Gordon Laing of CameraLabs.com reviews the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 digital camera.  The FX30 is an ultra compact digital camera with 7.1 megapixels of resolution and 3.6x optical zoom.  The range is equivalent to 28-100mm providing nice wide angle and telephoto views.  This camera at the time of this writing is the slimmest digital camera with a 28mm wide angle lens.  It is also slim enough you can comfortably carry around in your pocket.

The FX30 has a 2.5″ LCD screen that is bright and clear.  The metallic body has a nice, solid feel and the camera’s controls are simple and clutter free.  Gordon gives you a nice tour of the camera, menu system and demonstrates the image stabilization mode and other features of the camera.

Overall the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 is a nice compact digital camera, but every camera has some kind of down side to it.  The downside of this camera has to do with image noise when you zoom in on your photos after downloading them to your computer.  But, image noise is common with compact digital cameras and if you’re picky in this area, you should consider a digital SLR.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 in depth reviews and sample photos:

CameraLabs Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 review
DigiCamReview Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 review
Megapixel Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 review

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 sample photos at Flickr
Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 sample photos at Pbase

Gordon Laing of CameraLabs.com reviews the Panasonic DMC-FZ8 digital camera, their newest super zoom digital camera.  The FZ8 is the successor to the FZ7, has 7.2 megapixels of resolution, 12x optical zoom and built in image stabilization.

The Panasonic DMC-FZ8 has a 2.5″ LCD screen that is very sharp.  It’s optical zoom lens doesn’t extend too much keeping it compact.  It also comes with a lens hood.  Gordon demonstrates the FZ8 showing you the image stabilization feature and gives you a tour of the menu system.  The FZ8 has plenty of manual controls if you like adjusting settings - but also has excellent automatic settings as well.

On the down side, noise levels can be a bit high while using the FZ8 at higher ISO’s (200 and above) that may smear out fine detail in your pictures.  The Panasonic DMC-FZ8 is has an excellent price, currently averaging around $350.00 in the U.S. which is about half as much as competing super zoom digital cameras.

Panasonic DMC-FZ8 in depth reviews and sample photos:

CameraLabs Panasonic DMC-FZ8 review
DPReview Panasonic DMC-FZ8 review
DigitalCameraInfo Panasonic DMC-FZ8 review
Steve’s Digicams Panasonic DMC-FZ8 review

Sample Photos:

Panasonic DMC-FZ8 sample photos at Flickr
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 sample photos at Pbase