14May Panasonic GH4 weather seal testing

If you’ve been wondering why I’ve been missing from the internet for the past week and half or so, it’s because I was in France and Iceland. I made the decision to travel with only the Panasonic GH4 for the trip so I could shoot some 4k test footage and get a better feel for the camera. I’ll be posting more on that once I get a chance to dig through my footage and take a look at how well the Panasonic GH4 performed. I would have had something posted sooner, but I ended up getting stuck in Iceland a little longer than expected due to the pilot strike. A few extra days in Reykjavik wasn’t horrible, but i’m glad to be home.

While the weather in both countries ended up being pretty decent, I wanted to put the GH4 through the same sort of torcher I would expect my Canon 6d or 5d mark III to go through on a normal trip. Since I didn’t end up running into any rain I figured a waterfall was the next best thing to a rain test and you can’t throw a stick without hitting a waterfall in Iceland.

While I don’t recommend soaking down your Panasonic GH4 while walking behind a waterfall, I went ahead and risked my GH4 and Olympus 12-40mm f2.8 in a 10 minute rain test. Both the Gh4 and Olympus are supposed to be “weather sealed” and while that’s a pretty ambiguous term it should at least mean that the camera and lens can handle a bit of water.

As you can see the GH4 and Olympus 12-40mm f2.8 collected a very reasonable amount of moisture. It took 3 or 4 minutes to dry everything off, but the camera, lens, and flip out screen all held up through the downpour. The camera functioned without an issue while I was behind the waterfall and I’m pretty impressed with the performance.

I don’t know if the Panasonic GH4 would hold up to as much abuse as the Canon 6d or 5d mark III would take if it met with a 5 foot drop test but the weather sealing does seem to be very good. Honestly I was expecting to call my insurance company after this little run. I didn’t think the flip out screen and controls were sealed well enough for the GH4 to handle this kind of thing, but I was pleasantly surprised.

I had a lot of time to play around with the GH4 while I was out of the country. A full review should be coming in the next week or two depending on how much time I have. I’ll keep you posted.

Tags: GH4k, Panasonic Gh4, Weather seal