{"id":4846,"date":"2011-08-26T16:40:13","date_gmt":"2011-08-26T06:40:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/?p=4846"},"modified":"2011-08-26T17:04:41","modified_gmt":"2011-08-26T07:04:41","slug":"sony-may-have-trumped-the-feature-set-for-mirrorless-cameras-but-panasonic-leverages-pocketability-with-its-new-ultra-compact-3x-zoom-lens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/?p=4846","title":{"rendered":"Sony may have trumped the feature set for mirrorless cameras but Panasonic leverages pocketability with its new ultra compact, premium 3x zoom lenses"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Sony has just announced a range of mirrorless camera products which have fantastic features but ONE MAJOR problem &#8211; the lenses are way too big for the tiny NEX cameras making handling an issue as well as pocketability.<\/p>\n<p>Panasonic has just announced 2 new Micro Four Thirds lenses which bring compact size to zoom lenses &#8211; up until now, if you wanted a really compact lens for a mirrorless camera it had to be a single focallength pancake lens such as the 14mm f\/2.5, 17mm f\/2.8 or 20mm f\/1.7.<\/p>\n<p>Now Panasonic has added a <strong>new premium class<\/strong> of Micro Four Thirds lenses denoted <strong>Lumix X<\/strong> which have <strong>nano coatings<\/strong> for reached flare, and a <strong>high level of edge-to-edge optic quality<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>In addition, they have Panasonic&#8217;s <strong>HD<\/strong> badge which indicates <strong>AF is near silent<\/strong> and the <strong>aperture is stepless for HD video<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>The first two Lumix X lenses are very interesting indeed &#8211; the first is <strong>half as long<\/strong> as its predecessor,while the 2nd is <strong>half the weight and shorter<\/strong> than its predecessor, or the Sony&#8217;s new lens.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Panasonic LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 14-42mm\/F3.5-5.6 ASPH.\/ POWER O.I.S. (H-PS14042) lens:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>28-84mm field of view in 35mm terms &#8211; very standard for most kit lenses, as is the aperture f\/3.5-5.6<\/li>\n<li>new power optical image stabilisation for improved stabilisation of large slow movements in addition to fast small movements.<\/li>\n<li>new retractable design to make it ultra-compact and only <strong>26.8mm long<\/strong> when turned off, but almost doubles when turned on (this compares to 64mm long for the older Lumix 14-42mm lens, and is also shorter than the collapsible Olympus equivalent)<\/li>\n<li>interestingly it now has a <strong>multi-speed power zoom lever<\/strong> as there is no physical room for a zoom ring &#8211; and this has been designed to provide quiet, smooth zooming during HD video &#8211; so it now begs the question &#8211; will we see future camera bodies with a power zoom lever near the shutter as with camcorders?<\/li>\n<li>Manual focusing via a <strong>manual focus lever<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>fast AF<\/strong> with the latest generation cameras<\/li>\n<li>close focus to 0.2m.<\/li>\n<li>4 aspherical elements and 2 ED elements for high image quality<\/li>\n<li>7 rounded diaphragm blades<\/li>\n<li>internal focus<\/li>\n<li>37mm filter thread &#8211; doesnot rotate on focus<\/li>\n<li>95g<\/li>\n<li>RRP $Us399 or you will be able to get it bundled with a GF-3 camera<\/li>\n<li>on a GF3 or an Olympus E-PL3, this lens at last enables a 3x zoom lens on a large sensor to be easily pocketable in a jacket or carried in a purse.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Panasonic LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 45-175mm\/F4.0-5.6 ASPH.\/POWER O.I.S. (H-PS45175):<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>90-350mm field of view in 35mm terms with aperture f\/4.0-5.6<\/li>\n<li>power optical image stabilisation &#8211; even more effective than previous Mega OIS technology as it adds 2x more effective stabilisation of large, slow movements.<\/li>\n<li><strong>power zoom lever<\/strong> as for the 14-42mm lens, but also has a zoom ring<\/li>\n<li>a Multi-Actuator Floating Inner Focus System to control three lens groups separately helps reduce size and <strong>almost halves the weight<\/strong> whilst apparently maintaining image quality!<\/li>\n<li>weight 209g or 7.4oz<\/li>\n<li>only 90mm long! Not bad for a lens giving 300mm reach.<\/li>\n<li>the older 45-200mm lens is 100mm long and weighed 380g<\/li>\n<li>the new Sony equivalent, the 55-210mm has a reach of only 315mm and at aperture f\/6.3, and is 108mm long and weighs 345g (12.2oz) which<strong> is almost TWICE as heavy<\/strong>!<\/li>\n<li>shutter lag 20% of the older 45-200mm OIS lens.<\/li>\n<li>RRP $US449<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If compact size is important, these two lenses will give you the lightest, most compact kit while still having great image quality and fast quiet AF, at least fot stationary subjects.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sony has just announced a range of mirrorless camera products which have fantastic features but ONE MAJOR problem &#8211; the lenses are way too big for the tiny NEX cameras making handling an issue as well as pocketability. Panasonic has just announced 2 new Micro Four Thirds lenses which bring compact size to zoom lenses [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[18,15],"class_list":["post-4846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lenses","tag-four-thirds-micro","tag-panasonic"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4846\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ayton.id.au\/wp02\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}