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Panasonic FZ-20 Owners



 
 
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  #1  
Old December 17th 04, 04:38 PM
Ken
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Default Panasonic FZ-20 Owners

Hi,

After reading everyone's comments here, and visiting all of the review sites I could find, I am
on the verge of purchasing one. Many of you by now have had time to discover its strengths
and weaknesses and I was wondering if you have any regrets for having purchased one yourself.
I have a Sony P-10 P&S and have never really been happy with its image quality and don't want
to spend another $400-$500 without a demonstrable improvement in the images I shoot.

Good, bad or indifferent, your comments are welcome.

Cheers,

Ken


  #2  
Old December 17th 04, 04:55 PM
David J Taylor
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Ken wrote:
Hi,

After reading everyone's comments here, and visiting all of the
review sites I could find, I am on the verge of purchasing one. Many
of you by now have had time to discover its strengths
and weaknesses and I was wondering if you have any regrets for having
purchased one yourself. I have a Sony P-10 P&S and have never really
been happy with its image quality and don't want to spend another
$400-$500 without a demonstrable improvement in the images I shoot.

Good, bad or indifferent, your comments are welcome.


Ken, been very pleased with our FZ20. From my tests, the image quality is
equal to the 8MP Minolta A2 and as good as any other 5MP camera. You do
need to set the JPEG noise processing to "Low", though. Absolutely super
lens, good manual focus. About the only thing I miss is the swivel LCD
finder found on some other cameras.

You would find the zoom a major difference to the P10, and the overall
camera will be bigger. It's not heavy, though. Try it for handling if
you can.

David


  #3  
Old December 18th 04, 12:19 AM
Tony van der Vooren
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I "drowned" my FZ10 on a canoe trip last summer...I now have the FZ20..


"Dirk Gently" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 17 Dec 2004 15:38:38 GMT, "Ken" wrote:

Hello Ken,
If my FZ20 were stolen today, I'd buy another one tomorrow.




  #4  
Old December 18th 04, 01:35 AM
J.S.Pitanga
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Hi David, you say

[...] been very pleased with our FZ20. From my tests,
the image quality is equal to the 8MP Minolta A2


I compared A2's and FZ20's sample shots as found in DCRP review (the two
of Chinatown and the one of the white triangular building), downsampling
A2's to 2560 x 1920 to fit FZ20's size with IrfanView, Lanczos Filter and
observing the pictures on the screen.

I found that A2's pictures are noticeably cleaner, sharper and less noisy
than those from FZ20, the latter also displaying artifacts not visible in
A2's. This could be expected from A2's much bigger sensor anyway (2/3" or
58.08mm2 as compared to FZ20's 1/2.5" or 24.7104mm2).

Of course I excluded the church picture from the comparison, since for
unknown reasons I feel strongly biased towards (Konica) Minolta digital
cameras, an inclination which makes me believe that the shot is simply out
of focus.

Best,

Julio
  #5  
Old December 18th 04, 02:24 AM
Pete Fenelon
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J.S.Pitanga wrote:
I found that A2's pictures are noticeably cleaner, sharper and less noisy
than those from FZ20, the latter also displaying artifacts not visible in
A2's. This could be expected from A2's much bigger sensor anyway (2/3" or
58.08mm2 as compared to FZ20's 1/2.5" or 24.7104mm2).


As a Panasonic FZ10 owner I would agree that the A2 is probably
electronically a little superior to the FZs - its ancestry is very good
(Dimage 7, A1...). A good friend of mine finally "went digital" with a
Dimage 7i a couple of years back and the A1 and A2 carry on the good work.

The A series are excellent cameras. Don't judge Konica Minolta by the
cheaper Z range - they're low-budget fun cameras. The A2 is slightly
pricier in the UK than an FZ20 (at least in the UK) and the lens has
less reach, though to some extent you can trade pixels for zoom if you
plan on cropping... If K-M can get the zoom out past x8 (which they've
done with the optically and electronically inferior Z range) they're
going to have a truly formidable camera.

I think most of the good ZLRs (x7 zoom and above) I tried have plus and
minus points:

Olympus C770
+ : small size, style, good interface
- : no stabilisation

Konica-Minolta A2
+ : very SLR-like controls, pixel count, stabilisation
- : styling, relatively limited zoom (x7)

Panasonic FZ-10/15/20
+ : x12 stabilised Leica lens with manual focus ring
- : no "raw" mode

Canon S1 IS
+ : price, size, x10 stabilised
- : limited pixel count, feels flimsier than pricier Canons

Nikon 8700:
+ : pixel count, excellent EVF
- : price, prone to noise (small sensor - the 5700 is actually nicer at 5mp)

Sony F828:
+ : Zeiss lens with *manual* zoom and focus ring, articulated body
- : styling, size, no stabilisation.

(actually for most practical purposes I'd go for a 5700 over an 8700....)

All are fine cameras, and depending on what you're looking for any one
of them is likely to fit your needs. If Nikon can sort out the noise
issues on the 8700 with the 8800VR (x10 stabilised) then they'll have a
truly great camera too, at a price...

I haven't yet seen a Powershot Pro-1 but it seems to take many good
features from Canon DSLRs as well as compacts. Should be formidable.

The only ZLR I tried that I didn't like was the Fuji S7000. "Only" x6,
and murky, noisy 6-megapixel pictures (the "interpolated" 12 megapixel
ones are a gimmick).

pete
--
"there's no room for enigmas in built-up areas"
  #6  
Old December 18th 04, 07:00 AM
Ken
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"David J Taylor" wrote in message ...
Ken wrote:
Hi,

After reading everyone's comments here, and visiting all of the
review sites I could find, I am on the verge of purchasing one. Many
of you by now have had time to discover its strengths
and weaknesses and I was wondering if you have any regrets for having
purchased one yourself. I have a Sony P-10 P&S and have never really
been happy with its image quality and don't want to spend another
$400-$500 without a demonstrable improvement in the images I shoot.

Good, bad or indifferent, your comments are welcome.


Ken, been very pleased with our FZ20. From my tests, the image quality is
equal to the 8MP Minolta A2 and as good as any other 5MP camera. You do
need to set the JPEG noise processing to "Low", though. Absolutely super
lens, good manual focus. About the only thing I miss is the swivel LCD
finder found on some other cameras.

You would find the zoom a major difference to the P10, and the overall
camera will be bigger. It's not heavy, though. Try it for handling if
you can.


Thanks for your comments, David. I read your message and the others posted in this
thread from google groups at work today and had already pretty much decided to buy
one. Having seen no major complaints I picked one up on the way home and have
spent the past hour or so taking sample pics around the house. All I can say for now
is WoW! I don't know if it is the image stabilization or simply a matter of superior
optics, but I can say with certainty that the 30 pics I have taken with it are without a
doubt consistanly sharper than the majority of the 3000+ images I have taken with
the Sony.

It's supposed to be a bright clear and sunny day here tommorrow and I predict I will
spend most of it outdoors putting it through its paces. For the time being count me in
as a regular in this group.

Cheers,

Ken


  #7  
Old December 18th 04, 07:03 AM
Ken
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"Dirk Gently" wrote in message ...
On Fri, 17 Dec 2004 15:38:38 GMT, "Ken" wrote:

Hello Ken,
If my FZ20 were stolen today, I'd buy another one tomorrow.


Your positive endorsement duly noted.

P.S. If you would like to have your FZ20 stolen, so you can buy another one....


  #8  
Old December 18th 04, 07:24 AM
Ken
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"Dirk Gently" wrote in message news
On Sat, 18 Dec 2004 06:03:32 GMT, "Ken" wrote:
"Dirk Gently" wrote in message ...
On Fri, 17 Dec 2004 15:38:38 GMT, "Ken" wrote:

Hello Ken,
If my FZ20 were stolen today, I'd buy another one tomorrow.


Your positive endorsement duly noted.

P.S. If you would like to have your FZ20 stolen, so you can buy another one....

We don't wanna go there, besides you alreadu bought one. :-)


Just trying to be friendly :^ }


  #9  
Old December 18th 04, 07:56 AM
J.S.Pitanga
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Hi Pete,

Thank you for your thoughtful condensation of qualities and virtues of
different EVFs (I think that all so-called ZLRs have an EVF, and that
there is no camera with a EVF which is not a so-called ZLR, and thus that
EVF is an exact and unequivocal way of calling the inexactly and
equivocally so-called ZLRs).

I agree with your favorable remarks about Minolta A2 (even more applicable
to the new KM A200, which sports besides a very pleasant design): excelent
features and image quality but a zoom which in the long end is a bit short
for us spoiled by those 10x+ megazooms (in days of old I was so happy with
the fixed 135mm telephoto of my long deceased Kowa SETR!).

I also agree that the KM Z range are low-budget fun cameras, but just
because they are low-budget and fun (or in part exactly because of this) I
would no look so much down on them! I would for sure avoid the Z1 with its
high level chromatic aberration. However, judging from the sample pictures
available in the most well-known reviews, I would rate the 3MP Z10's image
quality above the 3MP S1 IS's, at least in terms of detail resolution,
noise and sharpness - for about half the price anyway.

As to the Z2 and Z3, the sample pictures found in most reviews are indeed
often not very appealing, too soft and the Z3's too noisy also. However,
being the happy owner of a Z2 which already came with the new firmware
(1.03), I believe that something changed, and the pictures come indeed
tack sharp straight from the camera, with plenty of fine detail and
beautiful, well-saturated colors, although less compression would be
welcome (I didn't dare to try the RAW hack). I would say that one could
hardly find better for the price, or even for quite a bit more.

Of course I would consider migrating to the enticing 8MP KM A200 (much
less expensive than a Nikon 8800), except for my present attachment to a
longer zoom - although according to my calculations, cropping from 8 to 4
MP (presently enough for me) would roughly correspond to a zoom factor of
1,414 (square root of 2) thus bringing its 200mm long end to 282mm, more
or less the same as the 8x Coolpix 5700 and 8700.

Anyway, for the moment I'm just enjoying my little cute Z2!

Cheers,

Julio.
  #10  
Old December 18th 04, 08:00 AM
Ken
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"Dirk Gently" wrote in message news
On Sat, 18 Dec 2004 06:03:32 GMT, "Ken" wrote:
"Dirk Gently" wrote in message ...
On Fri, 17 Dec 2004 15:38:38 GMT, "Ken" wrote:
Hello Ken,
If my FZ20 were stolen today, I'd buy another one tomorrow.

Your positive endorsement duly noted.
P.S. If you would like to have your FZ20 stolen, so you can buy another one....

My FZ20 has been dressed out a little since I got it, see the following.

FYI:
Here's what I've done with my FZ20;
1st) installed one of these adapters; aluminum, very well made
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...5126 897&rd=1

2nd) bought one of these semi-fish eye lenses, with a step down ring.
http://www.adorama.com/RXMX3000.html...3000&item_no=1
http://www.adorama.com/FLD6258.html?...6258&item_no=1

The adapter lets me use 62mm filters and have a lens hood out in front of the
filter, along with letting me attach the fisheye lens. This Raynox is a pretty
decent lens, much better than I expected.
I've also got one of Raynox's 2.2X telephoto lenses coming for the long end.
(it's here)
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/cont...=337263&is=REG


Yep, I read you earlier posting with these links and have since bookmarked the
Raynox site for future reference. Their example photos are pretty exciting and
I will likely get some add-ons before my vacation to Oregon next month.

I almost bought the 8080 for its wide angle capabilities rather than the FZ20
but it was the Raynox add-ons capabilities that swayed me toward the FZ20.
Best of both worlds the way I see it.



 




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