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From the Manufacturer The 8-megapixel Panasonic LZ8 is perfect for anyone who expects a digital camera that blends power, performance and quality, helping to maximize the digital photography experience. The LZ-Series lenses were developed by Panasonic, passing Leica's stringent standards to deliver an exceptional optical performance for Panasonic Lumix consumers. And with the the LZ8s 32mm wide-angle lens, you can capture larger group photos or more expansive scenic shots. To provide digital photographers with added creative elements and performance, the LZ8 sports manual control over aperture and shutter speed, thanks to the cameras newly-adopted iris. When shooting manually, you can choose from three modes: A-aperture priority, S-shutter speed priority and M-manual and enjoy added control and creativity normally reserved for higher end models. Also new to the LZ8 is Advanced Scene Mode -- a feature that gives you manual control using some of the frequently-used scene modes: Portrait, Sports, Landscape and Night portrait. While in Advanced Scene Mode, when selecting the Portrait or Sports mode, the consumer is then presented with additional settings, with the option of choosing outdoor or indoor. When selecting Landscape mode, there are options to specify if the shot is nature or architecture. For budding photographers who desire even more artistic freedom, they can choose Creative mode, which adds more manual controls over an aperture or a shutter speed. For those not quite ready for complete manual control, the LZ8 also features Panasonics Intelligent Auto Mode, which is comprised of five distinct technologies designed to provide users with intuitive and automatic camera adjustments, regardless of the shooting condition and without the user having to do anything manually. Intelligent Auto Mode consists of the following features: Mega O.I.S. Gyrosensors detect hand-shake and the lens system shifts to compensate, helping to prevent hand-shake from creating a blurry image. Intelligent ISO Can determine if the photo subject is moving and change the ISO setting and shutter speed accordingly, thus giving a blur-free photo. Intelligent Scene Selector Senses the ambient conditions, recognizes the shooting environment and will automatically select the appropriate scene mode from: Scenery, Portrait, Macro, Night Portrait or Night Scenery mode. Face Detection Panasonics Face Detection detects up to 15 faces anywhere in the frame, even if they are moving, and automatically chooses the optimal focus and exposure settings so portraits come out clear and crisp. Quick AF The Quick AF (auto focus) system starts focus on the subject by just pointing the camera to the subject, thus minimizing the AF time. The LZ8 also features new 230,000-dot high-resolution LCD, complete with the new Intelligent LCD, meaning the 2.5-inch LCD screen detects the lighting condition and controls the brightness level to offer optimal clarity in any situation, whether dark or light; indoors or outdoors. It also includes the popular High Angle mode, which makes the LCD screen easy to view when held high, to shoot over a crowd or a tall object. Additional highlights of the Panasonic Lumix LZ8 include: Newly-added speaker lets you enjoy a slide show with music, selecting from natural, slow, urban or swing tunes; or add voice to a motion video. Title Edit function which allows the consumer to input text to accompany a photo, for instance, the names of children or travel locations. Ability to record WVGA (848 x 480) motion images at 30 frames per second in a 16:9 aspect ratio, ideal for viewing on High Definition televisions, such as Panasonic Viera Plasmas and LCDs. The ability to shoot 1920x1080-pixel High-Definition ready photos, ideal for wide-screen viewing on a 16:9 Viera Plasma or LCD. The DMC-LZ8 shoots 180 images with the included Alkaline batteries and up to 470 images with optional Ni-MH rechargeable batteries (2600mAh). A record/playback mode switch, which lets the photographer switch between recording and playback modes, while always knowing the current mode.
8.0-megapixel resolution captures enough detail for photo-quality 16x 22-inch prints
5x wide-angle optical zoom; Mega Optical Image Stabilized
2.5-inch Intelligent LCD screen; Face Detection
Intelligent ISO; Intelligent Scene Selector
Captures images to SD memory cards (not included)
When my Canon A710is died, I needed a point-and-shoot that would fit a pocket better, offer similar zoom range, and good battery life... and I needed it quickly. I did some quick research, and had settled on another camera, but came across a deal I couldn't pass up on Amazon. Being short on cash I decided to look into it further. The Lumix rated well on some of the review sites, so I went with it. For the money, this is a solid performer.First the bad. It takes very natural pictures in good light, but in lower light the pictures look a little overprocessed by the noise reduction in the camera. It's also noticeably slower to focus as the light level drops. It does have a focus assist light, but it seems like the camera first tries to focus without it, then turns it on and tries again.. making focus in poor light annoyingly slow. The flash is strong, but a little harsh compared to the A710. Most of this is only visible in side by side comparison to photos from the A710, so unless you blow up your photos and print them, it's really not a problem. Using the iA mode drastically slows down the performance of the camera. The idea is good, but with every shot, the camera takes nearly a full second to decide on settings to use for that shot. In theory that's nice, but I think the camera may have too many choices for it's own good. The flash is also very slow to charge between shots.Now the good. When you use the other scene modes or manual settings, the performance really speeds up. It's never what I'd consider a snappy performer, but shot to shot times and shutter release to recorded image times drastically improve. The display is sharper and brighter than the A710, and the controls are just as intuitive, if a little different (OK, yeah... I'm a Canon fan). The zoom is relatively fast for a camera in this class, and it has a neat little E.zoom button next to the shutter that very quickly takes you from whatever zoom setting you're currently at to full optical zoom, full optical + digital zoom, and back to wide angle. I find this feature to be very handy. The LZ8's wide angle lens is nice, and because of this it's easier to use in small spaces than most other point and shoots I've owned. It's quick to power on and off, and I found the controls easy to use even with large hands. I also like the fact that the SD card door is separate from the battery door. The face detection is nice, but makes the camera just slightly slower.Battery life in the short time I've had it has been exemplary. I used up the set that came with the camera the first day I had it, which made me a little nervous, but I immediately switched to the 2300 mAh rechargeables I used in my old camera and performance has been great. Between experimenting with it the first week I had it, two birthday parties, a weekend at the beach, and day to day use I still haven't drained the second set of batteries yet.. after around 300 photos, many with flash. I never got more than 200 shots out of the A710, usually somewhere around 80 to 100. Flash recharge time is increasing as the batteries drain, as expected, but is noteworthy on a camera with such a slow recharge time to begin with. Most likely, after I've finished stretching battery life as far as I can, I'll get back into my old habit of swapping in fresh batteries before every event.Overall this camera isn't a great replacement for the A710, but as the 710 was a higher end (and therefore more expensive) camera back when I bought it, it's not completely fair to compare it to the LZ8. Having said that, I did expect the performance of a 4 year newer camera in this class to be slightly better. I bought this camera so I don't have to carry my dSLR around all the time, and for that purpose it's great. It stays in my work van most of the time, and fits a jacket pocket on a motorcycle ride easily. Battery performance so far is good enough that I would be comfortable not carrying a spare set for a day if the ones in the camera are fairly fresh.. a new experience for me. It's inexpensive enough that I wouldn't get upset if it were to get damaged, but still takes satisfactory pictures. It lost one star for the sluggish performance in iA mode and slightly soft low light images. The other star was lost for it's slow full shutter press to image taken time. I made the right choice for the money I had to spend at the time, and for about $130 (with overnight shipping) this camera performs well.I've been wanting something like the Canon PowerShot A series camera for a while. Another hobby of mine involves photographing small objects in a mini-studio settings (not unlike jewel photography, but less demanding/sophisticated). I wanted something that:- has aperture/shutter priority modes, and manual mode;- can set custom white balance- shows live histogram in recording mode.The Canon PowerShot A720IS and A570IS looked great, but neither had all three features I wanted. A query here on a photography forum last month led to a reply that pointed me to the then-just-announced Panasonic DMC-LZ8. On paper, it looked GREAT: All the features I wanted, 2.5" LCD with 230K pixels (the Canon ones, while having large screens, have low pixel counts), and priced well under $200 to boot. It seemed so perfect that I preordered it, which I normally don't do--I usually prefer the manufacturers to go through a few production batches and iron out all the bugs before buying a camera.The camera came today from Amazon.com, and I had a chance to take a few quick shots and get an initial feel for the camera. Here are my observation and thoughts. I also have the DMC-FX33, so a bit of the review will be comparing the two. Not that they are in the same category, but the FX33 represents last year's Panasonic design trends and philosophies, and LZ8 this year's, so I thought it'd be interesting to note the contrasts.The camera feels GREAT in my hand. I'm 6' tall and have I guess about average hand-size for my height, and the protruding grip felt very comfortable. The thumb naturally rests right above the Record/Review switch, which provides a nice counter-pressure point to the grip.The LZ8 uses two AA sized batteries and SD/SDHC cards. The battery compartment and memory compartments are separate, which I like a lot. The left side of the camera has a door that hides the USB/AV-out port. There's now a dedicated button near the shutter for Panasonic's Extended Optical Zoom, which allows you to "zoom" in further than the 5x optical lens zoom without the traditional degradation in image quality associated with digital zoom. The flipside is that as you zoom out using Extended Optical Zoom, the image size becomes smaller (at the maximum Extended Optical Zoom, the camera produces 3MP images).Unlike the FX33, the LZ8 does not have a Clipboard mode (at least not that I could find!). I actually really liked that! It was an easy way to carry some photos with me and use the camera as a digital photo album. Not that you can't do that with storing photos on the regular memory card, but the Clipboard mode made it easier. Oh well.Unlike the FX33, the down button on the four-way controller no longer acts as a quick review button while in recording mode. But, also unlike the FX33, you can enter the full Review (Playback) mode by using a dedicated switch, rather than having to turn the mode dial to Playback mode. The Exposure button controls the aperture or shutter or both values, in aperture/shutter priority modes and the manual mode. The Q. Menu button seems faster (more responsive) to bring up the quick menu than the FX33.The screen menus have changed little other than the background color. The LZ8 has the same size LCD as the FX33 (2.5"), but 30K more pixels (230K vs. 200K). The menu does certainly seem sharper. A pure eye-candy: When you shut down the camera, now there's a reflection of the word "Lumix" on the screen.A gripe I have with the FX33 was how narrow the viewing angle was for the LCD. I'm happy to report that the LZ8 is significantly better in this regard.The images straight out of the camera look great. I know it's a subjective matter, so be sure to check out various review sites and also photo hosting sites that let you view pictures by the camera model to see if you like the image quality. I've also uploaded some 20 images to accompany this review.So far I'm extremely happy with how the camera feels in my hand, how responsive it is, and how feature-packed it is. I haven't really tested high ISO performance, as that will not matter in the applications I have for the camera (mini-studio). I'm sure pixel-peeping the images to death will reveal all manners of shortcomings and imperfections, but for real-world usage, it rates very favorably against the PowerShot series. Well done Panasonic!
