Customer Reviews

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX33K 8.1MP Digital Camera with 3.6x Wide Angle MEGA Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Black)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This camera just feels good. This particular (black) body is rubberized (but all-metal underneath the rubber coat), something not apparent in the pictures or description. It's a small camera, smaller than the Canon SD870, but not as small as the Canon SD1000. Slim and pocketable, easily.

I was trying to decide between these three cameras, and I got the Lumix because of it's optical image stabilization (SD1000 does not have this) and because it felt better in my hands than the SD870.

This camera has a wide-angle lens (28mm equivalent), which REALLY makes a difference when you're taking a group picture in a small room or trying to fit a cathedral into a shot when you're standing in front of it.

Optical image stabilization will help remove your hand jitter in low-light situations. Possibly the best new, real feature to hit digital cameras since 7 megapixel resolution.

The other major feature on this camera is the new "Intelligent Auto" mode which works great, but it basically detects between 4 different scenes, not every single scene mode as I was led to believe. Face detection really does work, but I don't think it's any better than any other autofocus system.

Image quality is average, whatever that means. For a point and shoot though, nobody should be expecting SLR-quality shots on such a tiny camera, tiny lens, and tiny CCD sensor. I think it's ridiculous how anyone expects SLR quality at all. Physics people! So for it's size, the pictures come out great, and I am not disappointed.

Video quality is great - it supports a really high 848x480 (widescreen) resolution, higher than most (if not all) other compacts out there right now. The audio quality does suck. To me, it sounds like it's underwater compared to my old Sony or Nikon digital compacts. However, it's good enough, and if you want better, get a real camcorder. Caveat - the "Video" mode is on the opposite side of the mode dial from "Picture" mode. Somebody missed the usability memo.

Screen is sharp and is covered by glass, not plastic. This means greater scratch resistence, but since the glass protrudes a little from the body of the camera itself, it might also attract more scratches, too.

The only major downside to this camera is that from power-on until picture-taken, it's about 3-4 seconds. This is bad for when you just have to get that once-in-a-lifetime shot. However, if that moment only lasted 3 seconds, I don't think anyone could have gotten a good picture of it.

Look to this camera as a real alternative to the insanely popular Canon digital elph line. Hands down, Lumix cameras look cooler and have all the important features Canon has. I agonized between Canon and Panasonic, but I have no regrets with my choice. Do it!

If you're looking for a no-fuss, yet high performance compact digital camera in the $250-300 price range, this is the one. For starters, my number one feature requirement was an equivalent-28mm wide-angle lens. After many years living with 28mm as virtually standard in the pre-digital age, having to put up with a 35mm minimum (without paying a fortune) was starting to get really unacceptable. Being able to work with 28mm again, this time on a compact digital, is a real delight.
Even at the $300 level, I only really found this Panasonic and a Canon Powershot offering this feature. So choosing was easy - I just had a choice between two items. I chose the Panasonic because it has a Leica lens (power of the brand) and because it has a super high sensitivity rating of 6400 ISO which, in practice provides real advantages. I have been amazed by the photo quality when forcing off the flash in lower light conditions--to the extent that the non-flash photo of a same scene (e.g. in a normally lighted room) is often far more pleasing to the eye than the flash version.
Finally, the combination of electronic stabilization and Intelligent ISO (very effective in 95% of cases) means that the fully automatic setting does a fantastic job in just about every case of general photography.

Obviously there are a whole host of features that make the item very desirable, and most are present on both cameras. If both items had been absolutely equal, I still would have taken the Panasonic, because it just so happens that the brand takes up more of my mind-share than Canon (which means "photocopiers" to me).
I recommend this superb Panasonic item whole-heartedly and would encourage you to supplement it with a high-quality high-speed SD card such as the SanDisk 2GB Extreme III SD Secure Digital Card SDSDX32048901 / SDSDX3-2048-901. Don't make the mistake of going budget shopping for SD cards!

After long and arduous research, I finally decided to buy this Panasonic FX33K. Usually having invested so much time into researching and comparing products, I come down to a select few products, picking one, and end up somewhat regretting not picking another one. This has not been the case with the FX33K.

I am a very particular person when it comes to buying anything. My requirements for buying a digital camera were that it has to has to be black, it needs to have the best anti-shake available (as I have very shaky hands), it needs to be reasonably priced (at most around $200) and it needs to take high-quality pictures. That being said, after thorough comparison, I am assured I have found what I've been looking. If you're looking for an ultra compact camera that has great anti-shake, a bright screen (which you can adjust to make it multiple times brighter) looks chic and takes great pictures (look at the pictures in the "customer images" section), look no further. I bought this camera on Cyber Monday (the Monday after Black Friday) and so it met my criteria for price. Panasonic makes some compact cameras that fit similar criteria for a lower price, but don't look as fashionable as the FX33K or have the intelligent auto-adjust ability, which allows the camera to automatically adjust to the environmental settings, and tries to figure out what sort of picture you're trying to take and adjust itself accordingly.

I've never bought anything from Panasonic just because of their brand name before, but because of this camera, I'm considering going to them for many more of my electronic needs.

User's friendly, 28mm wide-angle, 2.5" vivid lcd screen and with the Intelligent auto mode, just point and shoot and you'll have a great picture

Pros: Very fast burst mode, LEICA lense, slim compact body, Optical Image Stabiliser, 15 faces recognition, anti-blur works

Cons: a bit low with startup time, no manual control, no view finder

Panasonic has always made great products and this camera is one of them. I don't know why other camera company's. don't see how important a 28mm wide angle lens is to everyone who shots pictures. During holidays I can get much more of the room and people in the shot without having to back up against the next wall, or take half the group at a time to fit everyone in. The camera is compact and the 2.5 in screen is easy to see the image before and after the shot. I bought an extra battery (off brand), that way I make sure to always have power. The charger that comes with the camera is small and cordless so it plugs directly into the wall. I love every thing about the camera. The main selling points for me where a 28MM wide angle len, Image Stabilizer (anti shake),Leica Lens, 2.5 inch screen, and the cameras overall small size that fits in my shirt pocket(without the case). Like with 35mm cameras, the lens has a lot to do with the quality of the image. The digital processor can do wonders but the lens still provide a degree of quality to the final image when details become important. If you can get this camera with all these features at a price of less than $200, why settle for less. If you could spend a little more money, you should consider the New 2008 Panasonic DMC-FX35 lumix which has a really wide 25mm lens and 10.1 megapixels. Over all the quality and feel of the camera is great. I can use the anti shake feature and the wide angle lens to take indoor shots without a flash in many vacation spots. This is a quality camera at a great price. Very, very happy.

I dont know much about cameras, and this makes it simple. There are options to change and select if you know what you are doing. But for someone like me i can leave it alone and still take great pictures.

The manual does not do a good job of fully explaining the options, (it tells you how to change them from one to another, but not what they mean)
So you need some camera knowledge to understand some of it... but like i said, i take great pictures and haven't messed with any of the different options. And if i was motivated i could probably spend 5 mins online and figure it out. So i dont want this to detract too much from how great this little camera is!

The display is nice and big and the battery is AMAZING and seems to last forever compared to my last camera and my friends cameras. (and the charger is nice and compact)

I also love the fact that it can take a 4-8 gig memory card, so i dont have to keep trak of 3-4 different memory cards and remember what pictures are on what card.

All-in-all this is an amazing little camera!

I gave it three stars because it falls short in one critical area - photo quality.

But first, the good stuff. Like an earlier review noted, the black rubberized finish feels good in hand. The "Intelligent Auto" mode works reasonably well - it was able to distinguish between macro, landscape, portrait and night modes most of the time. The wide angle lens really came in handy for group photos, landscape and architecture shots. Normal operation is fairly snappy, and the menu are easy to figure out. Lastly, the LCD screen's resolution is fairly high, and the gain can be adjusted with one button to aid viewing in bright environments.

However, the photo quality was underwhelming. I've owned a Canon Powershot S410 and Fuji Finepix F20 (both pocket-sized Point & Shoot cameras) and the photo quality in those cameras were superior to the Panasonic. Panasonic cameras have had the reputation of great lenses with mediocre noise reduction, and that's what I expected with this camera. However, the photos are very soft and the colors lack saturation. The noise reduction is noticeable at ISO 200, and is very apparent at ISO 400. This level of noise reduction is not unusual for this class of camera, though I prefer the Canon approach of more detail but more noise.

The camera also has an "Intelligent ISO" mode, which boosts the ISO if shaking or motion is detected in the frame. It sounds good, but it's very aggressive, and the resulting photos are usually shot at fairly high ISO where the detail is lost. There is a option to limit the highest ISO, though the option is not available in "Intelligent Auto" mode.

I haven't printed any photos from this camera, though I would suspect that regular sized prints would be fine. You can usually tell the difference in quality by zooming into a photo, but in this case, I was able to tell the difference even when shrinking the photos to fit in a web album.

It's not a bad camera. I actually enjoyed using it, but at the end of the day, when you sit down and look over the photos you took, that's where the camera underwhelms.

My past vacation pictures were typically marginal and I spent way too much time fiddling with the settings. I bought this point and shoot for our spring break vacation and the results are as hoped for. I also bought a Transcend 8 GB SDHC card for $35 and I took lots of 30 fps movies and 700 pics at maximum resolution and still did not max the card out (3.5 Gig left on the card) which left room for another 1700 pics. Here are some of the things I really liked.

- Small size with rubberized feel.
- Intelligent AUTO mode which also covered macro shoots and was used a lot of the time for instant capture.
- Burst mode (a few shots per second as long as you hold the shutter button) which came in handy for action and mid air jumping shots.
- Easy menu access.
- 16:9 aspect option (I used every available maximum resolution setting since I had a monster mem card)
- Easy to use playback mode
- Motion Picture Mode with manual on and off. While horseback riding, as an example, I just pushed the shutter button once, held the camera and pushed it again when I was done. The quality was better than expected including the audio which picked up coqui frogs specific to the island of Puerto Rico for instance. Also night scenes came out good pulling in ambient lighting.
- About 20 different manual modes which covers day, night, party, action, candle light, etc.
- I learned to prefer a camera without a viewfinder. No more nose grease smudge marks on the LCD screen.

For the price I was very happy with this camera and it met my travel camera needs and for a point and shoot darn good. The battery was long lasting as well.

I bought a black 7.2 model and fell in love with it. After comming off a Nikon I wondered if this camera had it...And it does and more...You guess Panasonic just has better electronic than a camera manufacturer..I just bought this model for me as my wife took the other away with her This one has more mega pixels anyway and has a 28 mm lens which is way cool, as extra lenses in my Nicon d 70 is major bucks. I want to see how the burst works taking a series of shots and I want to see if the lens speed can do sports clearly...I feel good about it though..I use my d 70 nicon for the real stuff that pays...It so cool looking too, and hey, blue is OK for me. If they want to charge less...so be it.

I just received this camera Thurday, 3/6 and am loving it so far. I haven't "figured it all out" yet but am really pleased with the ease of use and picture quality. As said in a previous review, the colored casing (I got blue) has a really nice feel to it. I originally wanted the black but most places were sold out. I am actually glad I got the blue - it's a really dark blue and gives the camera a good look to it. I am also enjoying the motion picture feature, though I need to read up on how exactly to make it work (I'm a "figure it out yourself" kind of person). I got the video to work Friday night but couldn't do it again Saturday, so a bit of reading is called for. But as far as taking pictures right off the bat, very easy. Especially like the "Intelligent Auto" feature - automatically figures out the best setting for your conditions. The only thing I don't like (and again, need to read up on it)is the red laser light that comes out of it during flash pictures - can be slightly blinding. All in all though, VERY PLEASED with the camera.