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| FZ80 Epacris longiflora |
The FZ80is a very interesting device. It joins a group of fixed zoom lens cameras each of which invites you to abandon your interchangeable lens kit (if you ever had such a thing) and do all your photography with just one thing.
Of course most people do this with their smartphone.
But no smartphone ever had a specification list or a level of capability like the current crop of superzoom cameras.
The FZ80 has an extraordinary zoom range spanning an ultrawide 20mm to an ultralong 1200mm (equivalent). It can follow focus on moving subjects, do 4K video and much else besides.
It is a very fully featured camera.
The lens itself is quite decent with good image quality right across the focal length range and no nasty optical surprises.
Handling is good and performance is good.
So what’s the catch ?
Why are not camera buyers flocking in their millions to snap up their very own copy of this paragon of photographic versatility ?
Not being a mind reader I do not know what other camera buyers motivations might be.
Many users have complained about the level of digital noise even at the base ISO of 80.
Some have grumbled about matters I regard as of minor significance such as the lack of an eye sensor necessitating manual switch from EVF to monitor.
I have now made several thousand photos with the FZ80 and come to realise that the issue which prevents me from wholeheartedly recommending the FZ80 is one which I have not seen reported elsewhere by professional reviewers (some of whom appear to have had the camera for 10 minutes) or by users on forums.
I will call it JITTER.
Our family has two copies of the FZ80 both of which suffer from the phenomenon so I suspect it may be endemic to the model.
In the mid range to long end of the zoom hand held photos show a variable percentage of frames with evidence of blurring often with double imaging. This is not attributable to bad camera holding technique as it happens with some frames of a sequence all of the same subject, all using exactly the same hand holding technique.
It does not occur with the camera on a tripod with the stabiliser switched off.
The frequency of blurred or double imaged frames varies but on some runs can be as high as 50%, more often 20-30%.
In addition one of the copies produces some frames soft on the right side, interspersed with frames sharp right across.
It appears there is some kind of instability in the inner workings of the lens perhaps in the focussing module or the stabiliser module.
I experienced the same problem with the TZ80.
My guess is that the basis of this could be cost cutting in the engineering of the mechanical components of the lens.
I do not see the problem with either of the FZ300 cameras or the FZ1000 in our household. Of course not every photo with these cameras is sharp but I do not see the frequent double imaging which is found with the FZ80.
The FZ80 was potentially heading for a Camera Ergonomics COTY nomination until I discovered the jitter.
I would like to see Panasonic change its product strategy in this section of the market.
I would prefer them to drop the budget model with its cost cutting, sub optimal inner workings altogether, but keep a model with an upgraded version of the 20-1200mm lens in a more robust, better engineered housing.
They could utilise the same body and controls for two cameras, each based on the small, 7.67mm diagonal sensor.
One model could be an upgrade of the current FZ300 with the principal lens attribute being a wide aperture.
The other model with the same body, controls, EVF, sensor and engineering would have the super zoom range but with smaller aperture.
Such a product differentiation would make more sense to me than the existing FZ300/FZ80 dyad.