Panasonic 6MP Digital Camera with 12x Zoom - Black (Dmc-Fz7k)

Panasonic 6MP Digital Camera with 12x Zoom - Black (Dmc-Fz7k)
Manufacturer: Panasonic
Product Type: Photography

Panasonic DMC-FZ7 6MP Digital Camera with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Black)

Average customer rating:

VERY nice!!! Great buy!
Great value for camera.
a superb digital camera
Great camera for the money!
Panasonic DMC-FZ7 digital camera

Panasonic DMC-FZ7 6MP Digital Camera with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Black)

Manufacturer: Panasonic
ProductGroup: Photography
Binding: Electronics

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Panasonic CGR-S006A/1B Li-ion Battery for Panasonic FZ50, FZ7 and FZ30 Digital Cameras
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Product Features:

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 432mm on a 35mm film camera lens) with aperture of F2.8 to 3.3 & 4x digital zoom
Compact 6mp camera with Mega Optical Image Stabilization which addresses "anti-blu" of hand & subject movement
LSI Venus engine II handles image processing, LCD functions, & writing to the memory card simultaneously for incredible responsiveness
Five software packages included, comes with battery charger& pack, 16MB Sd memoery card, AV cable, USB connection cable, AC cable, strap, CD Rom, Lens cap, lens hood, & lens hood adaptor

ASIN: B000EBK3FW

Customer Reviews:

VERY nice!!! Great buy!.......2007-06-12

It has been 5 years since I have bought a digital.

After WEEKS of research and ALOT of backtracking on reviews, specs etc. I narrowed my options between this and a Canon PowerShot Pro Series S3 IS.

Let me begin by saying that for the price, you can not beat this camera.

If you want a SUPER awesome camera that is TRUE professional quality, then you HAVE to go with a $800.00 and above SLR.

THIS camer however comes pretty close.

My ONLY dissapointment is that cameras in this level still do not have flawless crsytal clear images, but as I said, if you want PERFECT you have to get an SLR.

As far as choosing between this and the Canon PowerShot Pro Series S3 IS the deal breaker for me was the price. I did not see much of a difference in quality. Perhaps the Canon is slightly better, but in my opinion not so much that I would pay nearly $100.00 more.

This camera sports a VERY highly regarded lens and name brand.

The ease of features and point and shoot settings are amazing and deliver great photos.

As for night pics, it all depends just like every other camera. You want perect, use a tripod. Period.

Battery life is very good and speed of shooting is exceptional as well as the zoom and high pixel count.

ANOTHER great feature is that there are several attachable lenses you can buy. This camera ALREADY comes with an adaptor and lens hood! Super deal!

Really, if you want to spend under $300.00 and have a really nice high quality camera rather than a simple pocket sized point and shoot, DEFINATELY buy this camera!

Hope this helps.

Great value for camera........2007-06-08

I especially like the zoom - it's like having a zoom and macro all in one. The stabilization feature works well. There's lots of features, so I still am exploring the depth of features. Would buy this one again.

a superb digital camera.......2007-05-31

This camera is superb! lens by Leica - the best. 35-420 optical zoom. small and lightweight yet sturdy. large LCD. eyepiece for SLR-like LCD viewing. anti-shake mechanism. 6mp is more than enough for anyone. I still also have my Panasonic Lumix LC70 with the 3 x optical leica lens at 4mp. 4mp was excellent for all the cropping and blowing up I did in my photo journalism essays the last 3 years. 6mp is even deeper - or is it just that I am now shooting at 100 ISI instead of 400?
Great price too!

Great camera for the money!.......2007-05-26

I'm thrilled with this camera. I'd been a Canon user before this, mainly the little pocket cameras, but now, I have my panasonic and have done some great photos with it.

Panasonic DMC-FZ7 digital camera.......2007-05-17

The camera is a little more complicated that i expected. It does take nice pictures but you might need a little time to read and learn all of the details before you use it.

Panasonic 6MP Digital Camera with 12x Zoom - Black (Dmc-Fz7k)

Average customer rating:

Great Camera for Pix and Video

Panasonic 6MP Digital Camera with 12x Zoom - Black (Dmc-Fz7k)

Manufacturer: Panasonic
ProductGroup: Photography
Binding: Electronics

All Panasonic | Panasonic | Camera & Photo Brands | Camera & Photo Features | Electronics

Digital Cameras | Used Photo & Camera | Specialty Stores | Camera & Photo Features | Electronics

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Product Features:

Point & Shoot Digital Camera Compatible with MultiMediaCard (M), Secure Digital Memory Card
6.0MP for Clear Cropping and Printing up to 11x17"
2.5 " LCD Screen Features Histogram Display to Judge Shot Brightness, Auto Amplification to Brighten Screen in Low Light, Single Image Playback, Indoor/Outdoor Display for Sharper Images
12x Optical Zoom for Extreme Close-Ups from Afar; 4x Digital Zoom for Minor Cropping
Shooting Modes: Shooting Assist Functions, Macro, Infinity
15 Scene Modes ; Still Shot Modes: Fireworks, Child, Automatic Shooting Mode, Landscape, Night Portrait, Sport, Underwater, Snow
Features Direct Print Feature, Self-Timer, PictBridge Enabled, Electronic Viewfinder (EFV) to Preview the Scene, ISO Auto, Simple Button Layout
Lens-Focus Features: Seamless Zoom, LEICA DC Vario-Elmarit Lens
Additional Functions: Video Capture
Image Editing: Image Rotation, Mega Optical Image Stabilization, On-Camera Cropping; Movie Modes: VGA-Quality Movie Recording, Movie
Flash Modes: Red-Eye Reduction, Built-In Flash, Autoflash, Slow-Sync Flash Improves Night Photos, Foreced Red-Eye Reduction
Shutter-Priority, Manual, Aperture-Priority, Programmed Photo Effects
File Format Compatibility: JPEG File Format
White Balance: Daylight, White Set, Cloudy, Automatic, Halogen for Adjusting Light

ASIN: B000FDN0VI

Customer Reviews:

Great Camera for Pix and Video.......2006-07-03

I don't need a professional quality camera, nor a "prosumer" model as I want a camera I can easily put in my fanny pack along with some trail mix and a flashlight and hit the trail or tourist spots. This is a nice relatively small camera that has a powerful 12x zoom. I've attached my pix of a semi taken at regular and 12x to give an idea of the distance you can be from your subject and still take a great picture.

I purchased Panasonic's first iteration of this camera, the FZ1, a couple years ago. It was less than 3mp, but that was fine for printing 5x7 (and even up to 8x10). Here's why: the first mark of a good camera is not the megapixel count, but the lens that lets the light in. Four companies make great camera lenses. They are Zeiss, Leica, Nikon and Canon. Nikon and Canon of course make cameras. Certain Sony cameras use Zeiss lenses. Leica makes its own cameras, but Panasonic was able to persuade them to design a set of lenses that Panasonic can use (I imagine in return Panasonic takes care of the digital components and manufacturing for Leica's own series of digital cameras). Although common in video cameras Panasonic was (from what I've read at least) the first to bring image stabilization technology to ordinary digital cameras (despite Canon having developed this for certain of its telephoto L-series lenses and awesome binoculars). Thank goodness! It's vital for zooming as handshake will really spoil many shots.

So anyway, as should now be obvious, a buyer's first consideration should be the quality of the lens as that's what lets the light through and permits focusing on the image. Then is image stabilization. Don't leave home without it (in this respect the reviews I've read say you should set the image stabilization feature to only come on when the picture is being taken rather than keeping it always on). Only after those two features should you think about megapixels. That's why I was perfectly happy having my FZ1 even though it only had 2.1 megapixels. The wonderful Leica lens let in plenty of light and color even at zoom and macro. (TIP: if you're planning to print at 5x7, you can set your image resolution to only 3-4 megapixels rather than the full 6 megapixels and that will allow you to take more pix on the same size memory card while still getting enough resolution in almost all instances to print excellently for 5x7 and more than enough for e-mail or a webpage.)

What I didn't like about the FZ1, however, was the poor quality of the video. That's why when I read that Panasonic had doubled the video quality in the FZ7 and the TZ1 I went and bought a new camera. First I bought the TZ1 as it's even smaller than the FZ1 and it can fit in an off the shelf camera case, but it's only 10x and I just wanted 12x. Now I've got what I want. Hurrah!

In addition to what is now really great Quicktime video (only $30 to download the Quicktime editor from Apple so you can stitch together video segments), you can now select the aspect ratio to either the usual format (4:3) or a panorama format (16:9). Hurrah again!

It's also got a much larger LCD screen so it's much easier to frame shots than it was before.

There's more I could write about the great stuff, but this should suffice. Here's what I feel there is to not like for the average person. First, there's still no good camera case for this camera. It's absolutely shocking to me that the only case I've seen from Panasonic is one in which you stuff the camera in sideways (this is a really easy to fix screwup and they should probably hire Lowe to design a nice camera bag for this). I don't mind putting this camera in my fanny pack (I've done it for almost 2 years with the FZ1 without incident) but I would spend the money for a nice case that fit snugly so Panasonic is just leaving money on the table by not doing so.

Second, I don't understand why I can't zoom in and out when taking video. The Sony H2 reportedly will do this and is also 12x zoom with a Zeiss lens and image stabilization (having just bought the FZ7, I may exchange).

Third, in low light you will get grainier pictures than you might with some other cameras. If you're planning on taking mostly interior night club shots you'll definitely want a different camera (a "prosumer" or better that you can add a more powerful flash too). For me, not a problem. For you, maybe, depends on who you are.

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