By Yadira B. Arnold 
Although popular with vloggers, Panasonic’s mirrorless cameras were slowed down by the lack of a phase detection autofocus system. Finally, the company fixed this problem with the launch of the S5 II. It has a new 24-megapixel sensor with phase detection pixels, which is designed to eliminate the wobbling and chasing that has affected the contrast detection AF on Panasonic cameras over the years.
To make it even superior for content creators, Panasonic has also brought the new, more powerful stabilization system of the GH6. And you’ll still get the powerful video features you’ve come to expect from Panasonic cameras, such as up to 6k video, surveillance tools, and advanced audio capabilities. The S5 II is also offered at an attractive price of 2, 000–500 less less than the Sony A7 IV and the Canon EOS R6 II, its main competitors.
This is Panasonic’s first hybrid phase detection autofocus system, so I was very curious to see how it compares to these cameras. I also wanted to see if it would allow you to leave your gimbal at home, as the company suggests in its ads. To find out, I took him around Paris and my hometown Gien, France.
Bodywork and handling
The matter and the arrangement of the controls of the S5 II are identical to those of the S5, and this is generally a good thing. At 740 grams, it is slightly heavier than its main competitors. However, it is still a reasonably light video camera and comfortable enough to film for a whole day.
It has a great, comfortable grip, as well as a lot of manual controls that allow you to change settings without having to delve into menus. It has all the controls you would hope for, such as a joystick, dedicated AF control and much more. The record catch is at the top, so it’s easy to find it when vlogging, but it would be nice to have a record catch like the GH6 on the front.
Panasonic S5 II full-frame hybrid camera under review
If you need to use the menus, Panasonic has put together this part with well-organized categories that make it pretty easy to find important optimizations. It’s also pretty easy to customize things, so as with any camera, I would recommend doing this for your own style of work.
The 3-inch display with 1.8 thousand dots on the back is the same as before, and it is bright and sharp for video work. It articulates fully, of course, so you can flip it over, hold it high or low for vlogging, and much more. The only drawback is that it can get tangled with any cable, especially the headphone jack.
Fortunately, Panasonic has increased the resolution of the electronic OLED viewfinder (EVF) from 2.34 thousand points on the original S5 to 3.68 thousand points. It’s decently crisp and clear now and answers one of my biggest complaints about the recent model.
Another welcome update is two fast UHS-II card slots instead of one UHS-II slot and one UHS-I slot on the S5. This allows for faster transfer speeds and more reliable backups if you want to store videos on two cards at the same time. It also now uses a full-size jack instead of a micro HDMI jack as before, which makes it much more reliable when using an external recorder.
There are headphone and microphone jacks, of course, but the S5 II now offers 4-channel recording via the DMW-XLR1 hotshoe audio adapter, just like the GH6. It also borrows the audio interface of the latter, which provides you with a central hub for all audio settings. It does not have a dedicated catch like the GH6, but you can assign any function catch.
After all, the batteries are borrowed from the S5 II and provide up to 470 strikes on one power or a good two hours of 4K recording.
Video
Panasonic’s mirrorless cameras are designed primarily for video strikers, so let’s tackle that first. At the heart of this camera is this new phase detection autofocus, designed to avoid the wobbling or chasing that occurred on older Panasonic models with contrast detection autofocus. How does this work for content creators
As with other newer models, the system of the S5 II includes regular continuous AF modes, as well as subject tracking for humans and animals. However, it is not as sophisticated as newer competing cameras such as the A7 IV and the EOS R6II, as it cannot compete with cars and airplanes and does not distinguish in the middle birds and other animals.
Fortunately, the capabilities that it has are comparable to these models. It tracks subjects smoothly and has very little delay when moving to the camera, for example. The face and eye detection is good, although she has a little trouble when the subject is spinning and can’t track her eyes unless they are reasonably close to the camera. It is also not as sticky as the competing models.