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"Best of the 'Rugged' Cameras!"
on by J-CaywoodPros + Outstanding exposure balance
+ Battery life was great
+ The burst shooting works amazingly well for a P&S
+ Excellent color balance. Images are not over-saturated
+ There is comparatively little barrel distortion when close to subjectsCons - Accurate and rapid focusing is poor
- The macro feature is especially frustratingSummary I purchased this camera as an upgrade from my Fuji xp10. I also bought an xp30 and the Panasonic consistently blows it away.
GPS: First sat aquisition takes a while, that is to be expected. After than in clear view (no trees, etc) I have gotten quick consistent signals in Hawaii and decent signals in Washington. Hawaii is much better as would be expected because there are more available sat's the closer to the equator. If you are expecting performance on par with your Garmin device, you will be disappointed. If you are expecting the tiny gps sensor to work under most reasonable circumstances, then you will be pleased. The GPS data on the display screen is a nice bonus but again, don't fool yourself into expecting dedicated gps device performance.
Underwater camera: I've snorkeled in 75 degree salt water for four days in a row for not less than 3 hours. In clear water the underwater pictures are amazing. I never got anything close to this quality out of the XP10 and it is a good camera. It completely blows the XP30 away. The full 1080 movies underwater are also excellent, though to be fair I've only watched them on the 720 laptop screen. The camera has gotten a rinse in fresh water after each ocean bath and plenty of time to air dry. So far very good. I can't say enough about how much better the images are from this device.
Battery: yet another custom sized battery and accompying charger. I'm not going to pick on companies for having a custom sized battery too much, but for my sanity, please just make the darn camera charge over a standard usb plug. I see how having a seperate charger coudl allow me to run with one and charge another but really, the battery life is very good (2-3 hours of actual snorkeling with the camera on all the time and still only using about 60% of the battery.
Outdoor picture quality: Good. lots and lots of specific modes (everything from portrait, to sunset, to fireworks, etc..) good enough general use that I left the canon SX100 at home but I do miss the 10x zoom. I'm willing to trade off the zoom for the one device and the massive improvement in ruggedness.
Haven't done much indoor shooting yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if this camera gives up a little bit in that side of things. There are LOTS of good cameras for shooting indoors, but there aren't many that you can take snorkeling in the morning, drop on the gravel road loading up the car, and then rise and dunk into a snowbank in the evening. This camera impresses me more every day of vacation. I brought the xp10 as a backup but it hasn't even gotten out of the suitcase.
*** P.S. If you will buy this Camera I suggest you have compare price before you decide at: www.amazon.com/gp/*************?ie=UTF8&location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%****%2Foffer-listing%2FB004KKZ0KG%3Fie%3DUTF8%26ref_%3Ddp_olp_new_map%26condition%3Dnew%23&tag=***************&********=ur2&camp=1789&creative=390957 -
"Camera Leaks, and the Warranty Department is AWFUL!"
on by emdlang2Pros Color? The screen is nice....
Cons Lens fogs up with temperature change
Camera Leaks
Warrenty Department is BAD
Wrist Strap broke after little use... luckily not IN the waterSummary I purchased this camera last summer for its rugged and waterproof features. I noticed immediately that the pictures weren't the best quality. And that, when I took it underwater, the temperature change caused the lens to fog, making it impossible to move the camera in and out of the water for a clear picture.
After about one month of use, the macro button stopped working. Because they do not provide a phone number for the warrenty office, I sent it in as instructed. They did NOT contact me upon reciept of the product. In fact I had to contact them repeatedly during the TWO MONTHS that they kept the camera waiting for parts from Japan.
FINALLY they sent in back to be in September, after replacing parts. And the button still didn't work. So I called the office and talked my way up to the head of the warrenty department. She informed me that I was on the wrong setting. The camera was never broken in the first place.
Now maybe you can blame me for not pouring over the manual detail by detail. But I would think a technican in the warranty department would have noticed that BEFORE replacing parts.
Anyways, I got the camera back and took it on vacation to the Bahamas. I took it in the water and.... the screen froze. I opened the battery compartment and found water in there. I mean, I was snorkeling like 2 feet deep for 15 minutes! I thought maybe it was a fluke but experimentation proved me wrong. It leaks.
So much for waterproof. So now I have sent it back to the warranty department. I probably wont see the camera for another two months and will have to deal with the warrenty personnel again and there TERRIBLE communication skills.
Don't BUY! -
"One tough camera"
on by brucegoose03Pros -excellent photos and videos
-different modes are great
-lots of different features for any situation
-can go 42 ft underwater, be dropped up to 6 feet, and is dust proof
-holds my 32gb class 10 SDHC cardCons -gps takes a bit to update
Summary Great price for all the features and ruggedness. I've owned the dmc-ts1 as well and love both of them.
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"User interface way too complicated and poorly designed."
on by Gfive5Pros Waterproof feature has worked well for me both underwater and in the desert (keeping out dust), although the buttons need to be bigger so its easier to use underwater.
Cons User interface way too complicated and poorly designed.
Summary The poorly written user manual only exacerbates the problem. Very frustrating to use this camera. Often, I have to resort to Google to find out how to use the camera. For example, the camera settings are not all in one place. They are dispersed in a number of different places in the software, making it very hard to remember how to use it. I had a photographer friend help me once to figure out how to play back videos. It took him 15 minutes!
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"Good Camera, not very waterproof though...."
on by cdnjaguarPros Compact, shutter exposure settings (Limited though), easy to use, good number of preset picture taking conditions.
Cons Not waterproof
not the best imagesSummary I was happy with this camera until I took it on a snorkel trip (the reason I bought it). I am usually good with researching my purchases but guess I didn't dig far enough on this one to see that the waterproof capabilities are not as good as they claim....
I was snorkeling in the Caribbean for approx 30 minutes going no deeper than 4-5m as I had a vest on, when the screen went fuzzy and stopped working... I was nowhere near the 1hr / 20m underwater limit.... I am sending it in for repair, but find it rather crappy that I have to pay for the shipping and handling to a 3rd party Ontario to get it there!... will advise what happens...
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