review Panasonic Lumix ZS100 / TZ100

Panasonic Lumix ZS100 / TZ100

The Pansonic ZS100 offers great blend of quality, size and features for people who want better photos and are willing to trade off a little quality for a lot of lens.

Equally as important as the stills and video components, the ZS100 is also characterized by its intuitive physical design and inclusion of both an electronic viewfinder and rear LCD screen. The Live View Finder is a 1,166k-dot EVF that affords comfortable eye-level monitoring, and is especially well-suited to working in bright conditions. Contrasting this is the large rear 3.0" 1.04m-dot LCD touchscreen, which is best-suited for clear image review, menu navigation, and live view shooting. The camera body is also accentuated by a range of manual control dials, such as a lens-surrounding configurable control ring for direct control over zoom, focus, or exposure settings. Additionally, built-in Wi-Fi allows you to pair the ZS100 with a smartphone or tablet for wireless image sharing and remote camera control via the Panasonic Image app.

Pixels	Actual: 20.9 Megapixel Effective: 20.1 Megapixel
Sensor	1" MOS
File Formats	Still Images: JPEG, RAW Movies: AVCHD Ver. 2.0, MP4 Audio: AAC, Dolby Digital 2ch
Max Resolution	20 MP: 5472 x 3648
Aspect Ratio	1:1, 3:2, 4:3, 16:9
Image Stabilization	Optical & Mechanical, 5-Way

Optics
Lens	Leica DC Vario-Elmarit, 12 elements in 10 groups 5 Aspherical EFL: 9.1-91mm (35 mm equivalent: 25-250mm) Aperture: f/2.8 (W) - 5.9 (T) to f/8
Zoom	Optical: 10x Extra Optical Zoom (EZ): 14x Extra Optical Zoom (EZ): 20x Intelligent Zoom: 20x Digital: 4x
Focus Range	Wide: 1.64' (50 cm) - Infinity Telephoto: 2.30' (70 cm) - Infinity Wide Macro: 2.0" (5 cm) - Infinity

Exposure Control
ISO Sensitivity	Auto, 125-12800 (Extended Mode: 80-25600)
Shutter	Type: Mechanical Speed: 60 - 1/2000 Second Type: Electronic Speed: 1 - 1/16000 Second 120 - 0 Second in Time Mode
Exposure Metering	Center-Weighted, Multi, Spot
Exposure Modes	Modes: Aperture Priority, Manual, Program, Shutter Priority Compensation: -5 EV to +5 EV (in 1/3 EV Steps)
White Balance Modes	Auto, Cloudy, Color Temperature, Daylight, Flash, Incandescent, Shade, White Set 1, White Set 2, White Set 3, White Set 4
Buffer/Continuous Shooting	Up to 50 fps at 20.1 MP Up to 10 fps at 20.1 MP Up to 6 fps at 20.1 MP Up to 2 fps at 20.1 MP Up to 30 fps at 8 MP
Self-Timer	2, 10 Seconds

Flash
Flash Modes	Auto Auto/Red-Eye Reduction Forced On Forced On/Red-Eye Reduction Off Slow Sync Slow Sync/Red-Eye Reduction
Built-In Flash	Yes
Maximum Effective Flash Range	Wide: 1.97 - 26.25' (0.6 - 8 m) Telephoto: 2.30 - 12.47' (0.7 - 3.8 m)

Memory
Memory Card Type	SD SDHC SDXC

Recording
Video Recording	Yes, NTSC
Resolution	3840 x 2160p: 30 fps, 24 fps 1920 x 1080p: 60 fps, 30 fps, 24 fps 1920 x 1080i: 60 fps 1280 x 720p: 30 fps 640 x 480p: 30 fps

Video
Video Clip Length	Up to 29 Min 59 Sec
Audio Recording	Built-In Mic: With Video (Stereo)

Viewfinder/Display
Viewfinder Type	Electronic
Viewfinder Coverage	100%
Screen	3.0" LCD Rear Touch Screen (1,040,000 pixels)
Screen Coverage	100%

Connectivity/System Requirements
Connectivity	HDMI D (Micro), Micro-USB, USB 2.0
Wi-Fi	Yes, 802.11b/g/n built-in

Power
Battery	1 x Rechargeable Lithium-Ion Battery Pack, 7.2 VDC, 1025 mAh

Physical
Dimensions (W x H x D)	4.4 x 2.5 x 1.7" / 110.5 x 64.5 x 44.3 mm
Weight	11.005 oz / 312 g with battery and memory card

Packaging Info
Package Weight	1.15 lb
Box Dimensions (LxWxH)	5.4 x 5.0 x 2.6"

Design

A Live View Finder (LVF) is integrated into the sleek body design to permit comfortable eye-level monitoring. This electronic viewfinder has a 1,166k-dot resolution and covers 100% of the image frame while shooting.

Alternatively, a rear 3.0" 1.04m-dot touchscreen LCD monitor is also available for live view shooting, image review, and intuitive menu navigation.

A host of manual controls offer simple, direct control over a variety of oft-used camera settings, including a control ring surrounding the lens that can be configured to adjust zoom, shutter speed, manual focus, and ISO sensitivity.

Built-in Wi-Fi allows you to wirelessly share photos and movies to linked smartphones and tablets for direct sharing online. A QR code system of pairing makes it simple to link mobile devices and, once paired, the device can also be used to remotely control the camera via the Panasonic Image app.

Photo and video quality

Its 4K video is excellent for point-and-shoot purposes, though you do see visual noise in low light and slight movements of the camera produce wobble, which is pretty typical.

A lot depends upon how far you're zoomed in and what aperture is set in addition to the typical factor of the ISO sensitivity setting. The lens doesn't seem to be particularly sharp in general, with more than usual distortion around the edges. And at the longer zoom and narrow apertures -- essentially from f4 to f8 -- photos get a lot softer. You reach those apertures very fast; it reaches f4.1 by the time you hit 50mm. And that's the tradeoff for the benefits of a 10x zoom. As long as you're not scrutinizing the photos at full size, though, I think you'll find it worth the slight sharpness sacrifice.

There's a Diffraction Compensation setting which theoretically counteracts the softening effects of the narrowed aperture, but since the only choices are auto or off, it's impossible to tell whether it's actually doing anything.

In bright light JPEGs look very good; as the light dims, they start to look very smeary. Keep in mind that in low light (i.e., at high ISO sensitivities) for any camera, out-of-focus areas start to degrade a lot faster than those in focus. So the ZS100's naturally soft photos start to show artifacts in low light faster than ones shot with a better lens. Color and exposure look pleasing, though.

You can get better results in low light by shooting raw -- in some cases, without even doing anything to the file other than opening it and saving as a JPEG. That's because raw avoids Panasonic's aggressive processing.

VERDICT

The Lumix ZS100 (known as the TZ100 outside the US) is a big step forward for Panasonic's travel cameras, and brings an interesting new proposition into the one-inch sensor market – a pocket-sized camera with a 10x zoom range. For many, this might be the perfect compact camera.

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