Panasonic Lumix® DMC-FZ7 6-Megapixel Mega-Zoom Digital Camera with Image Stabilization
Written: Mar 21 '06 (Updated Mar 21 '06)
Product Rating:
Ease of Use:
Durability:
Battery Life:
Photo Quality:
Shutter Lag
Pros: Picture quality, resolution, price, features, included accessories, TIFF, size, weight, large LCD
Cons: No super-wide angle, no RAW
The Bottom Line: If you want a 6-Megapixel responsive "monster zoom" camera, this Panasonic FZ7 is an excellent choice. With 12x optical zoom, optical image stabilization, fast...
dkozin's Full Review: Panasonic Lumix® DMC-FZ7 Digital Camera
I have sold my 5-Megapixel Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ5 a while ago in favor of a smaller camera, but wanted to see if the new 6-Megapixel Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ7 is a remarkably different camera. I liked the FZ5's features, menu system and overall performance and liked the FZ5 better than the Canon S2 IS, so I was excited to try the FZ7.
Mega-Zoom and Optical Image Stabilization
Consumers like cameras that provide high optical zoom numbers (e.g. 5x and higher). I like them too. Having a camera with an optical zoom over 5x lets you magnify images far away without loss of sharpness. But not all mega-zoom cameras are created equal. Some of them have no optical image stabilization, which makes images shot at high magnification or in dim light blurry.
Optical image stabilization lets you have substantially sharper images in low light or at high zoom levels. It lets you shoot handheld in many situations that would otherwise require a tripod. I would never buy a camera with high optical zoom unless it has optical image stabilization. Cameras of Panasonic FZ (including this FZ7) line have optical image stabilization.
Why not Canon S2 IS?
First of all, the FZ7 has higher resolution: 6 MP vs. 5 MP in S2 IS. Just as the FZ7, the Canon S2 IS uses SD cards, but it uses four AA-sized batteries, meaning you have to get my own rechargeable NiMH batteries and a charger, recharge them removing them one by one (inconvenient).
The AA batteries are (4 of them) heavier than the battery pack used in Panasonic FZ cameras (including the FZ7), are more prone to reduction of power output in cold weather and take up more space. In addition to the power dilemma, there is an issue with filters.
You have to purchase an adaptor to be able to use filters with the S2 IS, whereas the cameras of Panasonic FZ line include a lens/filter adaptor and a lens hood. The FZ7 comes with both. The FZ7 can also record images in lossless TIFF format whereas the S2 cannot.
The FZ line ships with a real travel charger that can charge the battery pack from 110-240V, which means you can use it in the US, Europe and elsewhere. Furthermore, the FZ7 ships with a compact charger that has no cables and plugs into the wall directly.
I also like the Panasonic menu system better than Canon's. At the same time, Canon has an articulated LCD screen whereas Panasonic FZ7 has a fixed screen. But the Panasonic has a larger screen (2.5 inches).
Why FZ7 and not FZ5?
The difference in price between 5-Megapixel FZ5 and this 6-Megapixel FZ7 is only $30. Not only the resolution of the FZ7 is higher, the LCD screen is also larger and it has new features like manual focus capability.
About FZ7
The Panasonic DMC-FZ7 is a 6-Megapixel digital camera with Leica optics (12x optical zoom: 36-432mm in 35-mm equivalent), optical image stabilization with maximum apertures of f/2.8 at wide angle and f/3.3 at full telephoto. It stores images on an SD card.
The FZ7 has a 2.5-inch LCD screen. The camera is relatively compact and lightweight, features USB 2.0 connectivity that requires no drivers, unlike some Canon cameras I dealt with, and has a very easy-to-use menu system.
You can output video and sound to your TV (be it your pictures or video clips) using the supplied audio/video cable in NTSC or PAL format.
The camera is very fast in operation. The image stabilization now has two modes - Mode 1 and Mode 2. In Mode 2, the stabilization is engaged only when the shutter release is pressed, which makes the stabilization more efficient and less power-hungry. The images turn out to be sharper when the Mode 2 is used, but it makes it slightly less easy to confirm focus.
Features
The camera features selectable ISO between 80, 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1600 as well as Auto. The latter two settings (800 and 1600) are available in so-called high sensitivity mode. The White Balance can be set to Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Halogen, Flash, White Set (custom, using a white/grey card). The camera's auto white balance mostly works well and I left it in Auto most of the time.
The exposure modes include Program AE, Aperture and Shutter Priority mode, and even full Manual mode. The shutter speed can be set between 8 and 1/2,000 sec (up to 60 sec in Manual mode) and the aperture between F2.8 and F8 (wide angle) or F3.3-8 (telephoto). I usually use apertures around F5.6 and F8 for landscapes.
The lens seems to be sharp and the image stabilization allows you to take handheld pictures at shutter speeds you wouldn't think were possible e.g. 1/8 sec at wide angle or 1/30 at full telephoto (420 mm equivalent focal length). The image stabilization works best in Mode 2. Be advised that in Simple mode, the stabilization is fixed to Mode 1 and cannot be changed, unless you use P, A, S or other mode.
The camera has a focus assist light for better and faster focusing in low-light conditions. It works well in dim light. The FZ7 has a built-in microphone for recording notes or recording sounds while filming short video clips and a speaker, which can be used for operational sounds or to play back the sounds recorded. The camera can record short movie clips at high resolution of 848x480 or 640x480 pixels at 30 or 10 fps with sound.
The rotary main mode control at the top deck has positions for the easy mode (red heart pictogram), playback, P (program AE), A (Aperture priority), S (Shutter Priority), M (Manual Mode), macro, movie and scene modes. The zoom rocker, shutter release button, image stabilization mode button and burst mode button are located close to it. I rarely use the burst mode or stabilization mode buttons (I keep stabilization in Mode 2). The top deck looks exactly like the one on the FZ5.
The scene modes include Portrait, Sports, Scenery, Night Scenery, Panning, Night Portrait, Fireworks, Party, Snow and High Sensitivity. The camera is powered on and off by a simple sliding switch on the rear panel, that I find convenient. The green LED above it shows you if the camera is on or not.
The flash is open by a mechanical button and closed by pushing it down. There is no external flash connector. The flash mode and output can be adjusted manually.
The camera has an orientation sensor, which records if the picture was taken vertically or horizontally and this makes your pictures display in the correct orientation on your computer. It works in my Adobe Photoshop CS2, but (for some strange reason) not in the ACDSee viewer.
LCD
The camera has a 2.5-inch LCD with about 114,000 pixels that covers 100% of the view. You can also use the electronic viewfinder (EVF) with a diopter adjustment. The LCD screen is fluid, has pleasing colors and good resolution. But the smaller LCD of the FZ5 (1.8-inch) had higher resolution (130K).
I found that the LCD is well-visible in regular conditions, but in sunlight, visibility decreases and you have to use the EVF, which works well in sunlight. The optical viewfinder would be better, but it would not have been possible to make an optical viewfinder that would fit in such a small space and work with such a monster 12x optical zoom.
In the shooting mode, the "Display" button cycles through the image with no information, image with basic shooting parameters and a live histogram, image with lines that split the screen in nine areas and help you compose the shot better or image that is slightly decreased in size and the area around it filled with shooting parameters, etc.
At any time you can see the estimated remaining amount of pictures that will fit on the memory card as well as the battery status.
Operation
Just as I expected, I found the FZ7 to be well built, have a solid feel yet to be lighter than what you would expect. The menus are easy to use. The camera is convenient to hold. The initial battery charge took about 1 hour.
The camera comes with a 16-Mb SD card, which I immediately replaced with my Sandisk 512-Mb card. Also included are the USB cable, the A/V cable, CD-ROM with software (I haven't installed it and probably never will), the battery pack and charger, lens hood, lens filter adaptor, lens cap with a strap and a shoulder strap, manuals.
Performance
The camera is very fast and seems to operate even slightly faster than the, already fast, FZ5. The power-up takes only about 2 seconds (mostly taken by the lens extension). The camera seems to focus very fast as well, especially in its 1-area or 3-area High-Speed autofocus mode (well under a second, almost instantaneously), slightly less so in its 9-point autofocus mode (still less than a second).
In 1-zone autofocus mode (non-High Speed), even indoors in dim light, the focusing took less than a second regardless if the AF illuminator could reach the subject. This is in contrast with many other cameras that try to focus in the same conditions for several seconds, at times successfully, at times failing to focus at all. The competitor from Sony (Sony H1) is especially poor in this department.
Overall, the focusing performance of the FZ7 is probably the best I have seen so far, even better than the already impressive FZ5.
The camera has focus confirmation - it shows you a small or larger rectangle around the area where the camera is currently focused. The shutter lag when pre-focused is virtually absent and the picture is taken almost instantaneously. You can select to have the taken picture appear on the screen for 1 or couple of seconds after it's taken to confirm if it is good or you can select not to have this, so-called, quick preview at all. In the latter case, the LCD goes blank only momentarily.
Overall, depending on the focus mode, the shot-to-shot delay ranges between less than a second (High-Speed Autofocus) to a little more than a second (9-point autofocus). Since TIFF images are much large than JPEGs, the delay is longer, depending on the SD card speed. I got about 3 seconds with my 65x Kingston Elite Pro SD Card and about 4 seconds with SanDisk SD card.
The burst modes present are High Speed (4 fps), Low Speed (3 fps) and No Limit continuous (3 fps). In the former two modes, the camera takes 7 pictures within 2 or 2.5 seconds. In the latter, the camera keeps taking pictures at 3 fps until you let go of the shutter release button. Provided the memory card supports writing at that speed. Obviously, the times above are with no flash use.
Shooting with flash is slower since the flash needs time to recharge. Depending on battery condition and the subject distance, you can expect the flash recharge time of 2-4 seconds.
Zooming is smooth and responsive. The battery lasts for about 300-350 pictures and the supplied charger can recharge it in less than 90 minutes.
The supplied lens hood is easy to attach and works well to fight flare.
Picture Quality
The FZ7 features excellent lens design by Leica, which helps it produce excellent pictures. The photos are well-saturated, properly exposed and sharp from wide angle to telephoto. The fine details are sharp and clearly visible, weather viewed at full resolution on the computer monitor or after being printed. The colors are true-to-life.
The image stabilization works well (especially in Mode 2) and let me take handheld photos at full telephoto at 1/60 and sometimes at 1/30 and at 1/8-1/2 at wide angle.
This is much better than the rule of the recommended handheld shutter speeds (1/equivalent focal length) suggests. Without image stabilization I wouldn't be able to take pictures at the above shutter speeds. 1/500 at telephoto and 1/50 at wide angle would be the slowest I could use.
There is just a small amount of barrel distortion in wide angle shots (not visible in regular shooting) and no pincushion distortion at telephoto. I could find only small amounts of chromatic aberration in normal shooting - most of it seems to be suppressed by the Venus II engine and good lens design, but some is still visible. In high contrast scenes there is an occasional (very minor) chromatic aberration, but it is so minor.
There seems to be no vignetting at all, even at wide angle. The images are generally sharp from corner to corner. But at full telephoto, the corners of the frame get slightly soft, which is a general trend with mega-zoom cameras. The photos are still highly usable.
I mostly used the lowest ISO available (80) and see only small amounts of noise in the shadows, nothing to complain about (invisible on the resultant prints). At ISO 100 or 200, you can see noise appear in the shadows/darker areas areas and ISO 400 is so noisy that I would only use it for smaller prints (6x4 and 5x7). Fortunately, you can avoid having to use ISO 400 at all in most situations by simply using a slower shutter speed and/or larger apertures (F2.8 or F3.3).
Computer Connectivity
I was able to connect the camera to my Windows 2000 Professional computer with no need to install any drivers or software. After that, the camera appeared as a removable drive in my system and I could copy the files from it. I usually remove the SD card from the camera and use my card reader.
Panasonic FZ7 vs. Panasonic FZ5
The 5-Megapixel Panasonic DMC-FZ5 is about the dame in size as the FZ7. The FZ7 has a larger LCD (2.5-inch vs. 1.8-inch) and has manual focus. The FZ7 has a slightly higher resolution (6 vs. 5 MP).
FZ7, FZ5, Canon S2 IS or Sony H1?
The FZ7 would be my first choice, followed by the Panasonic FZ5, Canon S2 IS and the Sony DSC-H1. Panasonic cameras are more compact, provide better value and are easier to use than Canon or Sony. They are also faster in operation (especially than Sony H1) and produce excellent photos. The Canon S2 IS is my third choice (too expensive and uses 4 AA batteries). And the Sony H1 would be the last. It looks good on paper, but is large, heavy and too slow in operation.
Bottom Line
If you want a 6-Megapixel responsive "monster zoom" camera, this Panasonic FZ7 is an excellent choice. With 12x optical zoom, optical image stabilization, fast f2.8-3.3 Leica lens and responsive Venus II LSI engine, for less than $340, this camera clearly outperforms its current competitors. I highly recommend it.
Leica DC Vario-Element Lens System with 11 elements in 8 groups (3 aspherical lenses/3 aspherical surfaces) 12x Optical zoom (equivalent to 36mm to 43...More at Amazon Marketplace
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