Roundup: Compact Digital Cameras : Panasonic DMC-LX3
33. Panasonic DMC-LX3
Optical Viewfinder: Stylish but Pricey
Straight out of the box, the LX3 sports something of a retro look.
On top of that, though, you can also add an optical viewfinder onto the hot shoe, which makes the camera look almost comically old-fashioned.
That's about all it's good for though, as it only works with the 24-mm wide angle lens and is only reasonably precise.
Sold as an optional extra, this showy accessory will set you back 150 euros (200 USD / 115 GBP)
Almost two years after their last efforts, Panasonic has refreshed its selection of top-end digital compact cameras with the new Lumix LX3. The company had plenty of time to add new features, including a wide-angle lens and HD video, which should prove attractive to skilled photographers and beginners after a touch of style alike.
Handling
- Lumix DMC-LX3 Silver...
Our first impressions of the LX3 didn't disappoint. For a compact, the camera's metal case is a little large, but easy to grip. The build quality is excellent, and the solid frame, which weighs in just over 10-oz., is largely reassuring apart from a few nagging details.
First, the access to both the battery and the memory card slot seems a little too flimsy. Second, the plastic scroll wheel is a disappointing contrast to the high quality material used elsewhere. There's also a small bulge on the right hand side that makes gripping the camera easy, even if we have seen more ergonomic handles on other similar cameras.
Inerface
There's nothing outstanding about the interface on the LX3: the menus are fairly standard, and are manipulated using a directional control on the back of the camera. Some well-placed shortcuts, including a button that automatically activates AutoFocus directly from manual mode, make life easier. A joystick is used to control the Q.Menu feature, which groups the most useful settings for taking photos in the various semi-manual modes.
Controlling the settings with a joystick--rather than a wheel--takes a little getting used to, but it's still not as a useful as a click wheel. An LCD screen, measuring a handsome three inches from corner to corner, sports 460,000 pixels to produce a very detailed image. In low light, it can seem jerky, but of more pressing concern is the glossy screen, which makes it hard to use the camera effectively in bright sunlight.
Another disappointment is the LX3's sluggish response: you'll need to wait about two seconds before you can take your first photo. Once things get going though, the nifty AutoFocus gets straight to the point in less than a second.
Image QualityPanasonic has decided not to chase headlines, and the LX3 comes with only 10 Megapixels. However, the manufacturer's engineers have succeded in increasing the surface area of the sensor by 19-percent, meaning the LX3 delivers excellent quality photos. Indeed, it's one of the few models in Panasonic's catalogue to make it up 3200 ISO.
In practice, though, we found adventures above 800 ISO were a little trying because, despite the presence of a new Venus Engine 4 processor, electronic noise handling is not where the LX3 excels. Nevertheless, the results are far from disastrous: at 800 ISO, prints on A4 are completely reasonable, but at 1600 ISO, graininess appears in dark areas. It's rare that you'll need to use these fast shutter speeds, though, given the optical image stabilization and the fast lens.
There's very little distortion on the lens (even at 24-mm), with only minimal vignetting and chromatic aberration. A 24-60 mm zoom on the fast lens (f/2-2.8) gives excellent results. Automatic white balancing is well handled, but some images are all a little too warm under tungsten lights--a classic problem with digital compacts. If you are using RAW mode, it's easy to get around these faults.
Finally: video, where the LX3 also excels. Capturing 1280 x 720p HD clips, the detail was always going to be excellent, but scenes could be a bit more fluid. In low light, the image billows a little too rapidly, and it's a shame you can't use the optical zoom while recording.
Using the fast lens, it's possible to get a sharp image in just one tenth of second at 200 ISO.
| Panasonic DMC-LX3 | |
|---|---|
| Pluses | Minuses |
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| The Panasonic LX3 achieves the rare feat of excelling in both form and function. A well-crafted object, it performs well enough to win over photography fans as well as aesthetes. Fast wide angle lens, manual modes and HD video all put it ahead of the competition... for the time being, at least. |  |
should have classified the cameras to at least price and/or final rating. i got discouraged to read.
should have classified the cameras to at least price and/or final rating. i got discouraged to read.
When you say classified, what do you mean? Do you mean the pages should go in order of price, or in order of rating? Such as the cheap ones at the beginning and the expensive ones at the end OR the best cameras at the top and the worst cameras at the bottom?
i meant group them by chosen price ranges/brackets or any feature you think is relevant since comparison between cameras is just difficult with the present format wherein it is only possible to compare models of a certain brand.
It would have been nice if all the cameras were given scores (yes I know this is very subjective, but so are all the comments and pro/con sections). Idealy they would be given su scores as well (i.e. a still picture score, a video score, a asthetics score, a usablity score, maybe some others) and then the cameras could be sorted by those scores with links, maybey a short blurb at each camera in the sorted list. Another thing that would be very usefull to myself and I assume other readers is a features table that allows us to compare all the cameras.