Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX35 Digital Cameras Plus Information
The new Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX35, complete with Panasonic’s first-ever 25mm ultra-wide-lens, features 10.1-megapixel resolution, 4x optical zoom, Panasonic’s Advanced Intelligent Auto mode, a Leica DC Vario-Elmarit lens offering f2.8 brightness and the new fourth-generation high-performance image processing LSI, the Venus Engine IV.


To achieve a 25mm ultra-wide-angle lens in the slim design of the FX35, Panasonic developed a new, unevenly thick concave meniscus EA (Extra high refractive index Aspherical) lens. Working closely with Leica to meet their strict standards on lenses, the Lumix FX35’s lens compromises of seven elements in six groups, including four aspherical lenses with six aspherical surfaces.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX35 Professional Reviews:

• digitalcamerareview Reviewed the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX35 and gave out” that’s true if you read the fine print and understand Panasonic is comparing the FX35 to a 35mm-format camera with a 50mm lens. If you stack the FX35 up against another digital compact with a 28mm lens, the advantage is 3mm. While the 25mm is nice to have, it is, after all, a relatively small incremental improvement over the 27 and 28mm lenses that can be found on other competitors. The Panasonic’s lens separates itself from the crowd with largely distortion free performance, and the camera itself produces excellent image and color quality with ISO performance that looks to be typical for cameras in the class. Add to that good shutter response and decent flash recycle times, and you’ve got a camera that can more than stand on its own, 25mm lens or not.”

Main Features:

• # 10-megapixel resolution captures enough detail for poster-sized prints
• # 4x wide-angle optical zoom; Mega Optical Image Stabilized
• # 2.5-inch Intelligent LCD screen; Face Detection
• # Advanced Intelligent Auto mode
• # Captures images to SD memory cards

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX35 Customer Reviews

By Frank Frank “Frank” (Virginia)
The camera shown here has a 28mm lens. The FX35 has a 25mm lens. The only wider point and shoot camera is the Kodak v570 and v705 (hard to find).
And yes, 28 vs 25 does make a difference. Especially for real estate photography.
Frank

By Alexander S. White (Williamsburg, VA USA)

I received my camera a few days ago after deciding to buy it based on the reviews of quite a few cameras in its general class. I was looking for something quite specific - a small, easy-to-use camera with good image quality and, most particularly, the widest-angle lens I could find. I was looking for a pocket-sized camera with a wide-angle zoom starting at 28mm (in terms of equivalence to 35mm film camera lenses) when I noticed that the Lumix FX35 has a zoom range starting at 25mm. That was the main selling point for me.My main use for this camera will be for taking pictures of properties as my wife and I start looking for a new house. I have found it very helpful to have a camera that will let me get the whole front of the house and front yard in the picture without having to stand too far back. Also, for interior shots it can be difficult to capture a useful image of a room without a good wide-angle lens.

Having used the camera for a few days now, here are my impressions. I have never had a Panasonic camera before, so the camera’s controls and features were new to me. I have used mostly Canon Powershot cameras, and a few others, with somewhat different systems of menus and controls. So, my impressions are those of a first-time Panasonic user, and I can’t compare this model to previous Panasonic models or to other cameras.

This camera is very small, about 3 3/4 inches wide by 2 inches tall by 3/4 inch deep, and light. It feels solidly built and feels good in my average-sized hands. The LCD screen of 2.5 inches is not as large as those on some cameras, but is perfectly adequate. The camera has no separate viewfinder, and it can be hard to see the LCD in bright sunlight, but I found I can see enough of the image to compose the picture, even in bright sun.

I particularly like that the menu system is easier to use than the system on some other cameras. I found it to be quite intuitive and sensible, without a huge number of options to sift through. You can set the shooting mode, ISO sensitivity, backlight compensation, etc., but there is no real manual mode; the camera is essentially automatic, which is fine for my purposes.

One point confused me at first — there is a setting for “minimum shutter speed,” which is initially set to 1/8 of a second. So, when I tried to take pictures indoors with the flash forced off, the shutter closed too quickly, and the picture was always too dark. I finally realized I had to reset the minimum shutter speed to one second (its longest setting), and then I was able to take pictures indoors without flash, at least as long as there was a fair amount of ambient light.

There are several useful buttons on the back of the camera that let you control the flash, exposure compensation, macro mode, and self-timer, so you don’t have to memorize menu settings to make those adjustments, which is nice. Also, there is a “quick menu” button, which lets you get quick access to just a few of the most common adjustments while shooting, including image stablization, burst shooting mode, auto focus mode, white balance, ISO, and image quality, which is a helpful and welcome feature if you want to set up a shot rapidly without going through many menu screens. I found that the quick menu system really adds to the camera’s usefulness for everyday shooting, especially for someone like me who does not use the camera constantly, but likes to have it ready to use easily when needed.

The camera has many features, including HD video capability, which I have not tried. It sounds like a good thing to have, but as of now I haven’t had a need for it.

I tried the audio recording function, which left something to be desired. If you set the audio record function to on, then, whenever you snap a still picture, a microphone icon appears on the screen, and you have about 5 seconds to record your voice or any other sounds. I found it difficult to gauge exactly when to begin and end my talking, so my voice got cut off at times. This could be useful for quick and dirty audio notes, such as, in my case, stating the address of a house whose picture I’m taking, but it would be more useful if you had the option to start and stop the recording on your own terms, rather than being limited to the 5 seconds allowed by the camera.

The camera accepts SDHC cards, which have a capacity of up to 16 GB. I purchased a Transcend 8 GB card, which has worked fine so far. The camera also has a small internal recording capacity of about 50 MB, so you can record some pictures even if you don’t have a card, which is a nice feature. You can only use a card of up to 2 GB capacity unless it is an SDHC card.

As far as criticisms of the camera are concerned, I don’t have any really serious ones. I think it’s obvious that any camera in this class, with a fairly high mega-pixel count (10.1 in this case) and a small image sensor is going to have some compromises. The image quality is perfectly adequate for my needs, and the pictures look great to me, though I’m not scrutinizing them from a technical point of view. There is a noticeable increase in image noise at ISO 400 and above, but if that’s not a big issue for you, the pictures are still fine records of what you snapped; there just is a little fuzziness. The lens has a maximum opening of f/2.8, so you can set the ISO to 100 when shooting outdoors and get good results in most cases. (Oddly, the minimum aperture is f/5.6, so there is not much of a range in lens openings. I don’t know how that compares to other cameras nowadays; that just seems strange compared to lenses I used in the past with openings down to f/22.) The manual suggests you use the “natural” color mode setting to minimize the effects of the noise.

Overall, I’m very glad I found this model, and will be sticking with it for the foreseeable future. It has several other features I have not experimented with, such as face-detection, red-eye prevention, and “intelligent auto mode.” Those might be added reasons to get this camera, but for me, I am very pleased that the camera feels solid, is very easy to use to take pictures quickly, yields excellent images, and, most importantly, has the great wide-angle lens. I am giving it four stars instead of five only because of the noisy images at ISO 400 and above. That’s not a big issue for me, and I believe it’s an issue with other cameras in this class as well, but it’s something you should be aware of.

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