Author: alex

Fujifilm announces new 15x travel zoom: Finepix F305EXR (aka F300EXR)

This has been a busy week for new camera announcements. Following Panasonic’s stream of new cameras, both Fujifilm and Samsung have announced a number of new models.

Fujifilm’s new F305EXR (called the F300EXR in Europe I believe) looks like a very competitive travel-zoom camera. The F305EXR packs an incredible 15x zoom into a very compact body, while still achieving the widest angle lens out there of 24mm, (compared to the 28mm of the Canon SX210). It also features a high resolution 460k dots large 3″ screen.

The F305EXR faces stiff competition among other travel zooms, most importantly the ZS7 from Panasonic and Canon’s SX210 IS.

Fujifilm F305EXR vs Panasonic DMC-ZS7

  • The F305EXR has more zoom (15x vs 12x)
  • The F305EXR higher ISO sensitivity, hopefully indicative of lower noise at high ISO
  • The ZS7 features optical lens image stabilization, which likely will allow you take photos at even slower shutter speeds without blur than the F305EXR’s sensor shift image stabilzation
  • The ZS7 also has a built in GPS, great for geotagging photos

See a detailed comparison of the F305EXR vs the DMC-ZS7 at Snapsort.

Fujfilm F305EXR vs Canon SX210 IS

  • The F305EXR higher ISO sensitivity, hopefully indicative of lower noise at high ISO
  • As mentioned above, the Canon SX210 IS doesn’t have a very wide lens, only 28mm, unlike the ultra-wide 24mm of the F305EXR
  • The F305EXR has a much higher resolution screen than the SX210, making it much easier to see the quality and focus of your images as you take them
  • Similar to the ZS7, the SX210 has optical image stabilization built into the lens, whereas the F305EXR has sensor-shift image stabilization

See a detailed comparison of the F305EXR vs the SX210 IS at Snapsort.

Source: http://www.fujifilm.com/products/digital_cameras/f/finepix_f300exr/

New compact f/2.2, 1080p HD, Lumix DMC-FX700 with touchscreen from Panasonic

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX700

This is starting to look like a Panasonic news blog. It looks like Panasonic accidentally leaked details of 4 new cameras on its tech support website, and has now pulled those pages, but they are still available in google’s cache. I previously covered news of the new f/2.0 pro digicam LX5 (replacement for the LX3) and
two new 24x super-zooms.

The new Lumix DMC-FX700 has some hot features including a 3″ touchscreen, a huge and bright f/2.2 aperture, full 1080p HD video, and blazing fast continuous shooting up to 10fps.

The FX700 looks like a replacement for the FX580, but with 1080p video instead of 720p, a wider aperture (f/2.2 instead of f/2.8), addition of a touchscreen, and faster continuous shooting. See a full comparison of the FX700 vs FX580 at Snapsort.

The FX700 looks like a good competitor to the Canon S90 and an alternative to Panasonic’s own LX3, if you’re looking for a small camera with a wide aperture. See FX700 vs S90 and FX700 vs LX3.

New super-zooms from Panasonic: Lumix DMC-FZ100 and DMC-FZ40

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ40
Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ100

Along with the leak of the LX5, Panasonic has also accidentally leaked news of two new super-zooms, both featuring huge 24x zoom, the Lumix DMC-FZ40 (aka DMC-FZ45 in europe) and the Lumix DMC-FZ100.

These look like replacements for the DMC-FZ35 and DMC-FZ28, both with only 18x zoom. Both of the new super-zooms shoot RAW which is a great feature for those looking to correct white balance or fix exposure in post production, and shoot HD video.

Key differences:

  • The FZ100 shoots full 1080p video, whereas the FZ40 only shoots 720p
  • The FZ100 has a higher resolution screen (460k dots vs 230k dots), but, the FZ40 features a touchscreen, which is the first ever super-zoom with a touch screen we’ve seen
  • The FZ100 also shoots stills at a blazing 10fps, it looks like the FZ40 will do as fast as 6fps perhaps with some resolution limitations

Detailed comparisons at Snapsort:

Also, checkout the full lineup of Panasonic super-zooms.

New Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 confirmed

Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 Black
Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 White

Panasonic has leaked details of the Lumix DMC-LX5. This is the much anticipated replacement of the Lumix DMC-LX3.

Like the LX3, the new LX5 features a larger than average sensor (8x6mm rather than the standard 6x4mm), a very wide aperture of f/2.0 and 720p HD video (now with AVCHD).

The LX5 has a few key improvements:

  • More zoom: 3.8x (24-90mm) vs 2.5x (24-60mm)
  • Faster burst (6fps with some limitations vs 2.5fps, even up to 10fps at lower resolutions)
  • Uses the new AVCHD codec (in addition to Motion JPEG)
  • ISO up to 12,800 (vs 6,400) which hopefully indicates some image quality improvements in the new sensor

I expect it will retail initially for about USD $500, and will be available in both black and white in the US. See Panasonic’s specs page for more details.

Here are some preliminary details about the LX5 at Snapsort:

Also, you can browse other pro digicams at Snapsort. This may mean we’ll see a D-LUX 5 from Leica, since the D-LUX 4 is Leica’s version of the LX3.

Incredible concert photos with the Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS3 (aka DMC-TZ7)

Panasonic Lumic DMC-ZS3

The Lumix DMC-ZS3 from Panasonic (aka the DMC-TS7 in Europe) is one of the most popular cameras at Snapsort, and for good reason: very few camera’s its size have as much zoom (12x) while still having a good wide-angle lens (25mm), let alone also do 720p HD video and overall great pictures.

Here are some great photos taken by Wonker at concerts.  Taking good photos at a concert is one of the most challenging tasks for a camera because you’re often far away from the performer, there isn’t much light, and to get an awesome shot you have to turn off the flash so you capture the mood and lighting of the even.

  • f/3.3
  • 25mm
  • 1/20s
  • 800 ISO

This shot (above) was taken at 25mm (you can’t really go wider with a point and shoot, some do 24mm which is only slightly wider), and really puts the concert in context, I love the curve of the dome above which seems to frame the stadium below.

To be able to take a good photo in the dark like this, the photographer used ISO 800 and the f/3.3 (the fastest aperture the camera shoots), and 1/20s shutter speed, probably the minimum shutter he could use without introducing blur from camera shake. The ZS3 seems to do a decent job at ISO 800, if he’d left it at ISO 100, his shutter would have been 0.4s, which would have required a tripod.

  • f/4.9
  • 200mm
  • 1/250s
  • 320 ISO

Here the photographer got up nice and close using 200mm (about 8x zoom). If you only had a 3x or 5x zoom you couldn’t get a shot like this (unless you were really close to the action!)

 

  • f/4.3
  • 100mm
  • 1/25s
  • 800 ISO

From the same concert as the shot above, this time using a high ISO again to make sure he avoids blur from camera shake.

Learn more at Snapsort