Despite challenges, the year 2020 turned out to be full of new camera releases from big names like Canon, Nikon and Sony. I’m sure all those cameras are great, but I can’t afford any of them. Even if I could, my photographic ability wouldn’t be able to take full advantage of those technological spaceships. I already have nice cameras that give me more than ample space to grow my craft. But lately I noticed a void that none of my current cameras could fill – a small, lightweight camera with a large zoom range that I could stick on my backpack strap to be ready at any moment. Enter Panny, my $25 superzoom from 2010.
This is my new-to-me Panasonic FZ35. It has less megapixels than the big dogs by a lot, less frames per second, a really bad old-school EVF, caps out at 720p video… It’s perfect, really.
You might be asking, why now? Why would anyone want this camera over a decade later?
Well, there’s a lot of reasons. Superzoom cameras present an enormous value for money, despite not getting the respect they deserve from the photography community. Have you ever noticed that? They are super versatile – not only do you get the obvious advantage of a built-in massive zoom range, but you get it in a small package that is usually equally capable in stills and video.
There are modern superzoom cameras less than $500 with absolutely stellar image quality, zoom image, video quality, and more. So, naturally, I wanted to see if I could get one of the best from ten years ago and see if it was any good. I succeeded, and this guy only cost me $30. Which is about as much as a cheap vintage lens. I figured rather than slapping on a large cheap telephoto onto my large cheap camera, maybe I should just buy a small cheap camera?
Normally, with a lens range this long you’d be limited in what you could shoot because of shake and high shutter speeds; however, this camera has stabilization and it’s pretty dang impressive. Depending on the range and situation, I could zoom all the way in and still keep my shutter speed between 125th and 200th of a second if I was feeling stable. Check out my handheld shot of the moon from my background. So cool.
When you buy a camera, you’re buying it for it’s ability to help you take beautiful photos, not for whatever random topped out spec it has-or, I mean, that’s what you should be buying a camera for.
Good news is that this camera soars for a $30 camera. The colors are beautiful, the lens is usably sharp across the range. You can even get a little bokeh if you want. Just stand back and zoom in tight.
As another evidence of image quality, I would like to take this moment to announce that these photos are straight out of camera JPEGs. But, this has less to do with my trying to prove a point, and more to do with Snapseed’s lack of compatibility with the .RW2 raw files and my laziness in figuring that out. The programs on my computer handled the raw files just fine, so no worries there. I wasn’t after anything crazy with this camera and I just decided to stay with the JPEGs for social media sharing. I’m quite pleased with the results.
Now that we are halfway through this article, I have a confession to make – I owned this camera 8 years ago. Yep, I wanted an affordable telephoto and video camera. I remember being so excited and impressed with this camera back then. It was pretty amazing. So then I have to ask the question: Why can’t it be amazing now?
Okay, the video looks pretty lacking compared to modern offerings, unless you’re watching on a mobile phone, which according to my stats almost half ofmy YouTube subscribers are. But what it lacks in resolution it makes up for in impressive sharpness for telephoto video. Remember what you’re getting, and how much you’re paying. My $30 got me 450+mm zoomed video with stabilization. All the sample footage in the YouTube video was shot handheld. Sure, it’s not as advanced as some modern cameras, but it’s incredible for what it is.
If you have a few more bucks to spend, say $100 or so, then your world opens up to a whole bunch of other used superzooms of yesterday options. The features that I would consider worth paying extra for would be a flippy screen, better EVF, and 1080p video. Though, as noted the 720p works great for social media. And believe it or not, you can get even further zoom ranges.
It baffles me that superzooms aren’t recommended as often for practical photographers wanting an all-in-one package for cheap. The convenience matched with image quality is top notch.
If you’re on a super tight budget, but want to shoot telephoto, shoot some video, have a toss around do-it-all camera you’re not worried about breaking, then I don’t know if you can do any better than an old used forgotten about superzoom camera.
Go out there and takes pictures of whatever, with whatever, have fun, and until next time, happy snappin’
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