Panasonic’s new LX3 doesn’t simply crop away bands of pixels along the edges of its sensor to achieve the various aspect ratios. Rather, the LX3 uses a relatively new technique first introduced in Panasonic’s TZ3. The sensor is larger than the imaging circle of the lens. For each aspect ratio, a slightly smaller central portion is cropped out of the sensor. In each case though, the diagonal equals the diameter of the lens’ imaging circle. Thus each aspect ratio offers the same angle of view: the LX3 features the same 24-60mm (35mm equivalent) zoom range at all 3 aspect ratios. As is evident in the diagram below, although the angle of view and focal length remain the same at each aspect ratio, the horizontal field of view increases as you move from 4:3 to 16:9, taking in more of the scene horizontally.
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