The Panasonic GX8 Menu System Simplified

by David Thorpe

Content © David Thorpe. All rights reserved

Published in the United Kingdom

First Publishing Date December 2015

Menus

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Introduction

The Controls

The Rec Menu

The Motion Picture Menu

The Custom Menu

The Setup Menu

The Playback Menu

My Example Menu

Introduction

You've just bought your first digital camera, just upgraded from a point and shoot or maybe you've just been idly scanning through the menu options on your GX8 and thought "I wonder what that does"? The menu system and controls of the GX8 are some of the best presented and logically laid out of any digital camera. But with 5 sections containing more than 800 menu items, even the most experienced user will sometimes find themselves scratching their head and wondering what an entry means.
This small book goes through every menu choice and control and explains (a) what it does and (b) why you might want to do it. It may not inspire you in a literary sense but with its help you may find a GX8 tailored to your personal taste inspiring to use.
I sometimes give my opinion on the best setting. It is only my opinion from my personal experience. It is best treated it as merely a starting point for building your own experience.
At the end of the book I go though the menu items as I set them. The aim of this is to give you a working setup without having to learn what each item does straight away. As you use the camera with my settings you will find yourself thinking, "that's really annoying. If only I could change that." You most likely can. Find the item in question and change it. You now have a GX8 a little more tailored to you than before. The aim, eventually, is to have a photographic tool that is personal to your needs. Actually, using the custom settings, you can have 5 different GX8s at the turn of a dial.
If your interest is photographing the dim interiors of medieval churches using a tripod you might set your GX8 to Aperture priority f8/ ISO 200/ Silent Shutter. But you also like to photograph your son playing football with his school team on Shutter Priority 1/1000th/ ISO 3200. Your stand camera and your action camera are but a click apart on the Mode Dial. It is that flexibility that makes these gems of 21st century technology so functional. It is the same flexibility of setup that can make them seem more the province of the rocket scientist than the artist at times.
The GX8 ushered in several innovations for Micro Four Thirds cameras, the new 20Mp sensor, 4K still modes and combined lens/ body stabilization among them. Time spent learning what this camera can do and how to do it will be rewarded by better results. Enjoy!

The Controls

The majority of control over a complex, dedicated imaging computer, which is what the GX8 really is, is via the button. There are a few things so basic that they must be controlled by exterior levers and buttons. Those controls do not differ greatly from the ones which film camera users from the previous century would have been familiar. Set the camera to M on the mode dial and you can control shutter speed and aperture directly. Press the ISO button and you have changed the 'film' speed. The rest of the external controls are essentially shortcuts to often used menu items.Here is a brief rundown on the basics of the body controls of the GX8.

1- LVF (live View Finder) cycles between 3 selections, monitor on, eye level off, monitor off, eye level on and auto switching between them. The obvious setting is auto but under some circumstances, when using a tripod and viewing on the monitor for example, your arm passing near the LVF sensor can cause it to switch to the eye level finder. If you are using the eye level finder and you take the camera from your eye to view the scene, the sensor will auto switch to the monitor. When you put the camera to your eye again, you must wait a moment for the auto switch to take place. In that time, the bird may have flown! Switching explicitly to the eye level finder prevents that. In the Custommenu under Eye Sensoryou have a a choice of Highor Lowsensitivity. Highcan be quite twitchy so Lowis the general choice. Note that you can choose between monitor/ eye level/ auto in the Eye Sensormenu item too. If you find that convenient, you can free up the LVFwhich can then be used as Function Button 6(Fn6)
2- The Focus Modelever. AFS/AFCare single focus. When you half press the shutter button, the camera focuses and does not focus again until you again half press the shutter button. Whether the lever engages AFSor AFCmode is set in the RECmenu under AFS/AFF. I go into detail about the two modes there. AFCis continuous autofocus. All the time you keep the shutter button half pressed the camera will attempt to keep the subject in focus. If the subject is moving fast, the GX8 will predict where the subject will be when the shutter fires. MFis manual focus where you turn the lens focus ring and judge sharp focus for yourself. This is of use on the rare occasions the GX8 cannot find focus for itself. Generally speaking, the camera's auto focus will be faster and more accurate than your eyes. Note that I have outlined the use of the lever in principle. Practically every aspect of whichever Focus Modeyou select can be customized as you will find when you go through the body of the book. When you are set to any automatic Focus Modeyou can set many aspects of how it functions under Auto Focus Modein the Recmenu. This includes Face Recognition, Trackingand all sorts of goodies. It can be confusing but at root, the Focus Modelever sets the overall type of focusing, Auto Focus Modein the menu or on the rear curser button sets the way in which that Auto Focuswill operate
3. This is function button Fn5. It can be programmed how you wish in the Custommenu under Fn Button Set. I find it useful to have Fn buttons set to something associated with their position so that it is easier to recall what they do. In this case, I set it to Focus Area set.
4. The ExposureCompensation Dial. Good as it is, the exposure metering system of the GX8 cannot always be right. If you are shooting a dark skinned person against a light background, for example, it is likely that their skin tone will be underexposed and detail lost. With the Exposure Compensation Dialyou can modify the exposure how you wish. In the case outlined, a 1/3rd or 2/3rds + exposure on the dial will improve the rendering. When the dial is set to other than the centre 'no compensation' setting, a warning will show bottom centre of the view.
5. The Mode Dial. This is the arguably the most important control on the camera. The simplest setting is iA, Intelligent Auto. Set to this, the GX8 becomes a point and shoot. You have no control over how it takes the picture which makes it particularly irritating to experienced photographers like me. Because it is nearly always right. Pis for Program where the camera chooses the shutter speed and aperture. Ais for Aperture Priority. You set the aperture, the camera varies the shutter speed to suit your setting. Aperture is the deciding factor in how much depth of field you have in your picture. For a portrait, you would probably want any distracting background elements to be blurred, in order to focus attention on your subject. For that you would limit your depth of field (obtain shallow depth of field) by using a wide aperture, that is opening your lens to its maximum f/3.5 or f/2.8, f/2 or f/1.4 if you have it. by Stop down to f/8 or lower and you have a wide depth of field so that you can get more of your picture in focus. If you are photographing a field of flowers, you can get flowers from near to far in focus. The downside to a small aperture is that to maintain the correct exposure, the shutter speed must be lower. This can lead to blurring of the image due to the camera moving during the exposure. Or, if there is anything moving in your picture, motion blurring. Which brings us to S, Shutter Priority. If you are photographing your children running around, they can move a surprisingly long way in, say 1/60th of a second. With Syou can set a shutter speed which will stop the picture spoiling blurring that a slow shutter speed would entail. The downside of a high shutter speed is that the lens aperture must be wider to bring in enough light for correct exposure. That, as I previously said, cuts your depth of field, making your focusing very critical, just what you don't want for a child's unpredictable movement. What the shutter speed gives, the aperture takes away and vice versa. As with politics, exposure is the art of compromise. MManual leaves you to set both shutter speed and aperture. It can't achieve anything that Aor Sdon't but some people prefer to 'do it all'. Note that in all of the previous, I have not mentioned the effect of the ISOsetting. If you up the ISOsetting you can have greater depth of field combined with higher shutter speeds. It looks like a win/ win situation. Unfortunately, as with everyday life, there are very few win/ win scenarios. As you raise the ISOsetting, you are not increasing the amount of light , you are merely amplifying what you have. And as with a radio with a poor signal, the more you turn it up, the more background noise there is. On an imaging sensor, it manifests itself as a random 'rash' on your picture. This juggling act between shutter speed, aperture and ISO is at the heart of photography - only you can decide where your compromise will be. Note that a handy use of Mis to set the shutter speed and aperture you want and then set the ISOto Auto. It can't brighten the ambient light, though, so ultimately, handy or not, it is one more compromise. The other settings on the Mode Dialare less specific. Movie gives you full control over your Moviesettings, in contrast to the Recbutton (10) which when pressed starts your video using the settings you have set as your default in the Moviemenu. The artist's palette icon gives you direct access to the Filterssettings for various artistic effects while setting the camera to Programmode so that it controls all parameters. The cotton reel like icon is the Panoramasetting. With this, you pan across a scene with the shutter button held down and the camera shoots a series of exposures which it then automatically makes into a wide Panorama. You can adjust various parameters of the Panoramain the Panoramasection in the Recmenu. This s section is greyed out unless the Mode Dialis set to Panorama. The C1, C2,C3settings are for quick access to your often used settings. I describe the Customsettings in the body of the book. While there are 3 Cposition on the dial, C3can actually store 3 sets of setting on its own, chosen by pressing the Menu/Setbutton on the back of the camera after engaging C3.
6. The Rear Dial. This has different functions according to which Mode, A, Setc is chosen and is a key control during picture taking. Some aspects of its operation can be tailored in Dial Set.in the Custommenu. 7. This is Fn13, a press button in the centre of the Rear Dial. It is fully customisable in Fn Button Setin the Custommenu. I set this to toggle the Electronic Shutter/ Mechanical Shutter.
8. is the Front Dial. It has the same role in the control of the GX8 as the Rear Dialand its functioning can be tailored in the same Dial Set.section of the Custommenu.
9. The Shutter Releasebutton. No need to emphasise the importance of this. Note that it too can be customized via several items in the Customincluding setting it to release the shutter with a half press and locking focus and/or exposure.
10. The Recbutton. Press this at any time and the camera will start shooting a video using the default settings you have made in the Motion Picturemenu. To gain full access to video parameters you must set the Mode Dialto Creative Video.
11. Function button 1 - Fn1. Fully customisable. I have mine set to Metering Mode for quick access to spot metering.
12. AF/AE Lock. This can be set in the Custommenu. It can lock focus or exposure or both. I use it to lock focus. It can also be set to activate focus when pressed and de-activate it when released. This is called back button focusing and is very useful for sports photographers, for example.
There is a small Function button (Fn7) on the front of the camera beside the hand grip. Like all the other Fnbuttons is fully programmable.

The rear panel of the GX8 has a useful array of functions including the four Curser Buttons(3, 4, 5, 6) used for moving around option screens and changing parameters as well as the marked functions.
1. The Playbackbutton. After you have taken a picture, press this to review the image. You can, if you wish, review the image automatically by using the menu item Auto Reviewin the Custommenu.
2. The Disp.button. This cycles through four EVF screen views varying from minimal information to comprehensive information, with and without the tilt sensor showing. For the Monitor only it cycles through an extra stage of Monitor Offwhich can save power if you are using the EVF exclusively since the image display will not automatically switch on the monitor when you take your eye from the EVF (assuming you have the LVF button set to Auto Switching) There is another option which applies to the monitor only which is Monitor Info.Disp.in the Custommenu. If this is set on, another screen is included in the Disp.button cycle, a recording information screen (below). This shows on one screen all the parameters you would normally want to change when out taking pictures. If you have Touch Screenenabled they can all be accessed directly on touching.

3. The ISOcurser button. ISOis the sensitivity of your camera's sensor to light. If the exposure at the light level in an indoor sports stadium yields an exposure of 125th@f/3.5 (full aperture) with ISO set to 200 with your kit lens, that will be fine for a static shot. For an action shot, you'll need a minimum of /500th to stop subject movement. You can't open the lens up any more to let in more light. What you can do is set the ISO to 800. That will give you your desired 1/500th@f/3.5. As ever with life there are no free lunches. To raise the sensor's sensitivity to light, it simply am plies the signal. This amplifies any noise present too, which takes a grainy form of random coloured dots. You have to decide for yourself how much noise you can tolerate to get the exposure settings you need. The GX8 is the best Micro Four Thirds camera yet in terms of noise performance and I happily use up to 1600 ISO without concern. You can reduce noise in post processing, to some extent though at the cost of detail. As I said before, there are no free lunches in this respect.
4. White Balance. If you look at an object in daylight and then indoors by artificial light, the object will appear the same colour in both environments. Although the daylight contains much blue light and the artificial light much red, your brain instinctively compensates for the environmental differences. The camera cannot do this and must be told the colour temperature (more blue=colder, more red =warmer). You can set WBexplicitly for sunlight, cloudy, indoors and so on but in practise Autois generally best and you can correct to some extent in post processing. WBis irrelevant when you are shooting RAWsince it retains all the formation from the image and can be set to choice afterwards. In the case of RAW, just set it to Auto
5. This sets the Drive Mode. There are many of theses, from single shot through burst, 4K, Auto Bracket and delayed action. This button sets the overall mode. If you choose delayed action, for example, whether the delayed action is for 2 or ten seconds will depend on the setting you have previously chosen in the Recmenu. If you wish, a press on the top, 'Up' curser button will let you change the parameters on the fly.
6. This sets the AF Mode. Face/Eye Detectionwill recognise a human face and set focus on the eye nearest the camera. Trackingwill attempt to follow whatever you set it to follow and keep focus on it. It works remarkably well. Once set, just touch whatever you want to keep in focus on the screen and the GX8 will track it from there. 49 Areasets the GX8 to automatically select where focus should be. You can touch the screen to set bias to that position if the camera's opinion is different from yours. Custom Multiallows you to set a pattern to your taste. There are a series of presets and a Freefacility, using the Upand Downcurser keys plus the Menu/Setbutton which allows you to define your own pattern. For example, I find a pattern of four cells in a line spanning the centre of the screen ideal or photographing passing cyclists. I set this to Custom 2 and choose it for suitable occasions. 1-Areais my standard setting. I find it the most certain and controllable and very quick to focus on my subject, half press the shutter to lock focus and then re-compose. Because of the GX8's stunning focus speed, it takes longer to say than do. If you touch the focus rectangle so that it highlights in yellow, you can alter its size with the rear dial. If you simply touch the screen where you want to focus, the focus rectangle will immediately locate there. A touch on 'Set' on screen or a half press of the shutter button will settle it in place. An important tip - no matter where or what size or type the focus area, if you touch it and press the Disp.button it will immediately jump its central position. Thus, even if you move it accidentally, you can always reset it in a moment. Pinpointis great for macro mode or anywhere where you need a really precise position focused. I was recently photographing a cat looking out through a security grill over window. In any other mode, the camera will focus on the lattice grill. Pinpoint, just set it to the cat's eye.
7. In Playbackmode this button enables you to delete one or more files from the SD card. Since you can also delete by touching the trash can icon on screen, you may like to use this button for something else. In that case, re-assign it in Fn Button Setin the Custommenu, where it is referred to as Fn3

Rec Menu

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Photo Style

This gives you a series of preset colour values other than the standard neutral output.

Standard

Plain vanilla neutral values and the pick for general use.

Vivid

This is self-explanatory though I'd have called it Lurid.

Natural

Gives pleasantly soft colours.

Monochrome

Black and white! When this is set a new option appears at the bottom of the customizations options. It allows you to select red, green, yellow or orange filters. These are the classic filters used in film days with red being the most dramatic, yielding dark, almost black skies that enhance the dramatic effect of any clouds.

Scenery

Bluer skies and greener greens

Portrait

Warms the skin tones

Custom

All the styles can be tweaked for contrast, sharpening, saturation and noise reduction and saved in that modified form. So, for example, if Vividwas not vivid enough you up the contrast and saturation sliders and save that as the new Vivid. You need to experiment with these to see what you prefer The styles do not affect RAWfiles but if you set RAW+JPGyou get a normal RAWplus the styled JPG, effectively giving you the best of both worlds.

Filter Settings

When you set the Mode Dialto Creative Controlit not only applies the effect you choose, it sets the camera to Programmode, taking over control of shutter and ISO. Filter Settingsallows you to apply the same effects as Creative Controlmode but using the settings you are currently using. So if you want great depth of field for a landscape or a fast shutter speed for sports, you can use Filter Settingsto retain control of your GX8 settings while the filter is applied.
Note that this does notapply the filter to RAWfiles! The RAWfile will show the filter effect when viewed in camera but when imported into your imaging software, eg Photoshop, it will not be there. You cannot use Photo Styleand Filter Settingstogether. If you set a Filter Setting, it will set Photo Styleto Standardand grey it out.

Filter Select

Make your choice from the 22 filters(effects, really) available. These effects can be adjusted. Press the Right Cursorbutton to vary the intensity of the effect.
One of the most interesting and effective is One Point Color. This gives a monochrome image with only one color showing. It is slightly more complex to adjust. To set the color you wish to highlight, having set 1CLR, press Fn4button (bottom right of the camera body rear. A yellow rectangle appears on screen. Use the curser keys to move this around to the colour you wish to retain and press the Setbutton on screen. Everything appears monochrome except your chosen colour. Now press theRight Cursorbutton and you can adjust the intensity of the colour.

Simultaneous Record W/O Filter

This is a useful facility. One press on the shutter makes 2 pictures, one with the filter in operation and one without so if the effect doesn't look good you haven't lost your picture. Note: If you load both filtered and unfiltered images into layers in Photoshop (or any image program with layers) you can blend the two, making the effect more subtle. If you are in Burst Modeor Auto Bracketwhen you set a filter, your GX8 will revert to single shot

Aspect Ratio

4:3

gives you the maximum number of pixels/ biggest file size. It is the native sensor size and uses all the pixels available for an image.

3:2

is the old 35mm film camera ratio to which many photographers have become accustomed.

16:9

is widescreen TV/ Video aspect.

1:1

is the aspect of many older film cameras, usually 6x6cm in size and used by such cameras as Rolleiflex and Hasselblad. It is a rather awkward shape for most pictures but there are those who like it. It gives only a 14.5M image as compared to 20M at 4:3since it crops the image to 3888x 3888.
With 3:2and 16:9the GX8 is simply cropping the top and bottom sensor image to get the ratio required and the pixel width of the image will always be the same at 5184 pixels. You could argue that it would be better to shoot always at 4:3and the crop out any unwanted image areas but it is much easier in practise to view and thus compose the picture in the aspect ratio you have chosen.

Picture Size

This applies to the JPG files only. If you are shooting RAW, this will be blanked out because RAW always uses the full sensor area. It sets the number of megapixels or MP your camera will record from the sensor.

L 20m

will record the most detailed image but take up the most space on your SD card.

M10m

records less detail but also enable you to record many more images on your SD card.

S5m

records least detail but also enable you to record many, many more images on your SD card. It's the best size for images to be uploaded to social media,

Quality

This controls the amount of compression applied to JPGimages. If you shoot RAW+JPGit applies to the JPGfile only. RAWfiles are always maximum quality and cannot be changed. JPGcompression works by discarding image detail in an intelligent way and is highly effective. The six blocks means less compression and so larger files with more detail. 3 blocks give more compression and so smaller files at the cost of less detail. If you plan to send images directly to online destinations like Facebook, even the higher compression three block setting will be fine.
The relationship between Picture Sizeand Qualityis often misunderstood. Picture Sizegives a smaller file size simply because there are fewer pixels. The GX8's Largesetting has 5184x3888 pixels, over 20 million of them. The Smallsetting of 2624x1968, about 5 million pixels and not surprisingly gives a file size 25% of that of Large. Qualityon the other hand does not affect the number of pixels in the image but the amount of detail stored in the file. Where you have 10 pixels in a file, all very similar in colour, a JPG compression makes them all one colour and stores one pixel with information to repeat it 10 times, for example. Given the cheapness of storage, I would advise to shoot at maximum size/ minimum compression unless I knew my picture was only for social media. You can always discard detail for space saving later on but you cannot add it if you did not have it in the first place.

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AFS/AFF

This controls the action of the AFsetting position of the Focus Modelever. It can be quite confusing. Let's say you are making a portrait of your young daughter. She is a bit fidgety. You press the shutter halfway and the camera focuses on her face. You hold the camera in position and wait a second until she smiles. Press the shutter and there is picture. But what if she suddenly leans towards you at the very moment you press the shutter?

AFS

Focus is set when you half press the shutter. It remains locked while the release button is pressed half way. Though your daughter has leaned forward focus remains where it was before she moved and your picture will be out of focus.

AFF

Focus is set when you half press the shutter but the camera then adjusts the focus point continuously while half-pressed, following your daughter's movements until you finally release the shutter. The focus point had been shifted and your picture will be in focus.
Although the AFFsetting sounds the obvious choice, it can be a bit disconcerting on more static subjects. I use AFSas my normal setting, changing to AFFfor portraits of children or animals who tend to move unpredictably. AFFis suitable for fairly static situations where any movement is likely to be limited. If the subject is running around, constantly moving and over a distance, you need AF-Cor Focus Tracking, set on the cursor button.

Metering Mode

This sets the way in which the camera reads the light falling on your picture

Multiple, the whole screen is read and the camera judges the exposure for you. In my experience the Multiplesetting is very reliable and even when it does err it is not by very much

Center Weightedweights the exposure to the centre of the screen on the reasonable assumption that that is where the subject is. It was a method used by film cameras and remains for legacy reasons more than anything else. In practice Multipledoes everything Center Weighteddoes but better and more intelligently.

Spot Meteringmeasures the exposure from the centre of the screen. A small green cross appears on the screen to tell you it is spot metering. This works best when the lighting is extreme. For example, you are photographing a bird sitting on a telephone wire with a bright blue sky behind it. The camera on Multiplewill try to set a compromise exposure by balancing the bird with blue sky light reading. It cannot know that you care only for getting detail in the bird's plumage. Set to Spotand it will expose for the bird. This metering mode can be tricky, requiring experience, to use. In a situation as outlined, I prefer to use the GX8's nicely placed Exposure Compensationdial to add a stop or so or otherwise use the Auto Bracketsetting.

Burst rate

SH

Cannot be used while recording any RAWfile. It fires at a rate of 40 frames per second for a maximum of 120 frames. You cannot accurately see what you are photographing because the viewfinder image lags. All the following can be used with RAW as well as JPG

H

Using AFSshoots at 10 frames per second with the electronic shutter, 8 fps with the normal shutter. If you use AF-Cthe rates slow down to 6 frames per second. Again, the viewfinder image lags. You can use RAWbut the shooting rate will slow down much more quickly than with JPG. Again the viewfinder image lags.

M

While (obviously) slower than H, this allows you to see your subject movement in real time. With AF-Cspeeds are the same as with Hso given you can follow your subject this is the most practical burst setting. It actually slows down marginally with AFS.

L

2 frames per second - no viewfinder lag but when Panasonic say Low, they mean sLow!

4K PHOTO

This sets the 4Krecording method but does not activate it. To actually shoot in 4Kyou must set the Drive Modeto 4Kvia the button. This is hybrid video/ stills shooting ,really. It shoots 4K MP4video at 30 frames per second but whereas video is standardized at a 16:9 aspect ratio, 4Kstills allows you to use the more stills friendly 4:3and 3:2aspect ratios. After shooting, go into Playbackmode where you can select the frame(s)to keep. This is very well implemented and I select my stills in camera in preference to in post processing on the desktop. You could use the even faster SH Burst Ratebut that is limited to 3 second bursts rather than the in principle unlimited shooting period of 4Kand also 4Kallows for real time viewing of your subject. All these modes suffer from the jello effect so don't displace conventional Burst Modesentirely.

Rec Method

4K Burstis the most conventional of the 4Ksettings. Like all the conventional Burst Modes, just press the shutter button to start shooting and release it to stop.

4K Burst(S/S)differs from 4K Burstonly in one respect, in that the sequence starts when you press the shutter button but when you release it continues. To stop it, press the shutter button again. If you forget and leave it running, it will eat the battery power.

4K Pre-Burstis the star of the show! It performs the minor miracle of recording the sequence from one second before you press the shutter to one second after. It's less miraculous than it seems, though. From the moment you set it, the GX8 constantly records a sequence. When you press the shutter button, it keeps the 30 frames preceding your push and the 30 frames after, discarding the rest. Obviously this will eat battery life and if left running too long could cause the camera to overheat. That's probably unlikely except in unusually high ambient temperatures.
With the 4Kburst modes, if you press the Fn1button (that's the one behind the red dotted Recordbutton) while shooting, it will mark that frame for easier access when choosing which to keep in Playback

Loop Recording

If you are using 4K Burst(S/S), the only 4Ksequence to which it applies, it would be easily possible to fill the capacity of your SD card while waiting for the action to happen. This lets the shooting continue for 10 minutes, then deletes the oldest 2 minutes of the sequence, continuing on like that. It prevents the SD card filling but also limits the number of frames you will need to search for your desired piece of photo action.

Auto Bracket

Where light conditions are difficult, for example on a sunny day with someone half in and half out of a shadow, it can be difficult to know the correct exposure. Do you expose for the dark area, making the light area too light or the light area making the dark area too dark. Or somewhere in between? The camera's auto exposure cannot make this decision for you and it will try to find an average. This is not always the best decision. Enter Auto Bracket. At its simplest, the camera takes three frames one after another, frame 1 at what the auto-exposure thinks is the correct exposure, frame 2 at half that exposure and frame three at double that exposure. You decide which exposure you like best after viewing the three exposures and delete the others.

Single/Burst Settings

Single, the camera will go through the bracketing steps one at a time. If you set it to 3 steps, you will need to press the shutter 3 times to complete your 3 exposures, 5 times for 5 steps, 7 for 7

Burstsettings, press the shutter and hold it down, the camera will run through its exposure sequence and stop after 3, 5 or 7 steps. This is my preferred setting. With exposure bracketing you are taking 1 picture at different settings so it makes sense to press the button once for one picture. Set to single and you must press the shutter once for each iteration of the bracketing set. So, if set for 5 exposure bracketing, you will have to press the button 5 times until the sequence is completed.

Step

Set to 7-1 it takes 7 frames one stop apart giving you a span from 3 stops under to 3 stops over exposure. 7-2 spans from 2 stops under to 2 stops over. 5 and 3 Step pro rata. You can see all this on the excellent graphic at the bottom of the Auto Bracket setting Screen. I find Step 3-1 the most useful. The GX8's meter is rarely far off optimum exposure and if it is, frames 1 stop under and 1 stop over are usually enough.

Sequence

This gives you the choice of the bracketing shooting order. The 'correct' exposure followed by however many Steps you have set below 'correct', followed by however many you have set over 'correct' exposure. Since the camera meters so intelligently, I prefer to let it have its way first and then shoot the other frames after that 0/-/+

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Self Timer

delays the firing of the shutter for the specified time

10 seconds gives you time to get in the picture yourself.

gives a 10 second delay and then takes 3 pictures at about 2 second intervals. If you are taken by surprise by the first shutter click, you have two more in which to compose yourself.

This is useful for letting the camera settle down after the shutter button has been pushed. It can be used instead of a cable or remote release on a tripod but is also surprisingly useful for long hand held exposures, enabling you to remove your finger from the shutter release and settle the camera tightly against your body with both hands. See also the Shutter Delaysetting in the Recmenu which is similar but tailored to firing the shutter with the least possible shock.

Highlight Shadow

This does not operate on RAWfiles.
This is an advanced option which lets you set the tonal response of the camera to your personal requirements. If you find your images are consistently of lower contrast than you want, for example, you can set the curves so that the contrast is raised. There are a series of presets and a facility to save 3 of your own for later use. The first preset resets the response to default. You can alter the tone curve by touching the presets along the bottom of the monitor, dragging on screen or using the front and rear dials. I can't see many photographers using this facility since the GX8 takes care of the tone curve so well automatically but if you were to use a studio regularly, say, and found your results consistently flatter, less contrasty than you like, you might save an option here to correct that. Remember though that changes here affect video output too. Change it for one and you change it for the other. If you do use it regularly, probably best to set it to a Fnbutton because it is not something to be applied generally so easy On/Offaccess will be necessary. One for experts this but a good advanced option to have!

i.Dynamic

This tweaks the exposure and contrast on scenes with extreme lighting differences. Disabled in RAW. I find it makes little difference even on Highand don't use it. One to play with perhaps, I am sure it has its uses. It has four levels

i.Resolution

This tweaks the sharpness setting. Disabled in RAW. I find the standard GX8sharpness settings excellent so don't use this. Again, one to play with. Over-sharpened images can appear harsh and unnatural.

Post Focus

Essentially, this allows you to choose your point of focus after you have shot the picture. It takes a series of many exposures with the focus point moved around near to far. When you press the Playbackbutton, you will see an icon labelled 'Post Focus Play'. Touch that and your image comes up on screen. Touch it where you like and focus will be sharp at that point. Touch Fn2labelled Q Menu) and you will see focus peaking information for the shot. When you find an agreeable focus point, touch Menu/Seton the back of the GX8 and you will be offered to save that image. It saves the image as a separate JPGfile on the SD card. This facility operates in 4Kmode so file size is limited to 8Mp.

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iHandheld Night Shot

works only when the GX8 is in either iAutomode. Does not work in RAW. With this on, when the GX8 determines that you are making a night shot it fires a burst instead of one frame. It then combines the frames into one minimizing noise and camera movement. It crops the image slightly to give the leeway to shuffle the subject area around in the frame. All this highly complex computing goes on under the hood - you just see a less noisy, sharper result.

iHDR

This is only available with the Mode Dial set to iA. (See the iA Menu later in the book)

HDR

this does not work with RAWfiles. Set this ONand the camera will take 3 frames at different exposures automatically and process them to minimise the loss of detail in highlight and/ or shadow areas. It can give richly detailed skies combined with rich deep shadows at its best with the right subject. One to experiment with. The principal drawback with it is that the dynamic range of any image is constrained to that of the device on which you view it. If your HDRimage has a much higher dynamic range than your monitor (which is generally the case) the monitor responds by taking the image and cramming it into its own dynamic range. The result is a flat, lower contrast image.

SET

Dynamic Range

Choose between 1, 2 or 3 stops Dynamic Rangeor Auto. It is very difficult to foresee how HDRwill look with any given subject but I find AUTOworks well. If the result on AUTOis too lacking in contrast, try the 1,2 or 3 stops manual setting.

Auto Align

Since HDRworks by firing several frames at different exposure, any camera movement will lead to a fuzzy shot. Auto Alignmakes a good job of minimizing the fuzziness but the best results will come from using a tripod.

Multi Exp

This enables you to fire the shutter up to 4 times on one frame, combining the exposures. After setting the options below, you must initiate the multiple exposure from Start, the top item on the menu before pressing the shutter button. After the first shot a Next/ Retake/ ExitDialog pops up giving you some control over the sequence as it progresses.
OverlaySet to Offin JPGor RAWquality, means that the first shot you make after pressing Startis the exposure on which the subsequent ones will be layered. Oncannot be used in JPGquality! Set On in RAWand you must select the image on which the subsequent ones will be layered from a previously taken one on your SD card. When you press Start, you will be taken to the previous images to make your choice. Note! - You can only choose a RAWimage.

Auto Gain

For most uses, Auto Gain is best left on. With it off you will have to set the exposure of each shot yourself which will involve a lot of experimentation but could, with care, produce a result exactly to your liking. Play with this facility to see if you find it useful. Lots of fun experimenting with this!

Time Lapse Shot

Start

Once you have set the parameters below, press this and you are instructed to press the shutter button start the sequence.

Start Time

Choose between Now or any time in the next 23 hours and 59 minutes. So if you set it at 8pm you could have it start at 6am tomorrow, for example. Set to Now and the sequence starts when you press the shutter release.

Shooting Interval

This brings up settings for the Shootinginterval and Image Countas does

Image Count

Set the camera to shoot 1 frame every second to one frame every 99 minutes (or 1hr 39 minutes). The Image Countcan be up to 9,999. In other words you can shoot a sequence of 9,999 frames with one shutter press At 25fps video 1 frame per second time lapse for 9,999 frames compresses about 2hr 45m real time down to around 6m 30 seconds of video. At the maximum interval 1 year real time would be compressed down to 3 and a half minutes of video. It makes sense to use the Electronic Shutterwhere possible for Time Lapsesince even given the long average shutter life of modern cameras, you could very soon wear out the shutter mechanism.
As the sequence goes along, if you press Fn5you will see a dialog box offering Continue, Pauseor End, giving you some control over the camera if you have inadvertently or wrongly set the control.
When the sequence ends you will be asked if you wish to Create video Now? Press Yesand you are offered a choice. Rec Qualitygives you the choice of four MP4settings. One of the 25fpssettings is probably easiest. Frame Rateis a matter of choice. The higher the rate the smoother but shorter the sequence Sequenceenables you to choose between the animation playing forwards as shot or backwards. You can revisit the frames shot and make a new movie with them in Time Lapse Videoin the PlaybackMenu at any time.

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Stop Motion Animation

Do you want to make a pudding crawl? A teddy bear do the tango? This menu item makes it as easy as it can be. I'd suggest using the Electronic Shutterfor this. Stop Motion Animationis akin to Time Lapsebut after each frame it shows the last two frames overlaid, so you can judge easily how much you want to move your pudding or teddy bear.

Start

Press this to initiate the recording after setting the parameters below. You are offered the choice, on pressing Startof Newor Additional. Newstarts a new sequence from scratch. Additional will bring up previous animations from your SD card to which you can append the new one.

Auto Shooting

Set this to Onand the shutter will fire automatically at the Shooting Intervalset. Set to Offand you can fire the shutter manually, useful if you have particularly difficult adjustments to make from frame to frame, for example and you cannot predict when you will want the next frame taken.

Shooting Interval

This can be from one to sixty seconds. The beauty of Stop Motion Animationis that when you stop recording (by pressing on the monitor you are asked if you want to create the video now. Answer Yesand you are given some choices.
Rec Qualitygives you the choice of four MP4settings. One of the 25fpssettings is probably easiest. Frame rateis a matter of choice. The higher the rate the smoother the movement of your animation but the more individual moves you will have to photograph to make your pudding crawl. Sequenceenables you to choose between the animation playing forwards as shot or backwards. With this, your pudding can be made to do the cha cha cha. Again, it makes sense to use the Electronic Shutter. You can revisit the frames shot and make a new movie with them in Stop Motion Videoin the PlaybackMenu.

Panorama Settings

Direction

This sets the parameters when PanoramaMode is set. In any other mode setting it is greyed out. Directionlets you set the panoramic motion, move the camera left, right up or down. It gives a long, narrow strip image. To make a panorama, line up your camera with the horizon using the guide line that appears. press the shutter and pan the camera across the scene. The GX8warns you when the pan is too slow or too fast and it is occasionally tricky to get it right. Persevere, though, because when you get it right the results are very impressive. To stop the panorama sequence, either just keep the camera still or press the shutter button again.Panoramas can only be made in JPGquality - automatically set when you select the mode.

Picture Size

Standard

lets you scan across nearly 180 degrees.

Wide

lets you scan through about 320 degrees. That necessitates shooting from in front of you right round to behind you. It's quite hard to keep the camera steady while moving through such a wide sweep. Easy peasy for an owl, mind you. Wide, of course, gives you a thinner picture strip than Standard.

Electronic Shutter

Set to Offthe GX8 uses its conventional mechanical shutter speeds from 60s to 1/8000th. Set to Onand the camera can take pictures almost silently from 1 second to 1/16000th , ideal for in church pictures at weddings, for example, where you do not wish to disturb the other guests. Set to Auto, shutter speeds from about 1/60th to 1/320th will be the electronic shutter, faster and slower the mechanical shutter. This is to avoid the phenomenon of shutter shock, where the mechanical shutter can cause the camera to shudder as it fires, giving a slight double imaging. There are a few restrictions with the electronic shutter listed below, though, so Autoneeds to be used with care. It can be a little off-putting have no shutter noise at all. If you want a click, albeit quiet, when the Electronic Shutteris set On, go to the Beepitem on page 1 of the SetupMenu. Tucked away there you will find E-Shutter Volwhere you can choose from 2 levels of volume and off. You have a choice of three shutter tones there too. It would have been fun to name them if they were emulations of real shutters, Hasselblad,Leica, Nikon, say, complete with sounds of flapping mirror! You cannot use Flashwith the Electronic Shutter. It can also lead to distortion of your subject if it is moving quickly.
You cannot set an ISOof more than 1600 when the Electronic Shutteris set to on. Silent Modeon page 1 of the Custommenu also turns on the Electronic Shutterbut unlike this menu item forces any flash fitted, beeps, AF Assist Lamp, E-Shutter and Speaker Volume to Offin one fell swoop. I prefer to use the E-Shutterwith a quiet click set just to put my mind at rest that the shutter has actually fired.

Shutter Delay

Set On, when you press the shutter it will be delayed for 1, 2, 4 or 8 seconds. While it has a similar effect to setting the Self Timer, it is specifically intended for minimizing camera shutter disturbance or shock. Apart from having a greater selection of shorter delays than the Self Timer, it fires the shutter in a way that minimizes disturbance. This is for tripod use only since unlike Self Timeron pressing the shutter the viewfinder blanks. This is intended and necessary in order to fire the shutter in as vibration free a way as possible. Used with the Electronic Shutterit is practically as effective in eliminating shake as using a remote release.

Flash

This is available only if you have a flash fitted and switched on Flashdoes not work with the Electronic Shutter. Flashoperation has 3 pages of its own though the third page only appears when Wirelesson page 2 of the menu is turned on.

Firing Mode TTL

The camera takes care of the flash output automatically. (I use this setting all the time unless forced to use manual)

Manual

You can set the level of the flash output yourself using trial and error or using the flash guide number if TTLdoes not do the job to your satisfaction. You can set the output level of the flash in manual operation by going to the next page (Page 2) of the FlashMenu under Manual Flash Adjust. Normally, luckily, TTLtakes care of it all.

Wireless

If you have a separate flash with wireless control, this tells the camera to talk to it.

Flash Mode

The flash fires regardless of lighting conditions. The shutter speed can be set up to 1/250th Sec. Handy for backlit sunlight portraits for example.

The flash fires regardless of lighting conditions as in the first option but fires a couple of pre flashes to reduce red-eye
Slow Sync. This is effective to balance flash on a foreground subject with natural light on the background. Usually, you'll need to mount the camera on a tripod for this as it will often need slow shutter speeds

Slow Sync with red-eye reduction.

Flash Synchro

This controls when the flash fires on Slow Sync (see Flash Mode)

1st

If the exposure is 1 second, for example, the flash will fire at the beginning of the exposure.

2nd

If the exposure is 1 second, for example, the flash will fire just before the shutter closes. With this you can control motion blur with flash - set to 2nd, motion blur will be behind the flash exposure of a moving object. With 1stany motion blur would be in front of a moving object. If you are using slow shutter speed and flash, 2ndis the setting you'd most likely want. In general use, leave it on 1stBut - experiment!

Flash Adjust

This alters the overall strength of the flash to your taste. If in your opinion your flash lit pictures are too light, set it to a minus setting. Too dark, set it to a plus setting. For most people, the camera will get it about right without any compensation.

Auto Exposure Comp

If set to On, the Exposure Compensation Buttonon the camera body will apply to the flash as well. If you are in a dark place such as a club where all your light will be from the flash, this makes adjustment of your flash as easy as normal exposure compensation is in daylight.

Manual Flash Adjust

If you have the flash set to Manualin the Firing ModeMenu rather than the normal TTL, this menu item is enabled. It turns down the flash power. In TTLmode it is disabled, since the camera takes care of flash power.

Wireless

Sets wireless flash operation On or Off On setting it to On, Page 3 of the Wireless operations appears.

Wireless Channel

If you are using a wireless flash it will have 4 operating channels. You set the flash and camera to the same channel.

Wireless FP

With certain wireless flashes this makes possible the use of a higher shutter speed than the 250th second of a standard camera flash.

Communication Light

This sets the light output of the built in flash for triggering a wireless flash. It's obviously best to set it as low as will work reliably to save camera power.

Wireless Setup

This is beyond the scope of my book and will be explained more fully in the manual of the wireless flash itself. Basically, you can control the firing method and relative power of the inbuilt flash and up to three external units from here. With 3 external flashes you could have a full power key light, half power fill in and quarter power background, say. You have individual choice of the mode of operation of each flash or switching it off altogether. Personally, I would set the Firing Mode to Manual and set each flash myself, doing test shots until I nailed the exact result I wanted. It would take time but such a setup could be used over and over again to give reliable multi-flash studio style lighting out in the field. Test by pressing the Dispbutton on the camera back or touching Test Flashon the monitor. Complicated but an invaluable facility to have.

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Red-Eye Removal

when the flash is set to either of the red-eye reduction settings or if the camera detects red-eye it corrects it.

ISO Limit Set

400-25600

If you have the camera set to Auto ISOthis limits the maximum ISOthe camera is allowed to use. For example, if you considered 6400 ISO to be too noisy for normal use, you would set your ISO Limit to 3200. This would ensure that 6400 would not be used unless you explicitly chose it.

ISO Increments

Set to 1EV, when you press the ISObutton on the camera and alter the values with the rear dial, the ISOvalues can be set to 200-400-800 etc. Set to 1/3EVvalues can be set to 200-250-320-400 etc, giving a more subtle choice of speeds at the expense of more dial twiddling.

Extended ISO

Set to Off the lowest ISOyou can set is 200 and the highest 25600. Set to Onyou can set from 100 to 25,600. I find no obvious image quality difference between 100 and 200 but the lower setting can be useful in very bright light where you wish to use a fast lens to limit your lens's depth of field. With the electronic shutter's 1/16000th maximum, there is rarely too much light for depth of field control however.

Long Shtr NR

Removes noise from frames taken at long shutter speeds, night scenes, for example. In low light and at long exposures the image sensor generates noise of its own. Long shutter NRvery effectively lowers that noise but due to the way it operates doubles the time for capture of an image. If you have an exposure time of 10 seconds, the shutter will be open for 10 seconds and then the camera will be processing for 10 seconds. I would never turn this off unless I really had to. Disabled in Electronic Shuttermode

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Shading Comp.

Corrects vignetting or darkening of the corners of the picture with some lenses. If you have a lens that vignettes, try this. It mainly works with native MFT lenses - where you are actually less likely to need it. It adds a small overhead to the time taken to write images to your SD card I leave this Off.

Diffraction Compensation

When you pass light through a very small gap it bends it. This is known as diffraction. When you stop an MFT lens down to a small aperture, say f/8 and beyond, the aperture (or diaphragm) becomes small enough to diffract some of the focused light of your image. This causes the image to look 'soft' or blurred. This is an optical phenomenon and nothing can be done about it except to apply extra sharpening to the image which is what Diffraction Compensationseems to do. While it improves the apparent sharpness, as with any digital sharpening it can highlight noise in the image. MFT cameras are more prone to image diffraction than larger sensor cameras because the lens focal lengths it uses are smaller (25mm instead of 50mm for a normal angle of view, for example). Diffraction Compensationis a subtly implemented on the GX8 and well worth leaving at Auto. If set it also applies to video.

Ex.Tele Conv

This is of little use to stills photographers and is not operable in 4Kvideo mode. For video up to FHDit provides a means of more than doubling the image size for a given focal length, as if you had doubled the focal length of your lens but at no cost to aperture or quality. So, for example, the 100-300mm Panasonic zoom in terms of image magnification becomes a roughly 200-600mm zoom, still f4-f5.6. This can give spectacular perspective foreshortening effects and close ups of wild life but you would need a sturdy tripod. In HDvideo, 300mm becomes over 1000mm or on a full frame camera the equivalent of around a 2000mm lens. It sound great but actually is mostly unusable because of camera and atmospheric movement. Fun, though.

Digital Zoom

This is a hangover from the early days of digital cameras. It's not a zoom, it does no more than crop the picture in camera. It's pointless and best ignored

Color Space

Use sRGBalways except when Adobe RGBis requested. If you shoot RAW files Color Spaceis irrelevant since you choose the Color Spacein post processing.

sRGB

This is a world wide standard for color space and is best for digital images, general printing and Internet use.

Adobe RGB

This is more specialized and mainly for professional use. If you are working for the print industry, they may prefer this but without special software it can tend toward dull colours. It does not increase the number of colours the camera records!

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Stabilizer

This controls the type of stabilisation used. When using a Panasonic lens with stabilization built in, the GX8uses that in tandem with the lens stabilization. There are a few lenses which cannot combine the two but others are being upgraded via their firmware. The current state of play can be seen on Panasonic's web site. If a lens without stabilisation is mounted, an Olympus lens, for example, the camera automatically switches to the body stabilization.

Operation Mode

Normal stabilization correcting lateral and vertical shake.

Turns off lateral correction for when you are using a panning action (ie moving the camera to follow the subject). Otherwise the camera will attempt un-pan your careful panning.

OFF

The OFF option only appears when there is no on/off switch on the lens. To turn off stabilization with a stabilized lens, use the switch on the lens. When shooting from a tripod, stabilization is best switched off.

E-Stabilization (Video)

This crops the image slightly from normal so that it can digitally move the frame around to compensate for jitter. It combines with in lens stabilization. It does not operate with unstabilized lenses so for video no stabilization at all is available.

Focal Length Set

When you mount a non native Four Thirds or Micro Four Thirds lens on the GX8, the lens will not have the contacts on the mount to tell the camera body who it is and how it should be treated. For example, if you have an old Nikon lens which you are particularly fond of, you can buy an adaptor to fit it to your GX8. Without the standard MFT contacts on the back, the GX8 has no way of knowing if a lens is fitted or not, let alone what lens it is and it will not fire when you press the shutter release. To overcome this, you must set Shoot w/o Lenson the Custommenu to On. The camera will now fire regardless of whether there is a lens fitted or not. However, the camera needs to know the focal length of the lens you have fitted in order to apply the most effective stabilization. Focal Length Setis where you can set that. If your lens's focal length is not one the selection dial, 31mm, for example, you can register it explicitly, though in practice you'd do just as well to set 35mm or 28mm. Note that you should set the focal length to the actual marked focal length, not its equivalent in Full Frameterms.

Face Recog.

This works only with (Face Detection) set in the AF Modemenu. Face Detectionshould not be confused with
Face Recog. Face Detectionscans the frame for any face(s) and sets focus and exposure to suit. Face Recog. takes that a step further and scans for a registered face. For Face Recog. to operate you must first take a passport style photograph of a person and register it using the Memoryoption. Turn on Face Recog. and the camera examines your prospective photograph for a registered face, then focuses on and sets the exposure for that person wherever they are in the picture. Take Cinderella and the ugly sisters. If you registered Cinderella's face and then got the girls together for a family group shot, switch on Face Recog. and focus and exposure would be set for the pretty one even if the ugly ones made her sit behind them. It won't work in 4Kmode or video.

Profile Setup

This is to set a profile for the registered faces. Then, when you view pictures of them their name and age can be shown on the picture. You can actually stamp them on the image itself when reviewing them on the camera using Text Stampin the Playbackmenu. monitor l=umianceMotion Picture Menu

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Photo Style

Has the same options as it does in stills. It gives you a series of preset colour values other than the Standardneutral.
Vividis self explanatory
Naturalgives less vivid than standard colours . The 'soft' in the handbook refers to the colours, not the sharpness.
Monochromeis obvious.
Sceneryis bluer skies and greener greens.
Portraitwarms the skin tones.
Customlets you set a style from scratch.
Cinelike Dattempts to gives a film like dynamic range so that highlights and shadows retain detail and the video appears quite flat. Cinelike Dwith Contrastand Sharpnessat -5 seems to be a popular choice. This provides a good starting point, retaining detail and enabling you to enhance or manipulate your colours as you wish. If you are shooting two scenes under different lighting but want to match the colours as nearly as possible, for example, this is the setting to use.
Cinelike Vattempts to give a film like contrast range and is a good choice for everyday shooting without post processing. Note that The two Cinelikesettings only appear when Creative Moviemode is selected.

Filter Settings

The filter setting here are identical to those in the stills menu. For obvious reasons Simultaneous record w/o filteris not available in video.

Snap Movie

Lets say you are photographing your children paddling at the coast. You are taking stills but suddenly one starts splashing the other. It's a sweet still but it would make an equally sweet video moment. That's what Snap Moveis for. When you've got a still, just press the red Recordbutton on the top of the camera. The camera will automatically set Video Qualityto FHD 25fps MP4 no matter what you have set it to in Rec Qualityand Rec Format, shoot a 4 second sequence and stop. You can then go back to shooting stills just by pressing the shutter button as normal. This seamless versatility is the mark of a truly well thought out modern digital camera in my view.

Set

gives you access to

Record Time

2-8SEC

choose the length of the movie made each time you press Record.

Pull Focus

a short specially shot video clip can often make a nice transition from one scene to another. Lets say after paddling, your are going to get on your pedallo and move off down the beach.. You could shoot a Snap Moviestarting with focus on the children in the foreground and then have the focus move smoothly to your pedallo in the background. Pull Focusis how you do it. It gives butter smooth focus pull that in the past would have required a dedicated focus puller to errrm...pull off. The easiest way to set the two position is via the touch screen. Having set Snap Movieand Pull Focusto ONjust touch the screen where you want focus to start and slide your finger to where you want focus to finish. Take your finger off the screen. Now press Recordand your Pull Focusis performed. It is a remarkable facility, giving a professional gloss even to my vestigial video capabilities. You will need to keep the camera as steady as possible for the best effect. Note that if you decide you want to take a still instead of a Snap Movie, focus will be at the start point you set.

Fade

These are straight-forward. You can fade in from black or white to normal colour or fade out from normal color to black or white. Both of these options fade the sound in or out too. Similarly, you can fade in from monochrome to color or fade out from color to monochrome, though in this case the sound is unaffected. Like Pull Focus, Fadeis ideal for making transitions between scenes and can add a nice professional touch. Pull Focusand Fadecan be used together but do so with care because it can look a little heavy-handed..

OFF

Rec Format

Sets the file format of your video. In reality, the overall quality of your video is dictated by the RecQuality rather than the RecFormat.

AVCHD

This was originally a format for Panasonic and Sony camcorders and is probably included for that reason. From using it, I can see no advantage over MP4other than that you can burn it to a DVD and it will play back on a Blu-Ray player. Apparently

MP4(AAC)

This is probably the most widely used of all formats. It is native to YouTube and a good and versatile blend of image, sound quality and file size. AAC is Advanced Audio Coding and offers better quality than MP3.

Rec Quality

This is a complex area of video shooting but some guiding principles apply. Your GX8 will come set for PAL(25 fps) or NTSC(30 fps) depending on where you buy it. As a rule of thumb, PALis used in Europe and parts of Asia, NTSCin the North America and Japan. I don't bother with AVCHDat all because MP4is such a universal standard now, deservedly so since it is very flexible, providing a great balance of file size and quality in whatever image size you choose. Note that 4Kvideo (3840x2160)is only available in MP4format.
4Khas two possibilities, 25(30) fps and 24 fps. 25(30) fps is standard but 24 fps is deemed to give a more cinema like effect by enthusiasts. I can't see the difference myself and so use 25(30) fps. FHDgives you a choice of 25(30) or 50(60) fps. The faster frame rate can give a smoother effect on action videos showing fast movement and also means you can show half-speed slow motion without quality loss by playing it back at 25(30) fps. Some people hold that 50(60) fps looks less natural than 25(30) fps. Again, I perceive no difference in the material that I shoot but you may, so a little experimentation is called for. The HDand VGAoptions are becoming a little dated in these days of large monitors and screen and cheap storage. I standardize on 25 fps 1920 x1080 20Mbps for everything I do. There are more reasons for using 4Kthan simple image size. Shooting 4Kand down-sampling to FHDcan do wonders in noise reduction for high ISO videos. It also enables you to crop your video or apply digital stabilization in post processing if you wish. This is quite sophisticated stuff but well within the scope of an enthusiast videographer.

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Exposure Mode

Similar to stills. The stock advice is to use shutter priority (S) with the shutter speed set to double the frame rate. I shoot at 25fps so use 1/50th. It gives a natural looking movement but on a bright day may be too slow a shutter speed to be usable because of overexposure. In that case, use a higher shutter speed and the hell with it or - better - buy some Neutral Density filters. Alternatively, use Por Amode. Mis available too and is the professional choice. It avoids any amateurish flickering as the camera changes the exposure but does mean that as you move the camera a scene can be badly exposed. I use Smostly.

AFS/AFF

This is the same as in the Rec menu. It controls the action of the AFS/AFF single focus setting of the Focus Mode lever on the back of the camera.

AFS

When you half press the shutter button focus is set and pressing the button fully in starts the video with this focus point set. When videoing the camera will re-focus each time you half press the shutter release.

AFF

When you half press the shutter button focus is set and pressing the button fully in starts the video with this focus point set. However, if you half press the shutter while videoing and keep it half pressed, the camera will correct the focus point automatically if the subject move. This differs from AFC(continuous autofocus) in that AFCis suitable for predictably moving subjects and will attempt to keep focus by calculating the subject's position. This is potentially much smoother in video than AFF.

Picture Mode

You can still shoot still pictures while your video is being shot. There are limitations and this sets whether you want to favour still over video or vice versa. This does not work when the Mode Dial is set to Creative Movie, only when you start a movie by pressing the red Motion Picture button on the back of the camera.

gives a small picture size in JPG while your video continues.

gives whatever still picture quality you have set but the screen goes black, your moving video is replaced by the still image and the audio stops while the pic is taken.

Continuous AF

Set to Onto have the camera continually focus while recording. A half press on the shutter or touch on the monitor will readjust the focus point. This setting will override AFS/AFFon the focus mode lever. Set to Off, the camera will focus when you start the video and not alter. Set to Offwith the Focus Mode Lever on MF, focus is fully manual with no camera intervention at all.

Metering Mode

Same as for stills (Recmenu)

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Highlight Shadow

Same as for stills (Recmenu)

i.Dynamic

As for stills (Recmenu)

i.Resolution

As for stills (Recmenu)

Diffraction Compensation

This is the same as for stills on the (Rec) menu but possibly even more useful for video where you will be using a low shutter speed of 1/50th or so. In daylight this often means stopping the lens down beyond f/8 where diffraction can become an issue.

Luminance Level

This is a highly specialist video setting. It doesn't alter your recorded image in any way, only the way it will be treated by post processing software. If you are going to be taking stills from your video, 0-255 is best, as programs like Photoshop are suited to it Otherwise, the default is 16-255 and I can see no reason to change it.

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Ex. Tele Conv.

This gives the effect of more than doubling the apparent focal length of your lens without (usually) loss of quality (in video mode). It doesn't work with 4K. This really is something for nothing. In FHD quality, A 25mm f1.4 lens becomes a video lens with the angle of view of a 60mm but retains its f1.4 light gathering capacity. The 100-300mm Panasonic zoom gives the angle of view of a 240-720mm. To get such an angle on a 35mm camera you would need a lens of nearly 1500mm, a 25x telephoto. Note, though that such an extreme telephoto effect, while potentially exciting, is very tricky to utilise due to atmospheric movement and camera shake, even on a sturdy tripod. Note that in low light there might be a small increase in image noise. Ex. Tele Conv. works by cropping in to use only the central portion of the sensor. Normally, video is shot using the whole sensor and then down-sampled to the set image size. Down-sampling tends to ameliorate any noise from the sensor. The reason it can't work in 4K is that 4K uses most of the sensor's area so there is no scope for cropping.

Digital Zoom

This is no more effective in video than it is in stills. If you lack a telephoto lens you might want to use it but the quality loss renders it less than useful.

Flkr Decrease

This doesn't work when the mode dial is set to Creative Moviebut does when you press the red movie button. If your video is showing flicker or striping, as you get when videoing a TV screen for example, Flkr Decreaseallows you to choose a set shutter speed from 1/50th to 1/120th to minimize it. You'll have to find the best speed by trial and error.

Silent Operation

When this is set ONa small menu opens on the right of the monitor. If you touch it actuates a menu on screen so that you can change camera settings on the fly via touch icons rather than buttons which may make clicking sounds, for example. It is a very convenient way to change video settings on the fly regardless of any noise advantage.

Mic Level Disp.

Shows the Mic Leveldisplay on screen. Handy when shooting bands, for example, to make sure you are not getting distortion because the sound is too loud. As a rule of thumb, the meter should only momentarily flash red on the very loudest peak sounds. I set it to peak just short of red for safety's sake since it is impossible to remove distortion but practical to increase volume in audio software. In some respects, getting good audio is a more exacting task than good video.

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Mic Level Adj.

Adjust the recording level for loud or soft sounds. You have four levels available with the default level 3 being a good starting point.

Wind Noise Canceller

I leave this OFFfor indoor shoots and STANDARDfor outdoor shoots without any unwanted effects. The threshold from STANDARDTo HIGHis hard to fix but if I can hear wind noise in my ears, I switch.

Custom Menu

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Cust. Set Mem.

C1-C2-C3(1-3)

Saves your current settings to memory for instant recall and use. There are 3 main custom settings and 2 further ones selectable under C3. With all the normal Mode Dialsettings, A, S, Petc, the camera remembers its settings as they are when you switch off. When you switch on again the settings are as they were left. So, if you were set to A(aperture priority), ISO400, spot metering mode and then switch off, that is how the camera will be set when you switch it back on. Now set ISOto 200, switch off and back on. Ais now set to spot metering mode, ISO 200. It remembers the setting last used. With Cust.Set Mem., if you set the camera to A, spot metering mode, ISO400 and then record that setting to C1, every time you set the camera to C1, it will return to those settings. If you now alter the ISOto 200 and switch the camera off, on switching back on, it will return to its C1setting, ie A, spot metering mode - ISO400.
So, if you have 3 main types of pictures that you take, sports, still life and walk-about, you set the camera to your favoured settings for those subjects. Lets say, Shutter Priority, ISO800 for sports/ Aperture Priority, ISO200 for still life/ P(Program) with AutoISO for walk-about. Record those to C1, C2and C3respectively. Now, go walk-about, so set the camera to C3. When you've finished, go home and set up a still life. Set the camera to C2and shoot away knowing you camera is set up perfectly to your taste. Now, you go and shoot some sports. You set CI, your sports setting. It's darker than usual so you up the ISOto 3200. After that you do all sorts of photography. A month later, the next time you go and shoot some sports, it's better, more normal weather. You're late for the event. No sweat. Set C1again and all your favoured settings are there, no nasty surprises like finding you had forgotten to re-set the ISOafter finishing the last sports session. Practically everything is recordable to custom memory. It is one of the treasures of digital cameras.
Notes: In a Custom setting set to Amode, the aperture set is saved and when you switch on will be restored. In SMode the shutter speed set is saved. In Mmode the shutter speed and aperture are saved (and will likely need adjusting, of course) . In a Custom mode set to P, it opens with the exposure set for the current lighting. The basic building block of a Custom setting is the Exposure Mode, M, S, A, Por Creative Movie. Therefore the best way to set a mode is not in the C setting itself but in the mode which you wish to employ. Set the camera to, say Aand go through the menus setting up as you wish. Then go to Cust.Set Memand save it. The state of the monitor is saved to Custom settings, so if when you save a setting, the monitor was set to the Info page, that Custom setting will always open with the Info page. I set the monitor to minimum clutter and save it that way. If you want to set Cinelike Dor Cinelike Vto a movie setting, it is not available in the Custommode. You must set it in Creative Moviemode on the dial and then save it to your Customsetting.

Silent Mode

This could have been called stealth mode! It switches to the electronic shutter, turns off any shutter sound set, switches off the flash and system beeps etc. The only sound is the soft rustle of the aperture blades. It can be set to a Fnbutton and can be memorized in Custommodes. A very handy function for any situation where photography might be considered obtrusive or a lightly sleeping baby might be easily woken up! It differs from Electronic Shutterin that all signs and sounds of camera operation are suppressed. With the Electronic Shutter you can attenuate the shutter sound but beeps and any flashing lights continue to operate. The only indications of the presence of the camera are the Onlight, plus the Self Timerindicator and Wi-Fiblue indicator light if in use.

AF/AE Lock

On the extreme top right rear of the camera body is the AF/ AE Lock. This controls what happens when you press it.

AE Lock

Whatever the exposure is at the moment you press the Lock button it is held wherever you point the camera. The camera continues to focus where you point it.

AF Lock

The camera focuses where it is pointed and locks focus there. No matter where you point it the focus will not alter. The exposure, however, continues to change in reaction to the scene in front of it.

AF/AE Lock

The focus and exposure are set and locked to whatever they are when you press the button. You could point the camera at the sky and press the button. If you then pointed the camera at your foot in the shadow of a tree, it would remain focused at infinity and exposing for the sky

AF-ON

When you press the button, the camera focuses. That's it. Nothing is held.

AF/AE Lock Hold

Sets the modus operandi of the AF/ AE Lock Button.

On

After you press the button, the focus/ exposure/ focus and exposure/ remain fixed until you press the button again.

OFF

You must press and hold down the button to keep the settings fixed. As soon as you release it, the camera will refocus and reset the exposure and operate as normal.

Shutter AF

Controls whether a half press of the shutter release causes the camera to focus.

On

When you press the shutter release half way, the camera will focus.

Off

The shutter release simply fires the shutter.

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Half Press Release

Controls the action of the shutter release button.

Off

The shutter release has a two stage action, rather like the trigger of a gun. Press the release and there is a detente half way. Press a bit harder and the shutter fires. If you have Shutter AFset ONthen Half Press Releasegives you a definite 'switch' feeling for focusing at the detente.

On

The shutter fires in one smooth action. It has the feel of a hair trigger about it. Great for sports and action, it makes the camera feel very responsive. It can feel a bit uncertain where focusing is concerned, though. However, set the AF/AE Lockto AF-ONand Shutter AFto OFFand the focusing to AFCand you have a beautifully responsive sports camera. Keep the focus following by keeping the AF/AE Lockbutton pushed but when someone steps in front of your let it go. Instead of focusing on them, it remains focused on your subject. When the view clears, press the button and focus continues from where it left off. Or, if the action moves to what looks like being goal, let the focus set on the 'keeper and let go of the button. Now, whoever runs between you and the 'keeper, as soon as the view clears, you can shoot knowing where your focus is.

Quick AF

ON when your camera is being held steady it assumes you will take a picture and adjusts focus so that when you do press the shutter it should be a bit quicker. It's a bit haphazard because if you have the camera in your hand by your side it will focus on whatever is next to you. It can be an aid to fast target acquisition but as often as not it gives the camera more focusing work to do.

Eye Sensor AF

ON

When you put your eye to the viewfinder the camera focuses. Can save time.

Pinpoint AF Time

If You have the AF Mode set to Pinpoint (see icon above left), on half pressing the shutter release a magnified view of the focus area appears in the viewfinder for a set period before the viewfinder reverts to its normal view. This period can be Short, Mid, or Long.

Pinpoint AF Display

FULL

if you have the GX8 set to Pinpoint AFyou can focus on a very precise area. To aid you, the focusing area is magnified. FULLfills the screen with the magnified image, PIP(Picture In Picture) opens a window in the center of the screen with the image magnified. Of the two, FULLgives the greater magnification but PIPlets you observe the rest of the image while you focus.

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AF Assist Lamp

ON, in low light where the camera might have difficulty establishing focus a surprisingly bright red light comes on just long enough for the camera to lock on. Although the GX8 will focus in absurdly low light, it does have its limits.

Direct Focus Area

Controls the behaviour of the rear screen monitor focusing area when moving it about the screen.

OFF

When you touch the screen, the focus square appears. To alter its position and thus where the camera focuses, you keep your finger on the screen and drag the square around. Touch Screenmust be set ONfor this to work.

ON

The square appears when you press the Cursor Buttons(the four buttons around the Menu Buttonrear right on the camera back). To move it about the screen just use the Cursor Buttons. Of course, while Direct Focus Areais On, the buttons cannot be used for their normal functions. Note also that you must have Touch Screenset ON. You can return the AF Areabox to the default centre position at any time it is highlighted in yellow by pressing the Disp.button.

Focus/Release Priority

Which is more important to you? That you can always take a picture, even if it might be fuzzy? Or do you feel it isn't worth taking if it is going to be out of focus? Here's where you express your priority.

Focus

If the picture will be out of focus, the camera will not release the shutter

Release

The camera will release the shutter when you push the button regardless of focus being achieved. Under normal conditions and with native lenses the GX8 focuses so fast so that it is hard to tell the difference between these settings.

AF+MF

Normally when auto-focusing, the lens focusing ring is inactive. With this enabled, after focus is established, while the shutter is half depressed or the focus lock is on you can fine tune it with the focusing ring .

Off

When you press the AF/AE Lockbutton or focus by half pushing the shutter release, focus is set and turning the focusing ring on the lens has no effect.

On

When you press the AF/AE Lockbutton or focus by half pushing the shutter release, you can fine tune the focus manually by turning the focusing ring while half-pushing the shutter release.. This can be handy for example, when you are trying to photograph a bee flitting from flower to flower. Let the camera establish focus on the flower, then follow the intricate movements of the animal manually.

MF Assist

When you have set the focusing to manual or AF+MFabove) set to on - for macro work, for example, this will sense when you are turning the lens focus ring and magnify a relevant section of the screen. When you stop focusing the screen reverts to normal.

When you turn the focusing ring on the lens or press the left Cursor Button on the back of the camera, the focusing area will enlarge and magnify the target.

Focusing area will enlarge only when you turn the Focus Ring on the lens.

Focusing area will enlarge only when you press the left Cursor Button on the back of the camera
OFF
You focus on the normal size image only, no enlargement.

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MF Assist Display

controls how you view the MF Assist.

Full

The magnified focusing view is enlarged to the full screen

PIP

PictureInPicture - the magnified focusing view is shown in a window. In either case, the display reverts to normal with a half press on the shutter button.

MF Guide

ON

iindicator appears when you turn the lens focusing ring and indicates which way to turn the focus ring. From the photographers point of view, turning the ring clockwise focuses closer, anti-clockwise towards infinity (this is by default. The direction can be reversed in Dial Setin the Custommenu). MFT lenses are mostly 'focus by wire', that is the focusing ring has no physical connection to move the lens elements back and forth so the ring has no near or infinity stop points. This can be a little off putting. I find the main use of the MF Guideis to establish when the lens has reached its nearest focus point and is thus rendering small objects at the largest size possible in the frame. For landscape, it will establish unequivocally when the lens is focused at infinity.

OFF

Peaking

is a focusing aid that works with manual focus. It gives a graphic representation of which areas of your picture are sharply focused by highlighting the edges. It comes into its own in poor lighting when judging focus by eye is difficult and is especially good for those with poor eyesight.

Set brings up 2 parameters.

Detect Level

Highor Lowdetermines the threshold for sharpness. High is more precise for more critical focusing. If you are shooting at wide apertures or with long lenses, this is the one to use.

Low

is less critical, good for normal lenses and where the lens is stopped down a bit. You may prefer Peakingto the magnified portion of screen used for focusing when MF Assistis switched on. You can use both if you wish. I find Peakingideal for shooting manual focus video in my dimly lit blues club, for example but magnification better for macro. Setlets you set the colours for the two levels of peaking. I find blue the most effective.

Histogram

This controls whether you see the Histogramdisplay when you cycle through the screens via the DISP.button on the camera back.

Guide Line

controls whether the screen superimposes Guide Lines to aid composition or subject placement. If set to you can move the lines around the screen using the Cursor Buttons.

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Center Marker

A cross is shown in the centre of the screen. Convenient for re-aligning a scene which you are shooting over the course of time or centring a zoom - line the marker with the subject's eye, say, keep the marker on the eye and zoom in. One of those little additions that is more use than you thought it would be.

Highlight

When viewing/ reviewing your picture, any over-exposed light areas, ie areas where there will be no detail, flash black and white.

Zebra Pattern

A pattern of diagonal lines indicates saturated highlight areas of your picture which will contain no detail. Over-exposed white areas in a picture or video look particularly unpleasant and harsh. The Zebra Patternshows you where this problem is occurring (Zebra1) or about to (Zebra2)

Set

Allows you to set the zebras to occur at your chosen levels, from 50% to 105% in each case. The defaults of 100% (saturated) and 80% (close to saturation) are well chosen. The remedy is to apply minus exposure compensation. This is where the Histogramis useful. You try to adjust the exposure so that the hill like shape in the Histogram graph does not exceed the borders. In some cases a scene will simply have more contrast than the camera can handle and the decision over what to do can be made only by your own eyes.

Monochrome Live View

shows the monitor and EVF in black and white. It doesn't affect the image you record which will still be colour. Under some circumstances, manual focusing is facilitated by a mono view. Plus, for anyone shooting black and white for effect, this will be a quite handy preview.

Constant Preview

This works only in manual (M) exposure mode.

On

What you see is what you get. You can see on screen exactly how your picture will look.

Off

The camera alters the screen image to a normal level of brightness. If you are over-exposing an image for artistic effect, ONshows you how the picture will look at your chosen exposure setting. However, it may be impossible to frame the picture accurately if it very light or dark. In that case, set to OFFand compose, then to ONto view the effect.

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Expo. Meter

controls whether you see a graphic of an exposure meter when you turn the front or rear exposure dials. If you set it ONbut don't see it when you change exposure parameters, press the Disp.button until it appears on the detailed information display. It lingers for a few second after changing settings.

On

You see it

Off

You don't see it You have a numeric display of your current exposure display on screen whether you have the graphic on or not.

LVF Disp. Style

This controls where the main shooting information is displayed in the viewfinder. You can either have the info displayed in a black bands outside of the scene or superimposed on the of the scene itself.

Displayed in a black band outside of the viewing area. This setting gives a smaller image but keeps the view uncluttered.

Displayed on scene itself. This setting maximizes the image area but the info is superimposed on the screen. Note: Though the GX8's EVFis eminently viewable, if you wear glasses and have difficulty seeing the full width of the screen, it is worth seeing if the smaller image setting alleviates the problem.

Monitor Disp. Style

This controls where camera information and settings are displayed on the rear screen. You can either have the info displayed in a black band top and bottom of the scene or superimposed at the top and bottom of the scene itself.

Displayed in a black band outside of the viewing area

Displayed on scene itself

Monitor Info. Disp

This controls whether or not you see the Recording Informationscreen when you cycle through the screens by pressing the DISP.button on the rear of the camera.

On

The Recording Information screen is inserted into the sequence

Off

It is not inserted into the sequence The Recording Information screen is handy because it gives you a summary of all the main settings in use. Not only that, but the display can be live so if you touch the screen on a particular section it will bring up the relevant parameter for alteration. For example, touch the ISOsector and the ISOsetting control will appear. The screen after the Info screen is blank, the monitor turned off. This can save battery life since when you take your eye away from the LVF, the monitor will not turn on. A push of the Disp.button on the rear of the camera actuates it again.

REC Area

This switches between the your Aspect Ratiosetting of stills and video. Thus, if you are using 4:3for stills and 16:9for video, it will switch between them. The difference between toggling this and just switching between the two Aspect Ratiosin the Recmenu is that if you have the Ex.Tele Conv.switched on Rec Areareflects the narrower angle recorded by the video compared to the stills. It should be called Rec View, really.

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Remaining Disp.

On the bottom right of the screens is a figure showing either the number of pictures you will be able to take at your present stills setting or the available time left for recording video on your video current setting This sets which is displayed.

Auto Review

This controls whether and for how long the picture you have just taken appears on the monitor or in the viewfinder for inspection before reverting to the live view. If you have Auto Reviewset to 4 seconds but press the release button after 2 seconds the camera will still take the new picture. In other words, Auto Reviewdoes not freeze camera operation. I set it to off for out and about shooting, on when I am working on a tripod. You can always inspect your images by pressing the Playbackbutton on the left rear of the camera, of course.

Playback Operation Priority

sets what happens if you press the left arrow or delete button while the recorded image is being Auto Reviewed.

ON

the buttons behave as if the camera was in Playbackmode. So, press the left cursor button, for example and you can delete the image.

OFF

the buttons behave as if the camera was in Recmode. Press the left cursor button and AF Mode appears.

Fn Button Set

There are 13 programmable function buttons available on the GX8, physical ones the back of the camera and 5 which you can access via a tab on the monitor. The graphic shows their present settings and allows you to change them. There are an astonishing array of possibilities here but the default settings are well chosen and will suit many photographers without change. My advice is to leave these at their defaults until you find that there is a setting that you are constantly going to the menu to alter. Set that to a rarely used button. Certainly the Quick Menuis very handy on Fn2, as marked on the body. With so much choice, I think it is better to let the camera configuration change organically, rather than by experimentation. Here is my personal choice for the body buttons - I don't use the monitor tabs much as I don't like a cluttered screen. Fn1Metering Mode/ Fn2Q Menu/ Fn3Touch Screen/ Fn4AFS/AFF/ Fn5Focus Area set/ Fn6LVF/MON/ Fn7Level Gauge.
I like quick access to Metering Modebecause I often use a spot reading as a guide to how much exposure compensation I should apply: to the Touch Screenbecause I move the focus point accidentally sometimes and temporarily disabling the Touch Screenprevents it: to the Focus Area Setso that I can move the focus point with the Cursorbuttons when Touch Screenis disabled: to LVF/MONbecause switching off the monitor when shooting at eye level saves battery power: to AFS/AFFbecause which to use is often a momentary decision more under my subject's control than mine: to Level Gaugefor a quick check to avoid having to step through the monitor options with the Disp.button.

Q. Menu

This allows you to choose between a PRESETor CUSTOMversion of the Quick Menuaccessed by pressing Fn2by default. As with the Fnbuttons, there is a bewildering array of choices here. Probably best to go with the PRESETat first and amend to taste over the course of time as you learn to which parameters you need quick access. Because so many Fnbuttons are available for programming, I only use the first page of the Quick Menuand customize it to Quality, Stabilizer, Ex.Tele Conv, Peakingand 4K Photo.

Dial Set.

Assign Dial (F/SS)

means front dial

means rear dial
In Aand Smodes, both dials alter aperture or shutter speed respectively. In Pmode both dials shift the combined shutter speed and aperture. This setting really only applies to Manual mode and allows you to choose which dial controls which parameter.

Rotation (F/SS)

sets your preferred direction of rotation to change the parameters. You could either set the direction to match a previous camera that you have become used to or to the direction that feels most intuitive.

Exp Comp Setup

If the +3 or-3 stops of exposure compensation available on the GX8's dial are not enough for you, you can set the front or rear dial to take over where it leaves off, extending the compensation to +5 or -5 stops. It does nothing until you have used up all the compensation on the top dial. Once set to +3 or -3, turn the front or rear dial to take the compensation the extra 2 stops. Until you have moved the compensation dial to -3 or +3 both front and rear dial operate as normal.

OFF

Dial Operation Switch Setup

The button in the centre of the rear dial is a particularly easy one to use and remember. By default it operates as a switch which alters the assignments of the front and rear dials. For example, of you are in Aperture priority mode, both dial wills alter the aperture. If you set the front dial to ISOand the rear to WhiteBalance, here when you press the button it switches the operation of the dials to those two parameters. Having adjusted WBor ISOto your satisfaction, press the button again to go back to changing the aperture. Slightly confusing is that in Fn Button Setthis switch is labelled Fn13and can be set to any function there. I have set it in Fn Button Setto set electronic/ mechanical shutter so this menu item is redundant. If you have changed it to a set function as I have and want to revert to switch operation, go to Fn Button SetF13 and on page 13 you will find Restore to Default.

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Video Button

enables or disables the red dotted Video Recordbutton on the top of the camera. The beauty of this button is that you can press it at any time and video starts shooting at your default settings immediately. Otherwise you have to set Creative Videoon the mode dial and press the shutter button. The downside is that the Video Recordbutton can be pressed accidentally. The purpose of this item is to prevent that. A side effect of disabling is that if you have the Snap Moviefacility engaged you can no longer grab an instant video snatch while shooting stills.

Power Zoom Lens

If you have an electrically operated zoom lens fitted, this menu is available

Disp Focal length

When you operate the zoom lever on the lens, a graphical display of the focal length set is shown on screen

Step Zoom

Set to On, nudge the zoom lever and instead of sliding through all the zoom range, the camera will stop at predetermined focal lengths. With the 14-42 power zoom, for example, this is 14-18-25-35-42mm. This can feel quicker and more definite in operation

Zoom Resume

When you switch off the camera, by default the zoom will set itself to its minimum setting when switched back on. Set to Onthe lens will resume at the focal length setting when you switched it off.

Zoom Speed

This controls the speed of zooming through the focal length range, Low, Medium or High.

Zoom Ring

You will probably never see this. It only appears for lenses with both a zoom lever, as found on Panasonic's power zoom lenses and a focusing ring as well. If you have such a lens, set this to off to disable the zoom ring. It can be set separately for Video and Photo

Eye Sensor

You can either have the camera sense when you are using the viewfinder or monitor and set the correct one automatically or switch between them manually.

Sensitivity

How easily it switches from one to the other. Experience will tell you which is best for you but I find LOWminimizes mistaken switching when using the swivel monitor and your sleeve goes near the EVF mounted sensor. It can be very irritating.

LVF/MON Auto

sets the switching to automatic. Note that if you do use the LVFswitch beside the viewfinder it automatically resets LVF/MON Autoto manual and stays that way until you re-enable it here..

Touch Settings

Lots of useful settings here to do with the monitor here.

Touch Screen

the touch screen does not function. You must operate the camera via buttons and dials. Given the superb screen sensitivity and functionality, switching this off partially cripples the GX8. Note that it is handy to set this to a Fnbutton so that if you find you are unintentionally moving the focus area you can temporarily disable it. Keep in mind that of have accidentally moved the area, a touch on screen to bring up the yellow highlighted focus area box and a quick tap on the Disp.button will restore it to centre screen.

Touch Tab

Off, the display icons for Fn Buttons 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12, power zooming and touch screen exposure etc on the right of the screen are disabled. On, touch the tab and they all appear.

Touch AF

AF

when you touch an area of the monitor the camera will focus there.

AF+AE

When you touch an area of the monitor the camera will both focus there and optimise the exposure for that spot. Focusing by touching the screen is a major attraction of the camera. Switching it off partially cripples it.

Touch Pad AF

When your eye is to the viewfinder you can still set the focus area by touching the (now blank) monitor screen. This is a major aid. If you photograph a flotilla of ducks coming towards you, you may want to pick out the one to set focus on. Using this, without taking your eye from the EVF you can intuitively slide the focus area to exactly where you want it.

EXACT

touch the screen and focus is set at that position.

OFFSET

touch the screen and drag focus to where you want it. I find Offsetthe more intuitive

OFF

Why?

Touch Scroll

when in Playback mode reviewing pictures, you can scroll through them using the left and right cursor keys. This dictates how fast they scroll. Apparently.

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Menu Guide

Controls what happens when you turn the Mode Dial to from another setting.

ON

the Creative Controlmenu immediately appears opened up on the screen for you to make your selection

OFF

the Creative Controlicon appears on screen but does not open. Tap to open it.

Shoot w/o Lens

Controls whether the shutter will fire if no lens or a non-native M43 lens without electronic contacts is fitted.

ON

The shutter will fire regardless of whether a lens is fitted or not. This is necessary because non native M43 lenses from many other makers, for example Leica, Canon, Nikon or Sigmas can be fitted to the camera via an adaptor. As these do not have the electrical contacts necessary to communicate with the camera, it does not know if there is a lens fitted. This tells it to fire regardless. It is necessary also for fitting telescopes or scientific lenses to the GX8 - and useful for pinhole photography!

OFF

If no lens is fitted to the camera the shutter will not fire and a warning appears on screen.

Setup Menu

Page 1

Clock Set

Self explanatory.

Style

You have the usual choice of display modes, 12/24hr and European or American date standards.

World Time

Set up the camera for when you are travelling

Destination

Set your home location time zone.

Home

Set your home location time zone.

Travel Date

taking your shiny new GX8 on holiday? You can set your travel and return dates in advance and the GX8 will apply them to your EXIF info without further intervention. Whether the airline will match your camera's efficiency is another matter.

Travel Setup

Set when you are leaving and when you are returning

Location

Enter the name of the place where you are going. The camera will time stamp your pictures automatically to your destination time and place and revert back automatically on the return date you have set.

Wi-Fi

Initially, this turns on the Wi-Fifunction and the blue indicator light on the back right of the camera glows. (Note that Wi-Fi connections eat the battery!) Two sub menu options come up, Wi-Fi Functionand Wi-Fi Setup. The actual parameters of these connections will depend on your particular setup and so are beyond the scope of this book, of course.

Wi=Fi Function

New Connection

When you see a choice between Networkand Direct, Direct refers to a device that has its own Wi-Fi, as an iPad does, for example. If your PC is connected to your router by a cable for Internet access, it will not have Wi-Fi and is a network device. You would connect to this via the Network, ie through your router

Remote Shooting & View

This enables quite comprehensive remote control of your GX8. You will need to install the Panasonic Image App on your tablet or smartphone (iOS and Android). It is a brilliant facility to have, easy to set up and intuitive to use. Go to the Wi-Fi networks section of your phone or tablet and you will see GX8##### listed there. Touch it and it will connect. If you really feel the need to protect your connection, you can set a Wi-Fi Passwordin Wi-Fi Setupbut you will have to enter it every time you connect. After doing this once, this connection will be available in Select a destination from historyfrom where it can be registered as a Favouriteand thereafter accomplished with one touch.

Playback on TV

With smart televisions you can display your pictures direct from the camera. Depending on the TV, you can connect either direct or via your Wi-Fi router.

Send Images While Recording

Immediately after taking a picture it is automatically copied to your chosen destination. The original is left on your SD card. For most phones and tablets, extra software is required for a direct connection so this facility is mostly useful for connection to a desktop PC. If you want to transfer files from the GX8 to the smartphone or tablet, the easiest way is via the Image App.

PC

For connection to a desktop Windows PC, there can be some glitches to do with user names and accounts. Here's how to sort them out at the cost of a little security. If your router has a secure password (as it should have) and the firewall is on (as it should be), however, there's no risk from users outside of your control.
If you are already set up for sharing and know your account passwords and so on, skip this section below
======================================================================================== Firstly. The desktop folder to which you wish to send your pictures must have Sharingenabled. If it hasn't, here's how.
1. Go to the folder you wish to upload to, right click and choose Properties.
2. Click the Sharingtab and click Share. A dialog appears Choose people to share with. Open the drop down menu beside Addand select Everyone. If Everyoneis not listed, type it in exactly and click Add. It appears in the box. Click the Permission Leveland set Read/Write. Now click Shareat the foot of the page. You will see a dialog confirming the folder is shared. Click Done
3. Click Advanced Sharing. Click Permissionsand select EveryoneClick all of the Allow tick boxes and Applyand OK. The folder is now shared.
Now go to the Control Panel->Network and Sharing Centre-> Change advanced sharing settingsand scroll down to Password Protected Sharing. Turn it off.
========================================================================================= Now back on the GX8, when you touch PC, pick the Networkoption. The easiest way to get your connection is via WPS (Push Button). When the dialog 'Use button on wps device' comes up, touch it and you are given 2 minutes in which to press the WPS button on your router. From there follow the on screen instructions.
Equally easy (and I think more reliable) is From List. Just pick out your Networkname (SSID, technically) and enter your router's security pass phrase. You only have to do this once. You will be asked to Select a device to connect to. Select your desktop computer and your folder will appear along with any other shared folders on your machine. Select the one you want and a dialog comes up. Set as required and you are away. This sounds complicated but once it is done it can be made a Favouriteand will all happen automatically with one press thereafter.

Cloud Sync. Service

Settings here depend on your service rather than the camera.

Web service

Settings here depend on your service rather than the camera.

AV Device

This is the same as connecting to a PC but after you have selected your AV Device (Network Attached Storage, for example) it will depend on the device.

Send Images Stored in the Camera

This exactly the same as Send Images While Recordingto set up but instead of sending images as you go without intervention, you will be taken to Playbackmode and pick the images to send. Note that if you have a lot of RAWimages to transfer, it will be quicker to connect the GX8 to your computer via the USB cable or put the CD card in your computer's reader.

Select a destination from History

Once you have used a Wi-Fi connection, it is remembered here and touching its name will re-use it. For frequently used connections such as to your smartphone or PC, touch Register To Favoriteand you will be prompted to enter a name for the connection. This setup can in future be used by simply touching it in Select a destination from Favorite.

Select a destination from Favorite

Touch the name to select the desired Favorite. You can edit the name, remove it or get information on your Favorite here.

Wi-Fi Setup

Wi-Fi Password

Normally, you would open your smartphone's Wi-Fi settings and select the camera from there to connect. With this set ONyou will be asked for the password you set before the connection is opened.

Lumix Club

You can transfer images to social media sites and other web services via Lumix Club. Touch Set Login IDand you will be given a Login IDnumber. Touch Passwordto set a password of your choice. Now go the Lumix Clubweb site and enter these. You will be presented with several options, among them to transfer images directly to Facebook and other social media sites.

PC Connection

Workgroup

By default on Windows this is WORKGROUP. If you go to Control Panel -> System you will see the Workgroup name there. If it is different, set it here.

Device Name

When you see your GX8 listed in the available Wi-Fi networks on your smartphone or tablet it will be GX8 followed by a series of numbers. You can set any name you like here and that will be the one you see listed. Technically this is the camera's SSID.

NFC Operation

set this ONand make sure NFCis set on on your smartphone too. Now run the Image AppTouch the little NFClogo on the camera's handgrip to your phone and a connection will be made without further ado. NFC connections can be a bit temperamental. I prefer to leave the Fn8tab set to Wi-Fiand select the GX8 from the phone/tab's Wi-Finetwork list.

Touch Sharing

If you are in Playbackmode and make an NFCconnection (see previous) you can send that image to the phone/tab. Needlessly complicated as far as I can see. If you have the Image Appopen, use that.

Wi-Fi Function Lock

enables you to set a password that must be entered before Wi-Fi will operate.

Network Address

For information only. Displays the Media Access Control (MAC) address of the camera. This is a unique hardware identifier for the device. The IP address is assigned by the device to which it is connected. There's no use for these that I know.

Beep

Beep Volume

This controls the beep volume of all occasions when the GX8 beeps, when focus is obtained, for example. Two levels of loudness and Off.

E-Shutter Vol

The E-Shutteris almost silent in operation. While that is good in many situations, it can be hard to know when it has fired. Here you set volume for the artificial click sound you favour. Two levels of loudness and Off

E-Shutter Tone

Three tones from dry to wheezy. Enjoy!

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Live View Mode

This only affect the rear monitor, not the EVF which always refreshes at 60fps. The slower 30fpscan save a bit on battery power but at the expense of some of the smoothness of the view of moving subjects. I set this to 30fpssince I use the EVF for picture taking and the monitor mainly for reviewing pictures.

Monitor Display/ Viewfinder

This can adjust Brightness, Contrastand Saturation, Red Tintand Blue Tintof the monitor and viewfinder. Note: There is wizardry afoot here! If you view the menu though the EVF, you will see Viewfinder Display. If you view the menu on the monitor, you will see Monitor Display. The alterations you make will be stored and applied to the EVF or Monitor respectively. If you want to apply the same settings to both EVF and Monitor, therefore, you would need to change them separately, once viewing through the EVF and again for the Monitor. I find the default neutral settings to my taste and leave this alone.

Monitor Luminance

sets the brightness of the monitor with reference to the ambient light.

Brighter than standard.

Darker than standard.

Economy

Sleep Mode

Set this to the minimum that doesn't annoy you. Note that if you are using a C[1-5]setting and have altered it, when you wake the camera up by half pressing the shutter release it will have reverted to the Customsetting. So, if you are using a Customsetting that is set to 4:3 Aspect Ratiobut you have altered it to 16:9in the Aspect Ratiomenu and the camera goes into Sleepmode, when you wake it, it will have reverted to 4:3.

Auto LVF/Monitor Off

Again, set this to the minimum that doesn't annoy you. The EVF and monitor are big consumers of battery energy so the shorter this setting the better. Touch any button or the monitor to resume normal viewing. This does not reset the Customsetting. Using the previous example, if it went off in 16:9, it will resume in 16:9

USB Mode

Sets the function of the USB port.

Select on connection

This asks you which connection you want, USBor Pictbridge

PC

Appears as an external drive when connected to a PC or Mac. You can drag and drop files to your PC but you cannot delete the files from the camera when you are finished. Deletion must be done in camera.

Pictbridge(PTP)

Set to this if you want to connect to a Pictbridgeprinter to print directly from the camera.

Remote Control(PTP)

If you install Promote Systemssoftware, you can control (tether) the GX8 from your desktop. This is the setting to use for that.

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TV Connection

Video Out

Palfor Europe NTSCfor USA

TV Aspect

4:3or 16:9If you are using a GX8, you are unlikely to still be using a 4:3 TV!

HDMI Mode (Play)

When connecting to your TV with the HDMI cable, sets the output resolution compatible with your TV. You may need to look at the manual for your TV if you have a problem with this. Normally, set to Autoand the TV will tell the GX8 its output resolution without your intervention

HDMI Info Display (Rec)

If you are recording a video while monitoring via an HDMI cable connected to a TV, ONwill display the information displayed on the GX8 monitor. OFFgives you a clean, image only display.

Menu Resume

ON

When you press the Menu/Setbutton, the menu opens on the menu setting you last used.

OFF

When you press the Menu/Setbutton, the menu always opens on the Rec Menu.

Menu Background

If the default Menu Backgroundcolor offends your artistic sensibilities, you can change it here.

Menu Information

ON

When you access the Menu a brief description of what the setting does appears on the top line of the display

OFF

The Menu Name, Rec, Setup, etc appears on the top line of the display

Language

Select the language you prefer for your Menus.

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Version Disp

Panasonic and Olympus update the firmware, the code built in to their lenses and cameras, from time to time to take into account user requests, more efficient use of the hardware capabilities and so on. Body Firmwareand Lens Firmwareversions are displayed. If you visit the relevant maker's web site, you will be able to see if there is a more recent version of the firmware available. You should keep firmware up to date to get the best from your equipment. You can update Olympus lens firmware on a Panasonic body and Panasonic lens firmware on an Olympus body.

Self Timer Auto Off

Who hasn't set the Self Timeron, taken the pix, turned off and put the camera away. Then turned it on to take a quick pic....and the beeper goes...and you missed the pic. Never again. Set this to on and when you turn off the camera, it cancels the Self Timer setting. Sometimes little things mean a lot.

No.Reset

This resets the folder and/or filename to their start values when the camera was new. It takes 2 steps
Step 1 - format the card in the camera (see Setup Menu,Page 5).
Step 2 - press No.Reset You can choose which or both to reset. It usually makes sense to reset both.
Note that No. Resetdoes NOT work on its own. It must be used right after formatting the card, otherwise it does nothing!
Here's how the filing system operates: The folder used to store your first picture on the SD card of your new GX8 will be 100_PANA. The first picture you take will be stored in that folder with the filename P1000001.JPG. The first three figures after the P reflect the folder name - in this 100. The last three figures, in this case 001, are the number of the picture. Each folder can store 999 pictures. The filename of that last picture will be P1000999.JPG. A new folder is then made, 101_Pana and the first picture in it will be P1010001.JPG. At P1010999.JPG the next folder will be made 102_PANA and the first picture in that will be P1020001.JPG. And so on through to folder 999_PANA. Whether you delete files on the card or format the card the camera will follow the sequence above. Formatting the card or deleting the files does not reset the numbering system. Panasonic recommend resetting the file system before it reaches 999_PANA

Reset

Resets the RecMenu items to their default settings, undoing any changes you have made. Careful! You are also asked whether you wish to reset the Setupand Custommenu items. Again, careful! The main use for this would be to set the camera back to factory settings if you were selling it.

Reset Wi-Fi Settings

Resets all the Wi-Fi settings to their factory defaults. It can take a long time to set up all your Wi-Fi parameters. This wipes them all. Careful! I found this useful when I had made such a dogs breakfast of my Wi-Fi parameters that I had thoroughly confused myself. Just starting over sometimes clears the mind wonderfully.

Page 5

Pixel Refresh

For use If you notice bright (stuck) pixels on your images in the same place on every picture. It checks and optimises the sensor and processing to attempt to eliminate them. Switch the camera off and back on after the refreshing process.

Sensor Cleaning

Shakes off dust from the sensor. The GX8 automatically shakes dust from the sensor every time you turn it on. If you think there is still dust remaining on the sensor, you can give it an extra clean with this. Dust shows itself as dark spots on your pictures, always in the same location on the frame. To check for a dirty sensor, stop the camera down to f/16 and photograph a plain unmarked surface, a white wall or a sheet of white paper. It should fill the frame. The surface doesn't need to be in focus. When you view the image, if you see dark patches ,that is dirt or dust on the sensor. Strictly speaking, the dirt will not be on the sensor itself but on the protective glass layer in front of it and what you see is actually the shadow of the dirt where it falls on the sensor. You don't see it at wider apertures because the shadow, while still there, is much more diffused. If the Sensor Cleaningdoesn't clear it, you can buy wipes that should do the trick but they must be used with care and many prefer to have the sensor cleaned professionally now and again. The worst blemishes are caused by pollen which sticks to the sensor and can be very difficult to shift. For that reason be careful when changing lenses out in the countryside. Take the rear cap off the new lens so that it is ready to fit straight away and hold the camera face down if you can so that any dust present cannot settle on the sensor. It is good policy to clean the rear glass and mount of your lenses frequently since any dust on them is easily transferred to the camera interior. Dust wasn't such a problem with film cameras because effectively you were using a new sensor for every shot.

Demo Mode

This shows a demonstration image for honing your Post Focusskills. Why?

Format

Wipes all data from the card. Panasonic recommend formatting in the camera rather than your computer. Formatis much like selecting Delete Allwhen in Playbackmode but it can also help to clear any faults on the card. If you find your SD card behaving strangely, Formatis the first remedy to try.

Playback Menu

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Slide Show

Self explanatory. You can choose to set up a show of everything on the camera. Picture, Video, 3D, stuff you have Categorized or set as Favourites. Whichever option you choose Setup appears and you are offered two options Effect Set to Off, you have a normal slide show where your pictures are simply displayed one after the other. The other options give different panning effects and a different choice of music. Setup Duration Sets for how long each picture displays, from 1 to 5 seconds.. Note that this works only when Off is selected under Effect Repeat Show each picture once and then stop or recycle though them continuously. Sound Auto If you have recorded your own sound with the file it will be played. If not, the built in music will be played. Music Panasonic's built in music will be played. It changes depending on the Effect chosen Audio If you added audio to the file it will be played, otherwise no sound. Off Silence as the slides are shown.

Playback Mode

Sets which types of files are displayed, video, stills etc when you press the Playbackbutton on the rear of the camera. Normally best left on All.

Location Logging

If you have set up your GX8 to connect to your mobile phone, you can track your GPS location on your phone and transfer the GPS data to images on the camera.

Add Location Data

Transfers GPS Data from your phone and writes it to the images on the camera.

Delete Location Data

Deletes GPS data previously transferred. It is beyond the scope of this book how to set it all up but I have made a video of the procedure which can be viewed at: http://youtu.be/M0T3G7gemgM

RAW Processing

This allows you to process a RAWfile to JPGin the camera. You can, of course, have the camera record RAW and JPG at the same time but this gives you individual processing capabilities over each RAW file. It covers the most important parameters that RAW editing software does on a computer but with a more limited range of adjustment. To use, scroll to the RAWimage you wish to process and press Setin the bottom right of the monitor. Rotate the selector on the left of the monitor to the parameter you wish to change and press Setagain. Adjust how you wish and press Setto finalize it.
Go to the next parameter and repeat the process until you are satisfied with your picture. You can now scroll to the Setupposition which allows you to undo all your adjustments (Reinstate Adjustments) and start again, set the Color Spaceand Picture Size. When you are done, scroll to Begin Processingand hit Set. You are shown the original RAW and the JPG version you have set up. You are asked if you want to go ahead, press Yes and the JPG is saved.
Tap twice on the screen to magnify the image. When you see Disp.on screen, touch it and the original and processed images are shown together.

Clear Retouch

This allows you to process a RAWfile to JPGin the camera. You can, of course, have the camera record RAWand JPGat the same time but this gives you individual processing capabilities over each RAWfile. It covers the most important parameters that RAWediting software does on a computer but with a more limited range of adjustment. To use, scroll to the RAWimage you wish to process and press Set in the bottom right of the monitor. Rotate the selector on the left of the monitor to the parameter you wish to change and press Set again. Adjust how you wish and press Set to finalize it. Go to the next parameter and repeat the process until you are satisfied with your picture. You can now scroll to the Setupposition which allows you to undo all your adjustments (Reinstate Adjustments) and start again, set the Color Spaceand Picture Size. When you are done, scroll to Begin Processingand hit Set. You are shown the original RAWand the JPGversion you have set up. You are asked if you want to go ahead, press Yesand the JPGis saved. Tap twice on the screen to magnify the image. When you see Disp.on screen, touch it and the original and processed images are shown together.

Page 2

Title Edit

You can add text titles or comments to one or more pictures. It works only with JPGfiles, not RAWor JPG+RAWThe title or comment can be viewed on the Playbackscreen by pressing the DISPbutton. If you have a suitable printer or print shop, this text can be stamped on the picture when it is printed.

Text Stamp

You can add information to your picture(s).It works only with JPGfiles, not RAWor JPG+RAWShooting date (with or without time) Give it a name Set a location Set a travel date Set a title If you have a suitable printer or print shop, this text can be stamped on the picture when it is printed.

Video Divide

This splits a video into two parts. It is not undo-able in camera. Handy for rudimentary editing. In Playbackmode, you select the video you want to divide and the video plays back overlaid with the normal forward/ back/pause controls. Stop it where you want to split it and press the little scissors icon.

Time Lapse Video

After shooting with Time Lapse Shot(RecMenu), you can assemble your frames into an mp4video here.

Rec Quality

lets you choose the quality of your video.

Frame Rate

lets you choose the number of frames per second of your video. Faster is smoother.

Sequence

lets you choose to have your frames running backwards or forwards. More useful than it sounds. If you have a title spelled out in matchsticks, start with them making the static word and then move them about. Play it backwards and you have higgledy piggledy matchsticks forming themselves into a title.

Stop Motion Video

Pictures taken using Stop Motion Animation(RecMenu) can be assembled into an mp4movie here. This is handy if you chose not to make the movie immediately after shooting it or you wish to use the same frames at a different rate or backwards for a separate movie.

Rec Quality

lets you choose the quality of your video.

Frame Rate

lets you choose the number of frames per second of your video. Faster is smoother.

Sequence

lets you choose to have your frames running backwards or forwards.

Page 3

Resize

This works only with files shot as JPG, not RAWor RAW+jpgIf you have shot a picture or pictures at, say Large, press this and you can reduce it to Mediumor Small. You can either save it as a new picture in which case a copy is made and you have both the large and small files or, by answering Noto the 'Save as a new picture?' dialog, overwrite it and retain only the small version. Handy for sending via Wi-Fi.

Cropping

Discard areas of the picture you do not want. Press Setand use the rear thumbwheel to enlarge the image viewing size as required. Yellow crop marks appear on screen. Drag the image around until the part you wish to retain is within the crop marks. Press set and a copy of the cropped area is made as a new file. You can either save it as a new picture in which case a copy is made and you have both the large and small files or, by answering Noto the 'Save as a new picture?' dialog, overwrite it and retain only the small version.

Rotate

Rotates the image in 90 degree increments. Only works if Rotate Disp.(next Menu item) is set to ON. Rotate it to the orientation required with the arrow bars that appear and then press the MENU/setbutton. This will set the viewing orientation in most graphical software on your computer as well.

Rotate Display

Rotates portrait oriented pictures to landscape so that they can be viewed at the same size as landscape pictures on the camera monitor rather than with large black lines either side. This affects viewing on camera only. It does not affect the file or the orientation when viewed on your computer using your graphics software.

Favorite

If you set a picture or pictures as a Favoriteyou can play them back as a slide show, display only Favoritesto show to friends, for example or delete all pictures not marked as Favorites.

Single

Select the picture you want to make a Favoriteand press Set/Cancelor MENU/Setbutton. A star appears beside the picture indicating it is a Favorite. Another press will cancel the Favoritesetting

Multi

Same as single except you select a batch of pictures for marking with the Favoritestar.

Page 4

Print Set

You can set which pictures your compatible printer or printing shop will print.

Single

Select the picture you want to print and press Set. Countappears on screen. Set the number of copies you want printed. Dateappears on the screen. Press this and the date it was taken will be printed on the pictures

Multi

Same as above but you select multiple pictures for printing.

Protect

You can set a picture(s) with Protection Onand it cannot be deleted from your card.

Single

Select the picture you want to protect and press Set/Cancelor the MENU/Setbutton. Onappears below the word Protect on the top left of the screen.

Multi

As above but you select multiple pictures for protection. While Protecthelps prevent accidental deletion, it does NOT protect from deletion by the Formatitem on the SetupMenu. Neither does it protect your file once the SD card is removed from the camera.

Cancel

Removes all protection.

Face Rec Edit

If you have registered face recognition information on someone called 'Rocky' in Face Recogin the Recmenu and Face Recogis set to On, the camera may occasionally may apply this information wrongly. So, if you have registered a person called Rocky and when you view a picture of a young woman in a pretty dress, the GX8 has applied his name and details to her, either the GX8 knows something you do not or it has misapplied the recognition. This option allows you to clear the recognition data from this picture or change it.

Picture Sort

Display images in order of Date and Timetaken or by filename. Date and Timeis the default but of you have images taken on different cameras on the card (not recommended) filenames may be less confusing.

Delete Confirmation

When you want to delete a picture from the SD card, you are always asked to confirm the deletion. This sets the default to Yesor No, saving you a key press if you delete files using the Menu/Setbutton rather than the touch screen - which you may have disabled.

iA Menu

This menu appears in the menu list only when you set the Mode Dial to

Just want to snapshoot? Set to this, raise the flash and the camera takes care of everything. It turns the GX8 into a point and shoot.

Same as before but gives you a little control. You can lighten or darken a scene by rotating the Exposure Compensationfor example. For myself I would only use iAbecause I wanted not to make choices, so iA+is a little redundant. With either iAmode set, if you go to the menu you will see a sub-set of the full memory with many items greyed out. Some of those items, iHandheld Night Shotand iHDRare only available when iAis set.

Quick Menu

This is populated from a selection of the main menu items, all of which have been documented in their respective menus. The Quick Menusimply provides speedy access to these items. The best way to customize it is to see which functions you regularly use which are not accessed by hardware or Fnbuttons and add them on Quick Menu.
I use mainly the first page, from left to right Quality, Stabilizer, Metering Mode, Peakingand 4K Photowith on the second page HDR, Ex. Tele Conv., Guide Line, Picture Settingand Histogram.

My Example Menu

Rec
Photo Style - Standard| Filter Settings - No Effect| Aspect Ratio - 4:3| Picture Size - L20m or| Quality - RAW (or 6 block best quality JPG)| AFS/AFF - AFS| Metering Mode - Multiple| Burst rate - M| 4K PHOTO - 4K Pre-Burst (Loop Off)| Auto Bracket - Step 3-1 Sequence 0/-/+| Self Timer - 2 Seconds| Highlight Shadow - Standard| i.Dynamic - Off| i.Resolution - Off| Post Focus - Off| iHandheld Night Shot - Off| iHDR - Off| HDR - Off| Multi Exp -| Time Lapse Shot - Auto Gain On Overlay On| Stop Motion Animation - To Choice| Panorama Settings - Direction -> Picture Size Standard| Electronic Shutter - On| Shutter Delay - Off| Flash - N/A| Red-Eye Removal - Off| ISO Limit Set - 3200| ISO Increments - 1EV| Extended ISO - Off| Long Shtr NR - On| Shading Comp. - Off| Diffraction Compensation - Off| Ex.Tele Conv - Off| Digital Zoom - Off| Color Space - sRGB| Stabilizer - Standard| Face Recog. - Off| Profile Setup - N/A|
Motion Picture
Photo Style - Standard| Filter Settings - No Effect| Snap Movie - Off| Rec Format - MP4| Rec Quality - FHD 20M 25P PAL/ 30P NTSC| Exposure Mode - M| AFS/AFF - AFS| Picture Mode - (Movie Movie camera icon)| Continuous AF - On| Metering Mode - Multiple| Highlight Shadow - Standard| i.Dynamic - Off| i.Resolution - Off| Diffraction Compensation - Auto| Luminance Level - 0-255| Ex. Tele Conv. - Off| Digital Zoom - Off| Flkr Decrease -| Silent Operation - Off| Mic Level Disp. - On| Mic Level Adj. - Level 3|
Wind Noise Canceller - Standard if outside, Off if not.|
Custom
Cust. Set Mem. - To chpoice| Silent Mode - Off| AF/AE Lock - AF Lock| AF/AE Lock Hold - On| Shutter AF - On| Half Press Release - Off| Quick AF - Off| Eye Sensor AF - On| Pinpoint AF Time - Mid| Pinpoint AF Display - PIP| AF Assist Lamp - On| Direct Focus Area - Off| Focus/Release Priority - Focus| AF+MF - On| MF Assist - Focus| MF Assist Display - PIP| MF Guide - On| Peaking - On| Histogram - Off| Guide Line - Off| Center Marker - Off| Highlight - Off| Zebra Pattern - Off| Monochrome Live View - Off| Constant Preview - On| Expo. Meter - Off| LVF Disp. Style - Display Info within the live view area| Monitor Disp. Style - Display info within the live view area| Monitor Info. Disp - On| Rec Area - Still camera icon| Remaining Disp. - Still camera icon| Auto Review - Off| Fn Button Set - To choice| Q. Menu - Custom| Dial Set. - To Choice| Video Button - On| Power Zoom Lens - N/A| Eye Sensor - Sensitivity Low LVF/MOM Auto| Touch Settings - Screen On/ Tab Off/ AF AF/ Offset| Touch Scroll - H| Menu Guide - Off|
Shoot w/o Lens - On|
Setup
Clock Set - N/A| World Time - N/A| Travel Date - N/A| Wi-Fi - N/A| Beep - Volume Medium/ E-Shutter Medium/ Tone 2| Live View Mode - 60fps| Monitor Display - All Default| Monitor Luminance - Auto| Economy - To Choice| USB Mode - As Required| TV Connection - As Required| Menu Resume - On| Menu Background - Dark Grey| Menu Information - On| Language - A Choix| Version Disp - N/A| Self Timer Auto Off - On| No.Reset - N/A| Reset - N/A| Reset Wi-Fi Settings - N/A| Pixel Refresh - N/A| Sensor Cleaning - N/A| Demo Mode - N/A| Format - N/A|
Playback
Slide Show - N/A| Playback Mode - To Choice| Location Logging - N/A| RAW Processing - N/A| Clear Retouch - N/A| Title Edit - N/A| Text Stamp - N/A| Video Divide - N/A| Time Lapse Video - N/A| Stop Motion Video - N/A| Resize - N/A| Cropping - N/A| Rotate - N/A| Rotate Display - On| Favorite - N/A| Print Set - N/A| Protect - N/A| Face Rec Edit - N/A| Picture Sort - Date/Time| Delete Confirmation - "Yes" First| iA - iA (Not iA+)|