Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS9 review...with pics and video

[TenaciousTins]

Warning: Pics and video are not good compositionally. These are all just quick test shots with whatever subject was available (which happened to mostly be the cats lol).

I ordered this camera specifically for taking it in airports and on planes where it would be less obvious than a DSLR. So far I am fairly pleased with it. The low light performance is about as I would expect for a $130 dollar camera. I was going to get the Canon A1200, but then I saw this baby and decided to try it out. It has fully manual settings which is pretty nice for someone who is used to using them. The auto focus is a tiny bit slow but it's fine, it's really quite good. The ZOOM on this thing is incredible (IMO). For being such a tiny lens it does a pretty damn good job. The video is decent too. Auto focuses pretty well and you can zoom with it too. It's a quiet camera if you turn off all the settings for sound. The functionality is very good. Easy to use and figure out. Of course I'm used to a DSLR but some smaller point and shoot cameras really have me confused. Not this one. Even for the average or beginner user, I think this camera would be easy to figure out.

Here are the test pictures:

Inside low-light with flash, full auto, first pic taken

Inside low light (very low dim light, no flash, ISO800, f3.3, 1/20th second

Candle, no flash, ISO 1600, 1/50th sec, f5.1

Close up of the box it came in, no flash, same settings as above picture

Outside, mostly cloudy, ISO 200, 1/400th sec, f 6.3

Fully zoomed in...this is the chimney of the house with the green roof in the above picture

Inside, no flash, sun coming through a window, ISO 400, 1/60th sec

My breakfast this morning, same settings as last picture

Backlit subject

Outdoors, no flash, same settings as last outdoors picture

Close-up of birdfeeder

The bird feeder

Here are a couple of movies:

Inside low-light movie test (pardon the music and weird sound, I probably had my finger over the mic at some points)



Outside mostly cloudy movie test

 

[DiskoJoe]

Seems about right for lumix. A friend of mine had one of these for year until he upgraded to d5100. Solid camera for what it is. Pretty decent glass.

 

[TenaciousTins]

I certainly won't complain for $130!