Well, after sifting through all the pros and cons mentioned on here, bit the bullet, got hold of one, charged the battery! Had a bit of a play, settings are confusing for me coming from canon DSLRs.
But the images are very nice.
Will be keeping at least one 70D in play for a while, till I get the hang of this thing.

Filming a baby naming in a couple of days, would like to use this cam alongside a 70D
So what are some tips from the frequent users?
Not really interested in 4k, but will probably use it for "cropping"
Some opinions on recording modes, MP4? - AVCHD?
50p? - 25p?
I think I saw a 50i in there somewhere, always smooth.
Function buttons?
Picture styles? I put it on cinelike D
Battery life?


Work arounds?
I've already done the mod for quick battery access, had the same problem with EOS-Ms.

Jack

Hi Jack,

Welcome to the FZ1000 club :-)

Tips can be tricky as different people have different requirements, but here are a few things I have found.

If you are using sound from the camera, get an outboard mic as the built in ones pick up a lot of mechanical noise particularly the constant chatter from the OIS.

There is no onboard ND filter, so a variable one is very useful in very bright sunlight, although having said that, I have rarely needed to use mine.

I don't find much difference between AVCHD and MP4 recording, so now tend to record mainly in MP4 as it seems to be more computer friendly. I started recording everything in 50p, but now frequently use 25p as iI like the look of it and it seems to give a slightly better low light performance. You really need to try some different settings and see what you think.

The manual zoom is too jerky for anything apart for quick reframing but you can use the power zoom at a medium speed, but no slow creep ability.

I find manual focus with focus peaking on to be very useful for scenes with close but varying distance objects, otherwise I use it on 49 area AF mode or tracking if I am following objects.

Metering on center weighted for closer objects or multimetering for more general scenes. Spot metering will change the exposure very quickly if you have people moving about etc which can be annoying, but good to do difficult continuous shots of a particular subject in high contrast scenes.

The automatic settings are as good and often better than any camera I have used, and I regularly find myself sticking with them in run and gun situations. The thumb wheel for quickly changing exposure in auto mode is also excellent.

Battery life is quite reasonable. I carry 4 for all day weddings and have never used more than 3

If you use much 4K, you will find that the OIS is limited, so more care necessary with manual stability.

Hope some of that helps,

Roger

I'll second that the OIS is limited (almost non-existent) so a tripod or monopod is a must. I have picked up a Tarion LCD Viewfinder and this may help a lot with handheld stabilization (it means your arms are further from your body and it is easier to stabilize the camera to your body, plus the viewfinder pressed against your face provides more stabilization than the back of camera against your nose). I have not tried this in the field yet as I still need to make an offset plate to deal with the poor tripod hole placement.

I do find some amount of focus hunting so am playing with different settings (4K) and am still experimenting with the best metering.

There is a HUGE difference in the same footage shot with the Canon X20 at HD 50fps and the FZ1000 at 4K. While the Canon wins on OIS and 50 fps vs 25 for wildlife the FZ1000 is much, much sharper (the 1" chip) even when shooting HD 50 FPS and obviously in 4K. Better depth of field too.

If it had better OIS and 50 fps I think it would easily be THE goto wildlife field camera (at least until you get up to needing to carry REALLY heavy lenses and tripods), especially for on the run type shooting. The optical zoom at 4K is decent (590 mm equivalent) and the intelligent zoom comes in at 1200mm - you lose the 4K revolution but it is still HD. But none of this relevant to your initial use!

Hi Jack

I only shoot in creative video mode as it means I can use the shutter button for everything ..sooo easy. The MP4 format renders faster than AVCHD on my i7 too. Mainly I use MP4 25fps but 50P on the stedicam so I get nice slomo (I don't use the 100fps slomo on the camera as I do stedicam "roundie-rounds" and the locked exposure doesn't work that way)

With focus I find it brilliant if you use tripod mounted camera with APS mode and continuous focus off and my handheld camera has continuous focus on.

Funny what you guys say about OIS! I find my handheld footage is a LOT more stable than what I used to get with a shoulder mount camera ...I feel it works well!

I find OIS is good for the HD settings, but the 4K does not use the 5 axis hybrid stabilization so much worse than the Canon XA20 or even my older Panasonic video camera.

Thanks for the info, very helpful.
Don't have much time to get to know the camera, so you guys are a godsend.
Is there any way to lock the continuous focus whilst recording, or is the only option to turn it off and just use the half press mode.

There seems to be some love for the auto settings, I'll have to look at those more closely.
Just having trouble understanding the picture style setup in the auto modes.

Hi Jack

You can grab focus anytime during recording by half pressing the shutter button. As for picture profiles I find that Standard is really the best for me ..it's sharp and nice colour saturation ...the Cine Profile D to me tends to be a bit wishy washy as it pushes the dynamic range and Cine V is very contrasty so I stay with standard and find the results are really nice! To be honest on the focus issue I find that with continuous left on it's very good indeed and I have yet to have any follow focus issues with brides walking down the aisle. It does of course help a LOT by grabbing focus with a half shutter first to let the focus lock on! On the clip below the ceremony was shot on one FZ1000 using just focus push but the handheld camera has continuous focus on all the time..including on the stedicam shots ..I think it does a good focus job!! The OIS isn't too bad either ..only had the first camera on tripod for the ceremony ..everything else is handheld

Highlight : Tamara and Duane - 3rd October 2015 - YouTube

I agree with Chris on the standard picture profile, it has a very good balance of contrast and colour and I can play around with other looks if I want using New Blue Effects in Post.

The OIS is limited in 4K, whereas again, like Chris, I find the the OIS in HD to be very good indeed.

Roger