Panasonic FZ80 Review

 Last year I shot and reviewed 52 cameras in one year (one every week).  It was a monumental task and now I've mostly been using this Blog to ramble about my thoughts about Photography in general and camera technology in general. 

I do enjoy doing these camera reviews and since there are far far more then 52 digital cameras ever made (think more along the lines of tens of thousands; far more then I could ever hope to review) and add to that there are some digital cameras so incredibly rare that they are priced well out of the funds I have to dedicate to my digital camera collecting hobby.

The camera I am going to review today is neither Old nor Rare.  It does mark the swansong era of the late 2010's with the end of the Bridge Camera; an odd niche camera for most to use in the current age as it doesn't have detachable lenses nor can it fit into a pocket.  

Bridge Cameras often try to be "prosumer" and offer some of the features found on higher end DSLR and MICL cameras, but at the price of having lower end pocket camera responsiveness and handling which I may delve into later as I could easily do a follow-up article just about the concept of bridge cameras and how they evolved and eventually met their demise.

I could ramble on and on about the history and evolution of the Bridge Cam; so that will likely be done in a seperate post. For context purposes we'll still identify where bridge cameras, the FZ80 in particular excel and where they fall short during the review.

So now, lets dig into the camera in this review, a late model Bridge Camera the Panasonic FZ80.

Before I get into the review I should preface this by this camera being currently on loan to me by a local fellow Digicam collector and enthusiast (who I have parted ways with several cameras with and also acquired several from). 

It's a neat camera but isn't one that I am currently oogling over and feel I need to find one for myself to keep at the price-point they currently sell for, and I'll discuss why later in the review.

Released in 2017 the Panasonic FZ80 was one of the last Bridge Cameras ever made alongside the FZ2500 and the Nikon P1000 a year later.  These cameras are new enough you can still buy them brand new in a box from retailers; which pushes the resale value for a used one higher then I'd want to pay for one at the moment.

It has a fairly standard 1/2.3" 18mp CMOS sensor, as most modern bridge cameras use a small sensor like this for the crop factor to get a superior optical zoom; allowing Panasonic to take a 200mm or so optical focal length zoom lens and translate it into "1200mm equivalent" with the small sensor that provides a 5-6x crop factor.

Much like the Nikon P1000 it uses this sensor along with a fixed super-zoom range zoom lens to give users a larger amount of Optical zoom then their phone or even in many cases DSLR would have without lugging around a 5lb lens. This was the one redeeming and selling point for these late model bridge cameras: you could zoom in to your hearts content and capture things at a distance in a lightweight goes everywhere package.

There are a few exceptions like the RX10 and Panasonic FS2500 which offer a 1" sensor instead; but the last real niche for the bridge cams from Fuji, Nikon and Panasonic into the 2010s was to pack as much optical zoom as possible into a relatively compact and lightweight camera with a fixed lens that anyone could easily use.

Turning the camera on there is a short but not terrible startup delay.  It's about in line with what I'd expect from a pocket camera; and fast enough I can still do hipshots in Street Photography without fully missing the moment.  

This delay is more noticeable when you try and do Nature photography. This tends to be the whole package of taking a photo however that is overall slower that will make you miss fleeting moments, from turning the camera on, to waiting till the optical zoom extends, and then dealing with a fairly sluggish AutoFocus system lock onto the subject.  

The Panasonic FZ80 is defiantly more responsive and quicker overall then many pocket cameras; but this still leaves it slow enough you can defiantly tell a huge difference after you've been shooting a DSLR or MICL camera.

Controls on the FZ80 are fairly basic.  It was definitely engineered with the casual shooter in mind.  It does have a single function wheel which you click in to toggle function of such as using exposure compensation vs holding another button down and spinning the wheel such as with entry level Mirrorless and DSLR cameras.  It's a design I don't mind but did find confusing as my brain was always trying to hold down the nearby AF switch FN button and spin the wheel to adjust shutter speed in Manual or exposure comp in AV, SV and P modes.

The Panasonic FZ80 does have three programmable FN buttons which is actually a lot more then most consumer bridge cameras offer: two on the top and one on the back which doubles as the trash button.

The lens on the FZ80 is remarkably sharp and low distortion for the entire focal length; but with a tiny image sensor it does not show distortions and imperfections in the glass as much.  It's a huge improvement in optics over any smartphone lens and a slight jump from what is offered in a lot of point and shoot cameras. It does have some Bokeh smudging and Chromatic Aberration (which you can see in the photo of the owl later), but overall the actual optics of this camera are pretty solid.

I did manage to get some pretty nice photos off of it so far, a few I will share SOOC and two edited pics which I will show at the end when I get into RAW editing and overall tldr on my thoughts.  I really haven't tried using this in anything outside of bright outdoor lighting; but since I know from past experience this is where all tiny sensor (smaller then 1") will fall apart, I felt it wasn't useful to add that in the review and just cover examples and instances when I was able to keep it under ISO 400.

One of the main thing the FZ80 lacks (which is sadly very common in bridge cameras) is a control wheel around the lens element.  This feature is standard on any focus-by-wire MICL lens (albeit not able to do anything other then manual focus in this case with a few exceptions namely Canon).  

The lens control wheel in premium pocket cameras such as the Olympus XZ-1, Canon Powershot S90, Panasonic ZS100 and ZS50 are really nice to have and make fine-tune MF on a subject a lot easier to do.  It is the one major feature that would likely sell me on bridge cameras like the FZ80 more if more modern bridge cameras had this feature even if it could only be used when the camera was in MF mode.

In terms of Optical Zoom IE the big selling point to this camera; what you gain from this camera over a superzoom pocket camera like the Panasonic ZS50 or Canon SX720 isn't nearly as much as the "numbers on the camera" leads you to believe, which is a big part of the reason it isn't higher on my list to purchase.  For an explanation of why that extra "30x" more zoom is really deceiving I've got some examples.

First off here is the lens at the widest setting which Panasonic states as 20mm FF Equivalent (but I feel like is actually more like 24mm; still fairly wide for a fixed lens camera)

Zooming into 30x which is where the Panasonic ZS50 tops out you can see a huge difference, and up until this point every little tap of the zoom lever has a noticeable effect:

When you push past this halfway point the optical zoom seems to "slow down" as it were, and holding the lever all the way to the end at 1200mm makes it feel like you really only got an extra 3x zoom out of the lens vs the 30x additional you were expecting.  

One would think that being at 60x zoom I could clearly read how much gas is per gallon on that pump there right?  Well...  that isn't the case. Here is all the more zoom you get from the pocketable ZS50 to this not so pocketable bridge camera, not that much at all.

Had I not already had something like a ZS50; something like the Panasonic FZ80 would be a lot more appealing.  Ultimately the ZS50 has similar output, low light performance, dynamic range and sharpness to the ZS50 and lacks the second programmable control wheel (that the FZ80 lacks) around the lens, and most importantly I can throw the ZS50 hard case and all in my jacket pocket.  

The extra 6mp on the sensor (12mp on the ZS50 and 18 on the FZ80) likewise does not get me as much real-estate as one would think either; and if I felt this resolution bump was what was holding me back I'd rather just upgrade the ZS50 to the ZS70 which jumps to a 20mp sensor in the same compact form factor.

In addition the size of a bridge cam like the FZ80 means needing to carry a small bag when not in use and while its lighter and more discreet then my mirrorless cameras still it fits a niche I don't often find myself needing and  I own older bridge cameras should the urge to shoot a bridge camera arise such as the Sony F828.

Overall the FZ80 hasn't been an experience that makes me feel the desire to go out and buy one of my own, especially as they still sell for over $300 Used.  For 1/3 of that price at around $100 I can get a used DSLR or older Mirrorless camera that is a lot more responsive with better image quality and superior analog controls. If the camera was under $50 sure I'd still think it was worth that to have one in my collection but I don't see this happening any time soon. And for that $300 I could upgrade my ZS50 to the ZS70 or just about buy a used ZS100.  Seriously, IMHO the ZS100 would be a much better use of that money.

So while the Panasonic FZ80 may not be a great fit for me and I don't feel any specific attachment to it especially after the realization that the "Double amount of Optical Zoom" in reality is only about 10% more; the Panasonic FZ80 still gets really nice photos even Straight Out of Camera. Add the fact that it can shoot RAW (which is something I like about Panasonic in their cameras over Canon on any pocket or bridge camera they released after around 2010) makes it have a fairly solid dynamic range potential which I do have an example I will share later.  For now lets start with the Straight out of Camera un-edited photos I took doing Street Photography at a small town in WI the other day:

Nice colors, fairly accurate exposure metering (even with subjects like the robin that were in shadows which is pretty impressive), and plenty sharp.  There really isn't a lot to say bad about the SOOC results with this camera. Someone who knew nothing about photography could easily take this out, zoom and shoot and have photos that are as good or better then what their phone could take with a reach much longer then what the limited lens on their smartphone couldn't achieve.

The real hidden strength of course is that the FZ80 can shoot RAW.  This is a real full Camera Raw file with all the information included and not the less featured "DNG" format that the Pentax Q10 and various Smartphones can shoot at along with "hacked" Canon Powershots using the CHDK utility.  I have two examples of edited RAWs from this camera, one which I can compare to the original image:

And the final image after some fairly heavy tweaks in LightRoom:

To end the review, here is one more photo on a subject that pushes the camera's limits.  This was taken at the full 1200mm of an Owl under very dark overcast skies.  If I was using my Panasonic G9 and $700 100-400 zoom lens I still would have had challenges with this shot.  

The original which I do not have handy was 1.5 stops underexposed with severe chromatic aberration (thanks to tree branches against a white sky, which you can still see some of- it was way worse before editing). I think it cleaned up pretty well and while it may not be something you would see on the cover of National Geographic but most people would be more then happy with a photo like this:

CCD Magic- Yes it Exists but not everyone can see it

There's a huge Hot-Potato debate going around everywhere on the internet since things "opened up" from the Pandemic, and that is "are CCD sensors Better then CMOS/Modern/Smartphone sensors?

In late 2022 as the world moved out of their Vault-like lifestyles and began living again many people, especially young people who had part of their impressionable months or years locked away from their friends behind a mask, looked for new Hobbies to explore.

For a large number of Zoomers, one of the prominent hobbies that exploded during the beginning of the "Post Pandemic" era was Photography.  Teenagers and young 20 somes decided to put down their phones and look at the world through the lens of dedicated cameras instead, but the twist of this is: they didn't hop over to Nikon/Sony/Canon (albeit a lot did jump over to Fuji but that's a different subject for a different day) and buy the newest greatest Mirrorless cameras.  No, they did what I have been doing since 2018:  Seeking out the Digicam.

In part this post is going to be Elder Millennial defending these Zoomers because for once its something we actually share in common.  I may not have any interest whatsoever to play Fortnite or be bawling tears because the US is going to join several other countries in finally blocking a major Security Risk on the internet (TikTok) but I can appreciate a common ground when it comes to Digicams.

Then there are those who "fighting back against digicams" on various channels on YouTube and other Vlogs/Social media.  Most of these people are from two crowds:  Film Hipsters (who believe that people are viewing Digicams as "Better then/same as Film" and I can see why they feel defensive over that).

On the other side of the anti-digicam team are the more "Serious" photographers who of course want to validate the thousands of dollars they spent on equipment and thus are going on a crusade to stamp out "Inferior Digicams" so will go full on the defense of why their $5000 Full Frame MICL is better etc etc.

I've done several posts regarding "Gear Snobs" and why they grind my gears.  So I am not going down that Tangent in this post.  

Needless to say you've got two camps of people just as you did with the Film vs Digital movement that started around the mid 2010s (and is still ongoing): Those for Digicams and those attacking/against them.

Let's clear the air right now by saying one truth about Photography that has been a long standing point of this Blog:  Photography is ART.  Art is Subjective.  What looks great and amazing to one person is going to look terrible to someone else.  

In that sense no, your $5000 Sony MICL Full Frame Monster is not "Better" then the person shooting a 60 year old Medium Format Film camera nor is it "Better" then someone shooting a Vintage digital camera with a CCD sensor in it. It is just "Different" because to an artist will paint with the "canvas, brushes and paints" that look the best to them.

Another example of how a Photographer can use a different tool to get some really unique results is from online friend of mine recently 3D printed some pinhole lenses for their modern Sony APS-C MILC camera.  They cut out a lens from a disposable film camera and put it into this 3D housing for a homemade lens that got some really cool effects. I may do a seperate post about this sort of "experimental" photography though my experience with it is pretty limited (as of right now anyway).

Because of the premise that Art means embracing differences I am going to state that CCD Magic or even Film Magic is not and should not be considered "Better" then a Modern MICL Camera, nor likewise is a $5000 MICL camera better because it costs more and is new.  It's all about being different and that is what makes the Magic and makes the Art.  

If your Film gives a different look to a photo then a Sony A9 with a $8000 lens slapped onto it that is where the Magic is.  Art should be about what looks aesthetically better to you and will vary person to person. It's not about staring at a zoomed in at full pixel level to determine "which image is more technically better because it has less sensor noise".

I'll admit, I've even committed this Digital Photography sin more then once.  It's extremely common when I am doing Nature Photography.  But maybe in that one case yes I do need that tool with the better camera and the better lens because I am looking for a very specific look.

So putting this into context the question becomes not "Is Photography with CCD sensors Better?" to "Is Photography with CCD sensors different?".  That will determine if the Magic or Art is different with different tools.  In my opinion it is; but not everyone may see the difference.

Rather then ramble on about the science and technical specifications I'll provide some examples from 2 different CCD based cameras and 2 different CMOS cameras.  I am sticking to APS-C DSLRs for my "Test group" simply because the lenses I use on these cameras are the same.  I will also be throwing in a curveball at the end with the Fuji Super CCD sensors; but for now let's put two single layer CCD sensors vs two Single layer CMOS sensors.  

I wanted to keep this initial comparison small.  I could have easily thrown in a 1/2.5" Canon Powershot CCD sensor into the pot along with the unique properties of the Sigma Foveon sensor; but that sensor is unique enough it really deserves its own post to explain just how different of a tool it is.

Smaller sensors, Vintage Digital and Digi-cams will likely get their own future blog post, because I feel there is enough to cover just in the CCD aspect alone to put two comparable cameras with different technologies toe to toe and show off how it can differ.

In the APS-C CCD Corner we have the Sony a290 and the Nikon D200.  And in the CMOS corner we have the Sony a37 and the Nikon D7000.  Color science is a little different on newer cameras, so I thought it was more appropriate to keep this limited to cameras older then 2015.

These photos have been touched up minorly in post.  Mostly for exposure and sharpness.  Contrast, white balance, and contrast were mostly left alone.  I may do a SOOC comparison for a more "clinical" approach to this at a later date but for now I am just using 4 photos I really like shot on each camera.

First up for the CCDs the Sony a290:

Compare this to the Sony a37, a very similar (16mp vs 14mp APS-C) but CMOS sensor:

And now we move onto the Nikon camp.  Nikon uses Sony sensors.  So maybe the argument is we are only comparing Sony Sensors to Sony Sensors but I digress.

Nikon D200 (CCD)

Nikon D7000 (CMOS)

Overall in my personal experience the Sony a290's sensor is so vivid that it really steps ahead of the pack even over the D200.  It's a camera limited in so many ways and can be very frustrating to shoot but when I see how the images turn out I wind up holding onto it tight for well reasons.

The Nikon D200 is more subtle of the "CCD Effect" but it is there if your eye is trained enough.  Likewise the a37 and D7000 (which use similar 16mp APS-C CMOS sensors) have a more noticeable orange/yellow shift overall.

To sum my thoughts up: every camera sensor whether it is CCD or CMOS will have a different look.  They all have slight differences in how the processor outputs the data it receives and differences in how the photsites themselves capture light.  

So yes, there is merit in also saying the Canon 5D classic will get a more "Classic" or different look then a Sony A7 is valid as well since even though they are both Full Frame CMOS sensors they have different processors and way they output their files, yes even in RAW they will look wildly different.

Putting everything up to this point aside, many people may not be able to see much of a difference at all between different camera sensors;  Old, New,  Full Frame or Smartphone Sensor, CMOS or CCD.  

Many will see all of these photos as the same or "equally as good" and that is fine.  There are some factors that can influence not being able to see these subtle differences as well. 

For Example:  If you look at these photos on a standard computer monitor you should see some differences.  If you look at them on your Phone or a tablet however: those devices have vibrant OLED screens which tend to "even out" colors and contrast to make any photo taken with just about any camera pop and look good.  

That may be a reason why Smartphone photography is so hard to break out of, because those taking photos with their Smartphone are most likely going to view these photos on the phone and their friends are also going to look at them on their phones as well, which will often muddle the subtle differences you will see if you look on a computer screen.  They may not be able to see the differences you will see on a larger monitor or color print from all these different sensors.  

When you are trying to see the differences between these 4 cameras, I strongly encourage you to put down your phone or tablet and open up a browser on your Laptop or Desktop computer instead.

The Magic of Art is such a fickle thing:  some people can see it, while others can't.  I can see the Magic, and as such I can appreciate the photos from all of these cameras in a different way. 

I can still enjoy photos taken with my CMOS cameras while still admitting there is "Something different about the look you get from CCD and Older CMOS sensors that makes it Cool and Unique"

To end and summarize this blog post:  If you can appreciate the Art of having a different look to your photos, even if it is subtle and you really have to look hard to see "Oh hey CCD sensors tend to have a slightly more green/blue color shift vs a yellow/red shift that CMOS sensors give by default.  Then great! If not, use the tools you enjoy using and don't rain on someone else's parade simply because they see a different canvas with what is in front of them then you may see.

If you want to argue "well I can make my CMOS sensor look like that with a Filter in post" sure, obviously you can.  But at that point you are still using a different tool to make your Art so why not leave the CCD camera enthusiast alone and let them use the tools that work the best for them to create their own art with?

To end this post as promised, here is the Bonus or Preview as it were of some photos from the Dual Layer Super CCD sensors in the Fuji S1 and S2 Pro. A sneak peak at what the subject of one of my upcoming blog posts will be about.