Review Date: September 24, 2012
Category: Beginner to Serious Amateur
Photoxels Gold Award – Superzoom
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This Panasonic FZ200 Review is based on a production model. All sample images are unretouched, except where specified.
Super zoom powerhouse. Like the FZ150 before it, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ200 packs a punch in a DSLR-styled digital camera with features that should appeal to everyone and especially two groups: students of photography who need a camera with all the important manual functions, ultra wide-angle and super tele focal lengths; and travel photographers who want to capture shots ranging from 1 cm macro closeups, wide vistas and bring far away subjects close. All of that in one well-designed and solidly constructed camera.
The Panasonic FZ200 handles beautifully with a deep handgrip and control buttons and dials for the important functions. The large 3.0-in. Free-angle LCD with a 460k-dot resolution is clear and bright. The lens has the convenient Power Zoom lever on the side that is becoming a staple on Panasonic lenses. New on the FZ200 is a lens with a bright maximum F2.8 aperture throughout the whole zoom range.
Image quality for a small sensor camera is very good up to ISO 400 with ISO 800 and 1600 very usable. Get creative with Creative Control, Photo Style, and 3D Photo Mode. Continuous Shooting is 12fps at full resolution.
The FZ200 shoots Full HD Movie 1920 x 1080/60p with stereo sound. You can select your preferred shooting mode: iA, PASM, Scene mode and even Creative modes for movie recording. High-speed videos at 120fps in HD or 240fps in VGA allows slow motion playback. You can also take still images (3.5-megapixel at 16:9) without interrupting video recording.
The Panasonic FZ200 is a well-featured super zoom camera that both beginners and serious amateur photographers will enjoy using. But it’s not just features for the sake of it; all of them work very well, giving you the confidence that every picture you take has the potential of being a keeper. Highly recommended.
Next: Panasonic FZ200 Image Quality
