Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10S 4MP Digital Camera w/ 12x Optical Zoom (Silver)

Rating:
Summary: A great piece of engineering!
Review: When Panasonic released this camera in the fall of 2003, I couldn't wait for it to be available for sale. A couple of months passed and it was completely sold out even before it was available anywhere on the market. At that point, I couldn't wait and I contacted a Panasonic dealer and reserved one right away. I was on the waiting list for 2 more months and I finally got it in Jan 2004. A 12x stabilized optical zoom at that time was unheard of on a consumer camera. It was awesome! I could take pictures at full 12X without a tripod and the stabilizer made sure the pictures were perfect. For $599 it was the best digital camera out there. It has almost been a year since I bought this camera and I am still in love with it; but I wish I had waited. When Panasonic came out with the same camera but with a 5.0 mega pixels at the same price earlier this year, I was kicking myself for being so impulsive. Nevertheless, it is a great piece of engineering. The camera feels like a tank- very solid but not all that heavy at the same time. I have captured some of the most amazing pictures with this camera, which I will treasure for the rest of my life.

If you don't really care about all the features and just want a small digital camera to carry around and snap pictures with, I wouldn't recommend this camera for you. This is more like a camera you would want to take to your trip to the Grand Canyon and capture the breath taking shots or the perfect sunset that you always wanted to capture and have it blown up. There are so many features in this camera, it will take a good couple of weeks for you to read the manual and get used to them.

I am not going to list all the features this camera has; you can read about them on the product description page or you can go to the Panasonic homepage and get a more detailed description of all the cool features you can find in this camera. However, I do want to make a couple of points:

This camera uses a Leica lens. For those of you who are not familiar with this brand, Leica Camera AG is a world-renowned German camera and lens maker. Just the name Leica, in the photography world, is synonymous with durability, quality, and optical precision. Leica makes lenses that cost thousands of dollars for high-end professional cameras so for Leica to feature its lens in this Panasonic camera tells it all.

One thing a lot of people don't look at when they are buying a digital camera is if you can add additional lenses and filters like you can with a 35mm SLR. Although a 12X optical zoom (equivalent to a 36mm to 432mm in a 35mm camera) will be more than enough for most of us, some of us might want to add conversion or teleconversion lenses or filters and YES you can with this camera. Let me give you an example of what a 12X zoom can do: How many times have u been to a NFL or a baseball game and have taken pictures only to find out that you can't even make out what number jersey a player is wearing when u get the pictures? Well, with this camera, I have been talking pictures at games and let me tell you, they are just amazing! Besides all the close-up shots of all my favorite players, I could even capture those priceless facial expressions when someone makes a hit or at that moment when a receiver catches the ball for a touchdown.... it's truly amazing!

You cannot go wrong with this camera!