Images of Canberra - Introduction to ASP

I’ve got an army of “give me seeds or give me death” birds here, but none of them is orange! They’re mostly large and white, small and pink, or even smaller and various shades of red, green and black.

If I don’t put the seeds in their dish early enough, they are outside screeching and chewing the wood in the vicinity of my bedroom.

Ah that bird is the rare, blushing, yellow-hooded, banshee-singing, “give me seeds or give me death” parrot.

No, I haven’t heard anything about the FZ50. I did a lot of research before buying the Boat Anchor too, but you know those DPreview and Steven’s sites never seem to bag a camera!
And the negative comment about the FZ30 was pretty muted in photog. forums at that time (I bet it’s not now).

It’s such a shame, because as you say, the versatility of it is excellent, you’d need a bagful of lenses to do what the one prosumer will do… but it will give you rubbish shots most of the time.

That said, I’ve managed some reasonsble shots by getting to know it, and how to maximise its performance. But landscapes (it casts a coloured mist over them) and any low-light shots are its Waterloo.

When I was shopping, the Sony R1 fascinated me. It has an even better lense (Zeiss), but the price was above the entry level SLRs!

Certainly worth investigating the FZ50, as Panasonic are capable of making good cameras, and there was plenty of advice made available to them as to where they’d gone wrong with the FZ30! And how stupid of them, to squander their reputation by making such a thing.

I own a FZ5. I bought a good quality macro and telephoto lens, but to be honest I don’t use the telephoto much. I have not got a better coupler, and a heavy lens on those flimsy plastic threads is not good, has fallen off once already.
Great camera, but I would prefer a manual focus, and it sucks in indoor/low light. Needs a hotshoe and external flash. But then, it wouldn’t be such a great little camera would it?

Had it not being for the small megapixel count, I would still be using my FZ20. Very versatile, can swap from doing a landscape shot to a telephoto of a bird in around three seconds. To do that with a dSLR requires that I carry two cameras. A dSLR with tele-lens which ways about 4kilos and a film SLR with a wide angle lens weighing another two kilos. The FZ20 weighted about one kilo!

Do you know anything about the Panasonic FZ50? I hear they fixed up a lot of the issues that had plagues the FZ30. Further, word is that the reason the model numbers went from 30 to 50 is that the FZ40 they developed was so much worse than the FZ30, I would not have been merchantable.

As for Canon prosumer digicams that equal the FZ20. There is only one, the Powershot S5 IS. 8MP, 36-432mm focal equivalent, and a lens with USM & Image Stabilisation, features often found on the expensive SLR lenses. Sounds pretty good, but cNet reports that image quality is poor. Disappointing for a $700 camera. If the FZ50 is any good, that may be the best prosumer model at the moment, based on my comparison of the specs from major brands.

yup. The FZ30 has a wonderful lense… and a sensor much like an opaque button. And weird internal software. It is so frustrating! I was havering between it (a prosumer) and a SLR, but I liked the all-purpose functionality of the set lense. If only I’d known.

I wish Canon made a prosumer like this, I’d buy it at any price.

You were lucky to get the FZ20,which is a whole different animal with great raps from many photographers.

Thanks for the feedback by the way. I have a new exhibition coming up soon at a prominent Canberra dinning establishment. Keep an eye out on RiotACT for more!

ant, FZ30 was terrible. I came so close to buying it before going with a dSLR. FZ20 was good though. The Leica lens was exceptional and really good zoom. The image of the Wallaby was taken using my FZ20. The other were from my dSLR.

JD114, I should clear something up. I am an Emerging Member of the AIPP, not a full certified member. I stupidly drop the Emerging part sometimes, getting a little ahead of myself. To actually become a full member, you have to go through a rigorous process of review.

Widdershins, thanks for providing the name of the bird. I checked and you are indeed correct.

Lovely! I like the panoramas. The birdy is a Sun Conure, I think. Gorgeous birds.