Panasonic Panasonic FZ70 Superzoom Announced

Biro

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Okay, compact and bridge camera fans - especially those who don't mind cameras with small (as in 1/2.3") sensors - heads up! Panasonic has just announced the FZ70, a compact superzoom with a whopping 20 (you read that correctly) to 1200mm zoom range. Aperture range is f/2.8-5.9 and the camera has an EVF - the same one used on the new LF1 (no surprise since this is an FZ-series camera). MSRP is $399. Here's the news release and initial impressions at DPReview:

Panasonic announces Lumix DMC-FZ70 with 60x optical zoom

The camera is available for pre-order at Adorama now:

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ70 Digital Camera DMCFZ70K

Sounds pretty interesting.
 
it always seems to be a numbers race of some sort in this class....either price point, or zoom range (and now zoom speed apparently!). and all the camera manufacturers nibble around the edge to some degree. Maybe that's the way to make money. I'd like someone to make a bridge camera for me. I don't want it to be small. This camera will be in my bag 70% of the time while I use my favorite compact. It will basically be a KILLER tele lens attached to a great sensor. I've seen small senosr IQ....and it's come a LONG ways, but I'm not interested. And if I were, there's already 20 different superzooms with VERY similar specs.
 
Best I've seen so far is still the X-S1. I pretty much can't use the EVF on my FZ100, its just too small. I believe the FZ200 has a better, larger one. One hopes that might carry through to the FZ70. However, Panasonic usually releases their bridge cams in pairs. One with lower specs than the other. I'd expect to see an FZ250 or 300 with an f/2.8 and a huge zoom.... and it wont be small.
 
pretty impressive zoom range - to be honest I'm more excited about the 20mm wide angle than the 1200mm tele, although that tele end would make it one heck of a safari camera. Unfortunately these bridge cameras are too large for my purposes.
 
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