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Details at a glance
Megapixels: 8
Optical Zoom: 12x
Digital Zoom: 4x
LCD screen: 2inch
Storage: SD and MMC
Size: 140(w) x 85.5(h) x 138(d)
Weight: 138g
We clicked with
12x Zoom. (38-420mm in 35mm equivalent)
Leica Lens
Shots in the dark
Colour registration
Image quality
Links
More Panasonic information
www.panasonic.co.uk
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The Panasonic DMC-FZ30 comes with an impressive 12x (35 - 420mm 35mm equivalent) Zoom lens, Leica DC Vario-Elmarit lens system, which as a photographer fills you with confidence. It handles like a good SLR with the zoom being a manually turning ring. It feels right, with both the electronic viewfinder or the 2" TFT colour display. It's light and fairly fast to react to most situations. On the whole this is a camera which handles really well. I find myself liking it- I don't know if it's because it carries the Leica name on the lens (which is something that I have always admired), or if the build of the camera is just very good.
On the move
Even the MEGA O-I-S (Optical Image Stabiliser) works well as I lean my head out of the window to catch the dog chasing after a magpie. The camera comes with an LCD display that can be rotated 360 degrees, allowing you to shoot from just about anywhere, it's bright and displays well even in sunlight. With the 8MP sensor, there's a healthy range of image sizes and plenty at the upper end. The addition of a hot shoe makes this camera overall an excellent and versatile piece of kit, allowing the connection of studio and alternative flash heads. I gave it a quick test with my IR flash trigger and studio flash setup; everything worked very well.
Something for everyone
You have the ability to run from fully auto with a rack preset modes thrown in (Portrait, Sports, Scenery, Night Scenery, Night Portrait, Fireworks, Party, Snow, Self-Portrait, Food, Baby, Soft Skin, Candle, Starry Sky). ISO ranges from 80 to 400 are on offer, which should cover most advanced amateur scenarios. Throw in auto bracketing at 1/3 stop and exposure compensation and this camera performs very nicely, thank you. Feel free to set the camera to fully manual and away you go. In the studio or out on location, by beginners or semi professionals; this is a naturally comfortable and user-friendly piece of kit.
Strawberry fields never
Now the fun begins. Many moons ago, when I started working with digital cameras, I came across a problem. The problem was related to the camera's ability to differentiate between red and magenta. Sadly the Lumix pushes magenta quite heavily. This means that it you have a strong red image, in good light, you have every chance of suffering magenta highlights, which is a shame because I really do like this camera. The other colours can be a little lacklustre too. It's nothing that you can't adjust out with your image editing software, but it's still unfortunate. I also felt that the focus wasn't as good as I expected it to be. Most of the images that I took just didn't seem crisp; this could have been the 72dpi JPEG mode, with the JPEG algorithm taking a little more out than it should do, but the image quality disappointed me.
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Ease of use 
Functions 
Value for Money
Overall 
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Overall this is a lovely camera, it handles well and feels good. Great, in fact. But the image quality could be a improved - especially for an 8 mega-pixel beast. |
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