Customer Reviews:
 A fantastic buy for the money August 17, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
The quality of the camera makes this a purchase on which you can't go wrong.
Great camera! Great seller! August 17, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Received camera on time, good seller to do business with.
Camera is just great so far. Some people complain about the audio sounding muffled but might not realize the microphone is on the top left where many people automatically place their finger. Just be careful for this spot. Great camera, in love with the video quality for the price!
Excellent Point & Shoot August 15, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
As a REALTOR, this camera allows me to take any shot of any room or house whether or not there is adequate lighting. The 28mm wide angle is certainly noticeable when standing at a doorway of a 10x10 room. The Zoom is wonderful when standing on a corner of a 5 acre lot.
Simply put, an outstanding camera! August 15, 2008
14 out of 14 found this review helpful
I wanted to get a camera that was closer to a DLSR in quality and features, but that wasn't bulky. I wanted to get a camera that I could not only use casually at home and around town, but also on vacation where I tend to take a greater variety of camera shots. The TZ5 checked all the boxes and then some!
Other reviews compare it to the Canon sd870is and other cameras so I won't go into that here. Here's how I see it:
Pros:
- The lens and 10x optical zoom. Simply fantastic. I know, you may think you don't need the zoom. And I agree, for the most part, you probably don't. I'm certainly no professional photographer, but I thought about it, and those occassions when I do need more than your standard 3-4x zoom actually comes up more often than I would have thought - whether video taping an at bat for a baseball game or taking a close up photo from a moderate distance. And since I bought it, I have wound up using the zoom far more than I would have expected. Particularly in the 5-8x range for a variety of shots. This is key since many other comparable cameras only have zoom up to 4x.
- The wide angle! This is my first wide angle camera and boy does it make a difference from your standard point and shoot! I won't go back. It's more than just getting more into a shot, in many cases, its the difference between getting a shot framed properly or not. Getting the whole background or building or whatever into the shot or not.
- Pre-set camera modes are great. The TZ5 has 15+ pre-set camera modes that really are great for different environments. What's even better is that you can set two of those modes into the dial at top for quick access. This way, you don't have to keep adjusting the mode for each shot. For instance, at night, I pre-set the dial at top to "candle light" and "night portrait" and can quickly take shots that way.
- Great picture quality. I've read various commentary on the superiority of the Canon picture. I haven't done side by side comparisons but what I can say is that I've taken a lot of photos and am very satisfied. And anyways, I'm skeptical of some of these side by side comparisons on photo quality. So much of a photo is the setting, light, etc that you shouldn't be using the "standard auto setting" to get the best picture regardless. I doubt those comparisons adjusted each camera appropriately for each shot.
- Crisp, large 3" LCD screen. This is one of the primary differences between the TZ4 (comes with 2.5" screen) and TZ5.
- Long exposure shots are really, really cool. This camera takes amazing low light, night time shots. The exposure is 15 or 30 seconds but literally (if you don't move for that long), you can get AMAZING night time shots without a flash and with really cool light effects.
- Very cool "burst shooting". This is indespensible for action or fast moving shots. You can do normal burst shooting of any camera setting at about 2.5-3 pics/second and you can do it continuously! You can also do a high-burst at 6 pics/second at 2 megapixel quality. I got great shots diving off a boat in mid-air with this.
- For the lens and quality it's relatively compact. While its bigger than your standard compact point and shoot, its still small enough to fit in your pocket. Its about the size of an old school ipod, though thicker, and its way better than slugging around a DSLR. And the design is ergonomic.
And now some Cons:
- HD video recording. The quality of the HD picture on playback is great. But there are two shortcomings with this feature. 1) Sound quality is as you would expect for a camera. So its sort of like HD picture/low tech camera sound. It won't replace your HD camcorder, but its certainly good enough for casual recordings. 2) Takes up a ton of memory. I got a 16GB card and that will record about 30min of HD video. Not a lot if you want to take a lot of pics as well on a vaca. I just wind up taking normal non-HD videos, which works fine.
- Auto zoom on video recording is annoying. You need to turn the feature off when taking video, otherwise your video will be in and out of focus as you zoom. But the ability to zoom WHILE taking video is a differentiator for this camera vs. others. Also, some of the features still a work in progress. For instance, the auto face detect works some times, but not others.
- There are not many manual adjustments you can make- primarily shutter speed/exposure and other standard features common in most point and shoot cameras. Obviously I wouldn't expect this to be as flexible as a DLSR, but just something to keep in mind.
- Camera has two automated picture shot modes (where it takes a picture by itself) and the delay is either 2 or 10 seconds. I use this mode a lot - this way everyone can get into a pic! I wish they had longer delay time and more lead up warning to when the picture is going to be taken.
In summary, I would highly recommend this camera for anyone who wants the ability to take a wide variety of high quality pics but doesn't want to lug around a big camera. The cons are far outweighed by the pros. Don't hesitate - you will love this camera!
 You (and your kids) deserve a better camera than this one August 14, 2008
5 out of 10 found this review helpful
After reviewing my first set of prints, I decided to return this camera. I really wanted to love this camera. Compact body (fits in pocket nicely), 10X zoom, and intelligent auto focus. What's not to love? However, the picture quality and color were only so-so, and were especially worse in low light and indoor shots. Intelligent auto focus did not seem to work particularly well for me and was inconsistent (I could shoot the same shot multiple times and get different results). The deal breaker for me: Long first shot delay...which means you will miss a shot of your kids if it needs to be taken quicky (ex. kid on swing or kid petting animal). Also, many of the zoom shots were difficult to focus. A big dissapointment for me.
|
