- Lumix S9 - May 27, 2026
- South Korea Motorcycle Tour – continued - May 22, 2026
- South Korea Motorcycle Tour - May 15, 2026
Well after a long hiatus I’m again an owner of what you might (or might not according to some camera reviewers) call a real camera.
I’ve looked at each camera released the last five years, even managed to borrow a couple but remained unconvinced I needed to buy one. I still have no doubts my phone is sufficient quality for blogging but I’ve long harboured an idea of returning to photography as a hobby.
Basically I’m retired and have far too much free time. I need some more hobbies besides occasional rides and am not interested in the Men’s Shed or golf or fishing. This may not be the answer but I want to try something and was in Japan where cameras are cheaper.
Why the S9? Well one reason is my eyesight has reached a point where I’d need an EVF to have a 3.5X dioptric adjustment to be in focus but 3X is maximum found in consumer cameras.
I said well that’s that, then one day I was reading a photography blog and the writer was saying how he had same but had adjusted to using a camera without any EVF. This made me think well I could at least give it a go.
I have never really used a rear screen to frame. I had optical viewfinders in film cameras then electronic viewfinders shooting video for a decade before a brief period of early digital still cameras which I never took seriously. I moved completely away from video and back to still photography when Olympus released their Pen E-P1 with their clip on EVF and since had not used a camera without an EVF.
There have been a few cameras made for vlogger’s designed only with rear screens which were bright and high resolution. Of these the stand out model to me was the Lumix S9 which is a full frame sensor in a body similar size to my previous Lumix GX80 Micro Four Thirds (M4/3) camera.
When it was released the S9 had just one new 23mm pancake compact lens to suit the small body and a eye watering launch price. I promptly forgot about it. Along the way Lumix released a 18-40mm zoom for the camera. But not just any zoom, the smallest lightest full frame zoom ever and they released a new kit with a lower price.
In Australia now there is a limited edition Titanium Gold S9 + 18-40mm zoom kit being sold at a premium but the same colour combo is sold in Japan as a regular S9 kit $800 cheaper.
Not pocketable but small for a full frame with a zoom lens even when placed beside my other compact imaging devices.
Another camera also in titanium everyone is gushing over now is the L10 Lumix just released, but there are a few things not being talked about by the reviewers influencers.
I owned both the LX100 and LX100M2. The original was a nice camera for it’s day but quickly got dust on the sensor. The LX100M2 lessened dust ingress but still lacked any dust removal. The increase to 21.7MP gave the M4/3 sensor a very small pixel diameter causing diffraction. Quite noticeable by f8. Then compounding this the sensor is cropped reducing dynamic range and the lens is not so impressive once you factor the 2.2X sensor crop. Lastly the L10 is weirdly large compared to the LX100 it replaced. It has a bigger body than the full frame S9.
Back to the S9, perusing the usual review sites prior to buying I find it has been a divisive camera. Aimed at Instagramers/Vloggers stepping up from a phone it was heavily criticized for not featuring a leaf shutter. Bit overblown as not something the target market or I have needed in our phones. Moving beyond algorithm driven comment actual owners liked the S9’s size and image quality and it’s main feature which is film simulations to compete with the Fuji X100VI.
The Lumix S9 can hold 39 Real Time Look Up Tables (LUT’s). Each LUT can be a simulation of photographic film or simulation of a cinema look or any type of filter or photo style you can imagine. These are developed by Lumix and professional photographers and give you like a lightroom preset you can shoot live with.
There are many different LUT’s for you to preview in the Lumix Lab phone app which connects very fast and reliably. Every camera app I have used sucked but this is actually good. You can download any LUT for free and transfer it into your camera. The app also allows you to add grain or other textures to LUT’s or even combine LUT’s or edit raw images direct from camera and heaps more I am still to learn. It is a very responsive no lag.
Of course you can do simulation stuff in post processing but I have never shot a scene with the image in my head of how it will look with a film simulation or lightroom preset applied to it once back home. Probably why I remain poor at street photography, but with the S9 I can load a LUT then see how a scene looks with that simulation and then switch to a different LUT and see how that looks and so on. There is a LUT button to instantly bring up and change the simulation you are using.
I’ve so far only used a few LUT’s developed by photographers but already I am finding being able to shoot with the simulation live changes what I choose to photo. I first aimed the S9 at things that I thought would look good with a certain simulation but then I tried other scenes and was surprised at what worked with what LUT and what I could not find the right LUT for so easy and would need further shooting. It is a much bigger creative tool than I imagined.
I also purchased a cheap no name black mist filter 1/8 strength which frankly is low quality but I am just curious at this stage.
Komeda’s Coffee. Straight out of camera (SOC) jpeg with 1/8 black mist filter no LUT.
Drunk in Fukuoka. Also SOC jpeg, no LUT, 1/8 black mist filter.
Hair Salon. SOC jpeg S-Night Time LUT with 1/8 black mist filter.
Dongdaemun Design Plaza. SOC jpeg, Dark Night LUT with 1/8 black mist filter.
Dongdaemun Design Plaza. SOC jpeg, combination of Streetwise + Old Cinema LUT, 1/8 black mist filter.
I am a complete novice at this type of photography with zero time spent learning the LUT’s and a cheapo mist filter but regardless I just wanted to share a few photos to give a hint at how interesting the S9 with it’s LUT system is to use. It really invites you to grab it and head out which I can’t say I’ve felt about a camera for quite some time.
You could add Small Rig accessory grip items but I don’t think anything is needed because framing with rear screen you are not holding camera up to your eye but rather out in front with two hands. The zoom weighs nothing and this kit less than the L10.
Shadow of Shadow sculpture. SOC jpeg, Retro Style LUT, 1/8 black mist filter.
I did shoot some of my Japan ride with this camera, the header photo from the shrine was from the S9 which showed me it’s considerably better dynamic range than my phone and few other images such as below which I liked. The 18-40mm lens with full frame sensor is pretty good match for the type of the photos I take on tour so while I did not buy the S9 specifically for my riding I hope I might actually return to mastering the slow ride where I stop often and take more time composing better photos.
That’s not for you visiting this blog but for me, so I when I revisit my ride reports (which is the purpose of this blog) I might pause occasionally and say well that photo turned out not too bad Warren.
Sasebo. Jpeg edited to taste.
