Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #42311 in Camera & Photo
• Brand: Panasonic
• Model: DMC-LZ5
• Dimensions: 4.00" h x .50" w x 5.00" l, .50 pounds
• Display size: 2.5

Features

• 6.0-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 14 x 19-inch prints
• 6x image-stabilized optical zoom; 2.5-inch LCD display
• Playback of 9, 16, and 25 images is possible on a multi-split screen
• Consecutive shooting feature lets you take up to five shots per second
• Powered by 2 AA-size batteries; stores images on SD memory cards (includes 14 MB of internal memory)

Amazon.com Product Description
Your son takes his first step, or your daughter takes her encore bow at her first recital. Luckily, you were ready with your digital camera and caught this historic moment. But wait! The photo you took is blurry. In your excitement, you accidentally shook the camera just as you snapped the shutter. If this has ever happened to you--and you are by no means alone!--then you'll want to take a close look at the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LZ5 6-megapixel digital camera with 6x image-stabilized optical zoom.

The Lumix DMC-LZ5 was designed specifically to address the universal problem of "hand-shake"--the culprit of the majority of blurred digital images. At the heart of the Lumix DMC-LZ5 is Panasonic's Mega Optical Image Stabilizing System, or Mega O.I.S. A built-in gyrosensor detects any hand movement and relays a signal to a tiny microcomputer inside the camera, which instantly calculates the compensation needed. A linear motor then shifts the O.I.S. lens as necessary to guide incoming light from the image straight to the CCD. All this happens seamlessly and behind the scenes. All you'll notice will be the camera's outstanding results.

Mega O.I.S. is effective in most shooting situations, such as dimly lit indoor shots, nighttime shots, or macro shots. However, when taking indoor shots of moving subjects, such as children or pets, the movement of the subject tends also to contribute to the blurring. For this, the Lumix DMC-LZ5 features a high sensitivity mode to prevent hazy motion effects, further expanding your range of crisp, clear photo expression.

Another outstanding feature is the Lumix DMC-LZ5's 6x optical zoom. This powerful zoom--the equivalent to a 37mm to 222mm zoom on a 35mm film camera--lets you easily capture and magnify subjects in distant locations, and also produces impressive photos with soft-focused backgrounds. The zoom lens crystallizes Panasonic's optics technology, using two aspherical lenses to achieve compactness and boost optical performance. Together with the camera's 4x digital zoom, you can enjoy up to 24x zoom power--an amazing 888mm zoom equivalent on a 35mm camera.

With the consecutive shooting feature of Lumix DMC-LZ5, nothing will sneak past your photographic gaze. In one second, you can take up to five consecutive images in standard mode, and three images in fine mode with full resolution. In addition, the Unlimited Consecutive Shooting function lets you continue shooting until the memory card or built-in memory is full. All this is made possible by Panasonic's Venus Engine Plus, which reduces power consumption by about 50 percent compared with earlier Venus Engine-equipped models.

A bright 2.5-inch LCD monitor is easy to see when taking photos. The pixel-mixed readout method is used to automatically increase the brightness level of live images according to the level of ambient darkness. This allows bright, easy framing of scenes that would normally be too dark to see. The large LCD also allows the display of images even in tiny thumbnail size. Playback of 9, 16, and 25 images is possible on a multi-split screen in addition to the normal single frame playback. This helps you to search for the image you want out of a number of images stored on your SD memory card.

With the DMC-LZ5 you can also record beautiful full-sized movie at 30 frames per second. The camera's CCD enhances the picture quality not only in the resolution but also in the brightness level of the image as it gains much luminous signals. On the sound front, a built-in microphone lets you enjoy playing back movies with audio on TV or with PC.

The DMC-LZ5 is PictBridge compatible, which lets you print directly on a compatible digital printer. Print size, layout, date, and other settings can be made with the camera. The camera is powered by either two AA alkaline or two rechargeable nickel-metal hydride (Ni-MH) batteries. Alkaline batteries let you take about 175 photos and nickel-metal hydride batteries allow up to 390 photos. When you don't have an SD memory card on hand, the camera's built-in memory holds up to 14 megabytes of image data, which you can later upload to an SD card or PC. You can also download images from a memory card or PC to the built-in memory, and view them on the LCD anytime you like.

What's in the Box
Lumix DMC-LZ5 digital camera, two oxyride AA batteries, and software CD-ROM.

Customer Reviews

Perfect, pocket-sized digital camera. Excellent choice. Big thumbs up to buy.
Panasonic has reached perfection to put in your pocket with this DMC-LZ5 camera. This small, yet easy-to-hold 6 MP, 6X-optical zoom digital camera takes excellent quality photos of especially good color reproduction. The zoom is very powerful. The camera starts up in less than 5 seconds. It has the least amount of shutter-lag, about 1-2 seconds, that I've experienced. It takes sequential photos with such speed that you can keep on clicking and get moving objects with clarity. It has anti-shake technology.
It exhausts my rechargeable batteries within about 10-15 photos. It takes two AA batteries. So one needs to maintain a supply of charged batteries. It holds the settings when changing batteries and when turned off (when you select the no-reset option).
The camera does not have a viewfinder, but its 2.5-inch screen is quite satisfactory and shows the selected view clearly and accurately. Its size diagonally is 2 7/8 inches.
I am very impressed with the fine detail and the so-realistic reproduction of scenes that you may think you are looking at the real object, and the color reproduction. The blues and greens, as well as the reds and yellows, are stunning. It takes photos close-up to about 6 to 8 inches in focus and with wonderful clarity.
It has a superb fold-over lens cover to protect the lens while the camera is turned off. So you don't have to worry about lens damage or losing the lens cover.
I found the camera very easy to acquire a working knowledge of without the manual, which was not much help.
With a 128 MB secure digital memory card I can take about 600 photos at a 640X480 setting.
The only downfall(s) are:
The manual with it, like most electronics/camera manuals, fails to give complete instructions. The sections do not start at the beginning by telling you which settings or mode to be in when following the instructions. The manual I have seems to be geared to another model of camera. For instance, when I tried to find the 640 X 480 setting, the camera did not select pixels that way, but rather by 3M,2M,1M,.3M, and the chart did not convert to that means of measuring pixels.
The Panasonic "simple viewer" software is not simple. It apparently has a special driver necessary to view or upload photos, which did not transfer to my PC. However, there are three different software programs on the accompanying CD, one of which is an excellent ArcSoft program that I found easy to use and very complete. Also there is an Adobe software program on the CD.

All-in-all, I recommend this camera to the Amazon.com readers. The price is reasonable for all that it packs into it. You will be very happy with this camera whether you are a weekend birdviewing fan, a parent wanting to memorialize a baby or a child in play, or are using the camera for commercial or professional reasons. Just be prepared with a plentiful supply of charged batteries.

May 6, 2007, UPDATE: After over a year of use, this camera has become my favorite and most used camera. My comments above, first written last year, remain my opinion of this perfect camera.
I found that Radio Shack rechargeable AA batteries hold charges longest.
I discovered this camera's excellent "motion picture mode", which you use by turning a dial on top of the camera and then clicking the picture-takng button to activate and clicking again to stop.
It takes SD media cards. With a 1G or 2G card, you have plenty of SD storage for both stills and motion pictures. I like to take motion pictures of surfers, pelicans diving for dinner in Santa Monica Bay, and wrapearound views of my rose and blue-lavender bearded irises. The colors are vibrant.
My one difficulty is viewing images on the LCD screen in bright daylight.
At under $200 now, this camera is a great bargain with all its features.

almost perfect
Almost perfect camera.Small and light weight. Takes great pictures. Image stabilization worked wonders when taking fireworks even without a tripod. Clarity and contrast is beyond what was expected for a camera of this price. The scene modes making taking pictures easy even for the beginner. Being a camera fanatitic, I was impressed with the dual scene mode which when reading the reviews thought was just a one upmanship on the competitors. But when scenes change quickly I have my favorites pre-programed in and changing on the fly is a snap.
Its major disadvantage is the LCD sceen. Although easy to see during overcast and night, it fell short during bright sun, especially over your shoulder aiming at the screen. I still prefer a viewfinder. The trade off is the large LCD screen. Battery life was good using rechargable batteries and only requiring two (2) instaed of my Canons IS2 four(4)batteries.

Amazing Image Quality, Incredible Camera
The bottom line: Amazing image quality.

This is the best camera I have ever used for simple point and shoot image quality, and the image modes available as well, are excellent. Without an sort of manual adjustment, it takes incredibly good pictures, far better than Pentax or Canon cameras I have used. It was used to take pictures of my wedding, and the quality of the photos was flawless! It also takes excellent, in focus pictures in rapid fire mode.

I have not experienced the issues with auto-focus the other reviewer has mentioned, and at this point I have taken well over 1000 photos with the camera. The optical image stabilization feature is awesome, you can use the 6x optical zoom without fear because of the stabilization.