Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ100 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 24x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 3.0-Inch LCD (Black)

#1: Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ100 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 24x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 3.0-Inch LCD (Black) Reviews!

As a semi-pro photographer and digital painter I enjoy having different tools for different purposes. A couple of years ago I bought an FZ28 and was quite impressed by the image quality, for a point and shoot. Of course, it did not even come close to the quality I get from my big camera, but there was nothing really to complain about other than comparatively slow focusing which is not unusual for point and shoot cameras. I recently purchased the FZ100 from Amazon. Believe me, the 14 megapixels made me very cautious - that is an awful lot for a tiny sensor and in the past that kind of pixel density has resulted in disaster. Panasonic is definitely doing something different because the image quality of the FZ100 is definitely better than the FZ28 PROVIDED you make a few changes to the settings. It is also much better than you would expect from a 14 Mp tiny sensor - this does not have a CCD sensor. I have found setting the noise reduction to -1 or -2 improves the image detail considerably even though it has a bit more digital noise in the image. For photos, I prefer to turn the sharpness down to -1 and also set saturation and contrast at -1 or -2. You need to experiment a little to find what you like best. For base images for paintings I often go the other way with the settings.
On the whole the image quality is quite good for a superzoom, even at maximum zoom. At the widest angle there is a bit of distortion in the corners, but that is not unusual for a superzoom point and shoot wide angle. But it is perfectly usable in regular size prints. Of course, with big prints, well, the images might not be so great. The focus is very fast, unlike the FZ28 - I can even photograph birds and not have them vanish before the camera focuses. There are gobs of wonderful little settings that are really useful - such as being able to change the area the camera uses to judge focus and then move the focus point around; how I wish my DSLR did that. Exposure accuracy is very good with a nice but not great dynamic range.
If you are thinking that 14 megapixels alone is going to give you DSLR quality you will be terribly disappointed. Judge it for what it is and you will be quite pleased. The lens on this camera, as is often the case with Panasonic, is excellent and to get that quality from such a wide range zoom is a credit to the Panasonic-Leica relationship. I did not give it a 5 star rating because I don't think any point and shoot deserves 5 stars and most don't deserve more than about a 3 and some can't break above 2. But for point and shoot cameras 4 is as high as I will go and this camera is a solid 4 star camera.
As for my uses, I don't suspect I will use it that much for photography as I have a big, expensive camera with wonderful lenses for that purpose. That is not to say it will not produce fine photographs, because it does. Where it will be particularly useful is photographing scenes that I want to turn into my digital paintings. The problem with using a high quality DSLR for digital painting is there is way too much detail to deal with and your paintings tend to come out looking more like really bad photographs. With the FZ100 that deep detail is not there and if one turns up the noise reduction to the maximum the detail really vanishes leaving the essentials which is what is needed for digital painting. By tweaking the noise reduction one can get as much or as little detail as is desirable for a base image for digital painting. High noise reduction with a DSLR still leaves at least 100 times more detail than is desirable. With the good wide angle to super telephoto and excellent color the FZ100 is an excellent tool for the digital artist. But if you are only interested in photos and don't make huge prints the FZ100 will be good and very versatile. It also has very good video capabilities that might replace the need for a dedicated video camera.
I highly recommend this camera, but keep your expectations sensible and don't go pixel peeping. Believe me, this isn't a Hasselblad digital camera; nor does it cost ,000 - for the body only.

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Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ100 14.1 MP Digital Camera with 24x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 3.0-Inch LCD (Black) Features

• 14.1-megapixel resolution; 24x optical zoom with 25mm wide-angle Leica DC Vario-Elmarit lens
• 1080i HD movies in AVCHD format; 3.0-inch free-angle LCD
• Intelligent Auto (iA) mode; new My Color mode
• Continuous Auto Focus up to five frames per second at full resolution for great action shots; capture up to 60 frames per second at 3.5 MP resolution
• Capture images to SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards (not included)

Customer Reviews

fantastiic zoom great image quality - Helmut -
i am very happy with my new panasonic FZ 100 , much better than my older FZ 28 and FZ35 , superb image quality and video