Autumnal Landscape Photography with the Lumix S1R
The Panasonic Lumix S1R
A couple of weeks ago in my blog post Return to Holne Bridge, I mentioned that I had a Panasonic Lumix S1R on loan. In that blog post I was out with the S1R to try and familiarise myself with the camera before putting it to use on the project I had planned for it. Having now completed filming for that project I was ready to return the camera to Panasonic but they very kindly asked if I wanted to keep it for another couple of weeks.
Plan A Becomes Plan B
With the camera on loan for a bit longer I had a few ideas on how I could put it to good use. My initial project for the S1R was to make a landscape photography video in Scotland, but I did also have a secondary project planned as well. Unfortunately though, the weather conditions were pretty awful in Scotland in the later part of my trip and so I never got the chance to shoot the 2nd video. This loan extension would be a great time to revisit that project and shoot it on Dartmoor rather than Glencoe.
My plan A was to head up to one of my favourite Dartmoor locations, Belstone Common. Checking the weather forecast the evening before I knew it was going to be a bit of a risk to go there because of the forecasted cloud cover. However I thought it was worth a punt and made my plan for a dawn shoot.
Arriving at Belstone Common the following morning it quickly became apparent that I had been a little too optimistic about the weather forecast, specifically the cloud cover. The cloud cover had even descended into the village of Belstone and by the time I had reached the parking area for Belstone Common it was looking very cloudy indeed.
Normally I wouldn’t necessarily let this put me off and I would risk ascending up to Belstone and hopefully wait for the cloud to clear. This clearing of the cloud can often lead to spectacular scenes but at the back of my mind I thought I’d probably be better going with plan B.
Fingle Bridge
Plan B was to go and shoot at one of my favourite autumnal Dartmoor locations, Holne Bridge or Fingle Bridge. I reckon either would have been good but given Holne Bridge is on the opposite side of Dartmoor from Belstone Common and Fingle Bridge just 15 minutes away the decision was easy.
When I arrived at Fingle Bridge I could see that I had made the right decision. The autumnal colours were looking great and even though it was a bit lighter the sky was still heavily overcast so staying at Belstone probably would have been a waste of time.
Fingle Bridge #1, Dartmoor, Devon - Panasonic Lumix S1R, Lumix S 24-105mm f/4 at 24mm, f/11, 10 seconds at ISO 100, Kase Filters CPL. Three horizontal image panorama at 16:7.
Though it was tempting to just create a short vlog of my time at Fingle Bridge, I decided just to concentrate on stills photography so I grabbed the Lumix S1R but left behind my Lumix G80 (my vlogging camera). As I walked along the riverside and admired the beautiful colours on the trees I was surprised not to see any other photographers or even dog walkers. I wasn’t complaining though. It was very relaxing, just me, a camera, the gentle noise of the flowing river and the wind blowing in the trees. What a way to start the day!
Fingle Bridge #2, Dartmoor, Devon - Panasonic Lumix S1R, Lumix S 24-105mm f/4 at 54mm, f/13, 10 seconds at ISO 100, Kase Filters CPL.
What I like About the S1R
As I said in my blog post Return to Holne Bridge, it is not my intention to review the S1R. There are lots of dedicated written and video reviews out there and they are done by people much more proficient at reviewing than I am. However, having used the camera for a few weeks I thought I would at least share some of my thoughts on this camera.
Things I liked:
47.3 megapixel sensor - no complaints with the image quality.
Dual card slots - dual xQD would have been nice though.
Good controls, knobs and dials - plenty of physical controls.
Focal length of the lens is displayed in the EVF.
Triaxle tilt LCD - you can even flip it out when the camera is in a vertical orientation…..very handy!!
Countdown down timer for long exposures (up to 60 seconds). Also very handy!
The 24-105mm f/4 lens I used. Great image quality and useful focal length.
Minor gripes:
Long exposures are limited to 60 seconds before you need to switch to bulb mode. This is better than most DSLRs and some mirrorless cameras, but not as good as cameras from FujiFilm (which can have exposures timed in minutes).
Size and weight - while some people prefer the feel of a bigger camera, the S1R is big for a full-frame mirrorless camera. It’s about the same size and weight as a Nikon D850 but bigger and heavier than a Nikon Z7. However, in some ways it has more features and controls than a Z7 so some additional bulk is probably necessary (e.g. dual card slots and great video features).
Though the S1R has one of the highest resolutions EVF on the market, I thought images looked a little low on resolution when reviewed. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not bad, but not as good as other mirrorless cameras I have used. I wonder if the embedded JPG preview of the RAW file is low resolution. The images when reviewed in Lightroom look amazing. The EVF looks great when viewing live.
No wide angle zoom lens at the time of loan. (A 16-35 f/4 is due in January 2020 though).
This is by no means a comprehensive list but these are some of the things I wanted to highlight when compared to other mirrorless cameras I have used. Minor gripes aside, there is little to dislike about this camera and anyone buying one is sure to be happy.
Fingle Bridge #3, Dartmoor, Devon - Panasonic Lumix S1R, Lumix S 24-105mm f/4 at 28mm, f/13, 10 seconds at ISO 100, Kase Filters CPL.
A note on the video features:
I know many of you don’t shoot video but for me some of the most stand out features of this camera are the video features. It can shoot up to 4k, 50 fps at 150 Mbps. The video quality is beautiful. I shoot and publish almost all of my videos in 4K but I don’t think anyone would notice much change in video quality if my bitrate jumped to 150 Mbps. On the other hand 50 fps does give me a few more creative options in post production.
As a bonus the S1R writes video to both cards which is definitely welcome. However, my one gripe is that if you have your camera set up for stills (shutter speed, ISO, and aperture) and then you switch to video mode, all the settings from your stills configuration carries over. The same applies when moving from video mode to stills mode. Given that you set the camera up very differently when shooting video and stills this seems a little annoying if you need to quickly switch between both modes.
Panasonic have also now released the Lumix S1H. This camera is a little more video centric and offers video modes such as 6K recording, 400 mbps bit rate (depending on mode), and HLG video. I can just imagine the creative options open to me with this camera if I did another series of Vignettes of Landscape Photography.
In case you are wondering, the video that I did have planned for the S1R has been filmed and is currently being edited. It should be ready in the next couple of weeks. I have also managed to shoot one of my 5 Minute Photo Adventure videos with the S1R so I hope to publish that in the next few weeks as well.
I hope you enjoyed this blog post and the images I capture from Fingle Bridge. Have you been out to capture some autumnal images? Have you considered or even bought an S1R or any of the cameras in the Lumix S1 range? Let me know in the comments below.