Gear Review: Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS7 Point-and-Shoot Camera
This point-and-shoot camera does it all: stills, video, and GPS.
Stills. Video. GPS. This camera is all you need to produce a georeferenced, multimedia tour de force. After a four-day camping trip from Boulder to Bozeman and back, our tester said, “The camera kept up with our constantly changing location, which we could upload with images to a digital map without additional software,” she says. (Shameless plug: She used backpacker.com/postatrip.)
And there’s no compromise on image quality: The 25mm ultra-wide-angle Leica lens with 12X optical zoom means you can capture big landscape scenes, as well as zoom in on distant features. Still shots are crisp and rich. And the AVCHD Lite HD video format uses half the memory of traditional Motion JPEG technology.
Our only complaint: The record button is awkwardly placed on the right back corner of the camera, so it’s easy to accidentally start filming while framing still shots. $360; SD, SDHC, or SDXC memory card; lithium-ion battery; 7.7 oz. (mfr. weight); panasonic.com