continues does it is it continuing if it's if it's actually ordered it pre-tin use the awesome feeling nasaan ik cameras though it is sold at a fantastic price right now as of the recording of this video you can get it for $700 this camera is way better than that price tag suggest another big benefit for setting up the cameras it's got that fully articulating screen with full touch functionality and on the screen you can set up some series pro level assist features such as focus peaking histogram audio levels I really wish all camera had these features like it is so useful but we can take all the time in the world to set the camera up that's not nearly as important as once the heat is on it's business time yeah we've had a little bit of a nomenclature change here on the everyday dad where instead of fiddling it uglyness we're now gonna consider how easy or hard it is to use the camera body itself whereas business time is after you hit record so how easy is the panasonic gh4 after you hit record you you know you want to get some good online content video and it's actually pretty darn easy just like all of Panasonic cameras the big- will still run into when it comes to any of the Panasonic cameras at least the ones currently on the market is the autofocus is not good but if you're going to be doing something like talking at the camera you can only just touch the screen focus that way that's the way I've been doing it and it works incredibly well you don't have to worry about the autofocus not working if you just don't use it and then when you're in something like a studio like we've seen earlier you can just use your phone or tablet to connect to the Panasonic app and then it just works incredibly well to make sure that you're in focus so don't worry so much about the auto focusing system on the GH line of cameras because it's because there are workarounds to it but once you record again you can see what's going on you can change the settings way in front of the camera you can get everything going while it's in use so it's just like it's incredible like the Panasonic cameras are some of I'm not sponsored by Panasonic I've never even talked to anybody that works at Panasonic they make a heck of a camera and what's really impressive to me is how well the holds up even though it's so old like we said we let off this video with a if a camera with these kind of specs were announced today would be like whoa it's shattering everybody's preconceived notions of what a camera can do Olympus just announced a camera a few days ago that can barely do what this thing can do I mean it has better stabilization yes but it's just so good and once you hit record it's still incredibly easy I'm still sick it's freezing out here let's go back to the video inside so I can warm up see you there oh and we're back again we've seen what it can do set it up to do it and use it to varying degrees of success if you do end up getting a gh4 what is the upgrade path slash ecosystem well the good news is is that it uses the exact same batteries and the lens mount as the GH five so it comes already with a very mature native lens ecosystem we've been saying this for dang like almost two weeks now january kind of turned into like micro four-thirds a month maybe we should get the gh 5s next but either way the gh4 gets the benefits of the rest of the months statements of Nativity unlike half I'm half delirious right now from a sinus infection another big benefit of being a five year old camera is it's really good quality but the accessories both first party and third party are numerous and very cheap right now one of the problems of being like on the cutting edge of technology is accessories are gonna be hard or very expensive so there exists battery grips cages microphones the fact that you can get these for the gh4 at a very reasonable price point is one of the biggest selling points of this camera and not just that but you can find a plethora of used items that are severely discounted just like the camera itself you can get one of these even used for even better you can go on eBay and get like a whole kit for almost nothing of accessories so what right so after all of that should you get a Panasonic gh4 in 2019 if you were looking to get into a 4k camera that has actual pro level video features and you don't need the stabilization of something like the G 85 or the autofocus of something like the Canon M 50 spoilers we'll be comparing those on Wednesday I think the gh4 is a really strong camera seriously like I said in the beginning of the video if a camera was announced today with these video features we'd be calling this one of the best was in the last six months like it's seriously good I'm just I'm really shocked at how good this is for the price you can get it right now and then it's like five years old this was really ahead of its time plus again something we haven't mentioned yet but having access to the Panasonic app like we're doing right now um you can check everything without having to physically touch it and that places it up really highly on the hierarchy so if you don't need the stabilization of the GH five the gh4 is a fantastic camera that I can wholeheartedly recommend as an online video camera for 2019 thanks for watching\n"