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Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ8
(Including DMW-LW55 Wide-angle converter.
My DSLR cameras are big - too big for purely casual everyday use, so, I normally carry a Fuji F30 for 'grab' shots, avante garde and creative photos, etc.
But, P&S compacts have limitations - namely no RAW image capture and some handling issues concerning the viewfinders and LCD screens.
Enter the Lumix FZ8!
(c) Digital Photography Review
After much internet searching I decided that the FZ8 offered all the features that I needed in-between a P&S and a DSLR. Reviews were all very good, and the only critical points appeared to be the 7.1MP resolution and the limited wide-angle capability. The resolution issue is, for me not overly critical because the sensor/lens combination gives good images at the widest angle, allowing the full image to be used with confidence. A wider angled lens with poor edge performance is often (in my experience) less satisfactory than a modest angle and good performance.
Here's a link to the DPReview.com webpage.
My FZ8 came courtesy of eBay and a fair price and in exceptional condition. From the outset I was impressed, not only by the tiny size of the camera, but also it's intuitive handling and its excellent image quality, particularly in RAW mode.
The Leica lens is sharp, contrasty and well behaved. There are very few signs of colour shifts or fringing, although there are signs of barrel distortion at the widest (6mm/36mm) setting - these are all easily fixed using SilkyPix software.
I am particularly impressed with the black and white images that can be obtained with the FZ8 and SilkyPix:
My DSLR cameras are big - too big for purely casual everyday use, so, I normally carry a Fuji F30 for 'grab' shots, avante garde and creative photos, etc.
But, P&S compacts have limitations - namely no RAW image capture and some handling issues concerning the viewfinders and LCD screens.
Enter the Lumix FZ8!
(c) Digital Photography Review
After much internet searching I decided that the FZ8 offered all the features that I needed in-between a P&S and a DSLR. Reviews were all very good, and the only critical points appeared to be the 7.1MP resolution and the limited wide-angle capability. The resolution issue is, for me not overly critical because the sensor/lens combination gives good images at the widest angle, allowing the full image to be used with confidence. A wider angled lens with poor edge performance is often (in my experience) less satisfactory than a modest angle and good performance.
Here's a link to the DPReview.com webpage.
My FZ8 came courtesy of eBay and a fair price and in exceptional condition. From the outset I was impressed, not only by the tiny size of the camera, but also it's intuitive handling and its excellent image quality, particularly in RAW mode.
The Leica lens is sharp, contrasty and well behaved. There are very few signs of colour shifts or fringing, although there are signs of barrel distortion at the widest (6mm/36mm) setting - these are all easily fixed using SilkyPix software.
I am particularly impressed with the black and white images that can be obtained with the FZ8 and SilkyPix:
Wide-angle converter
A modest (36mm) lens on a digital camera can sometimes substitute for a rather wider one (e.g. 28mm) by virtue of the ease in correcting converging parallels, etc. However, wider coverage - out to 24mm or beyond - normally involves the use of a wide-angle converter (or buying a suitable camera).
The dedicated Panasonic 0.7x converter DMW-LW55 effectively extends the wideangle capability of the FZ8 to 4.2mm (25mm). While there are general concerns about the resulting image quality, my first impressions using this converter are that it gives 'better' images than are currently available (2009) from P&S cameras with 24mm lenses. 'Better" is a subjective term: to be more objective, the images I have produced with the converter show more detail (sharpness) than those that are available on-line) for the Lumix TZ7 and LX3 at 25mm.
Admittedly downsizing those larger images to 7.1MP resolution apparently improves the detail - but at the risk of losing detail elsewhere in the image.
However, there is an important limitation with this converter: for it to be 'recognised by the in-camera functions (e.g. metering) the zoom lens becomes fixed at its widest setting - 6mm. This means you cannot zoom with the converter attached - the lens becomes fixed 4.2/25mm one.
But ..... this does help to maintain image quality, because the converter is very well-matched optically to the camera lens.
Here is an example of the quality obtained using the converter (full size image, perspectives corrected, but with foreground cropping and very slight sharpening of the RAW image).
Edited 28 November 2009
A modest (36mm) lens on a digital camera can sometimes substitute for a rather wider one (e.g. 28mm) by virtue of the ease in correcting converging parallels, etc. However, wider coverage - out to 24mm or beyond - normally involves the use of a wide-angle converter (or buying a suitable camera).
The dedicated Panasonic 0.7x converter DMW-LW55 effectively extends the wideangle capability of the FZ8 to 4.2mm (25mm). While there are general concerns about the resulting image quality, my first impressions using this converter are that it gives 'better' images than are currently available (2009) from P&S cameras with 24mm lenses. 'Better" is a subjective term: to be more objective, the images I have produced with the converter show more detail (sharpness) than those that are available on-line) for the Lumix TZ7 and LX3 at 25mm.
Admittedly downsizing those larger images to 7.1MP resolution apparently improves the detail - but at the risk of losing detail elsewhere in the image.
However, there is an important limitation with this converter: for it to be 'recognised by the in-camera functions (e.g. metering) the zoom lens becomes fixed at its widest setting - 6mm. This means you cannot zoom with the converter attached - the lens becomes fixed 4.2/25mm one.
But ..... this does help to maintain image quality, because the converter is very well-matched optically to the camera lens.
Here is an example of the quality obtained using the converter (full size image, perspectives corrected, but with foreground cropping and very slight sharpening of the RAW image).
Southwell Minster, Nottinghamshire
(Click on the image for a super-size version)
(Click on the image for a super-size version)
Edited 28 November 2009
Talisker |
Latest page update: made by Talisker
, Nov 28 2009, 12:29 PM EST
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