Help with Lumix

[Tommy Kovacs]

Hi There,
I have recently bought a Panasonic Lumix FZ45. My newbie problem is that the LCD monitor shows a nice bright picture in medium to low light but the photo when take is unusably dark. Also, the photos lack the crispness I would expect from a camera that cost over £200. Anybody out there have some experience with this camera??
Many thanks in anticipation

[FrankMi]

Hi Tommy and welcome to CiC! Hopefully we'll get a Lumix user to chime. In general terms, if you have read the user manual carefully (read: not a user error!), shooting with the camera's setting on Auto and the results are unusably dark, I'd take it back to where you purchased it and show them. If they can't determine the cause, then hopefully they will address the problem to your satisfaction.

If it was a mail order purchase, hopefully you can e-mail them examples of what you are getting for results. It shouldn't matter what brand of camera it is, it should, like anything else you might purchase, work correctly.

[Tringa]

I used an earlier FZ model (an fz28) for a few years with no problems but it is difficult to advise without seeing the results. Can you post some examples of your photos on here with details of the camera settings, so we can see what are you getting from the camera?

Dave

[Tommy Kovacs]

Thanks for the help. You are the salt of earth for helping newbies.
The pics I have taken have been deleted. However the test was not fair because I have taken them it in low light. Repeating focusing and exposure tests in full daylight the results were indeed very good.

[HMW12]

I have just started with an FZ100 - from what I have read on other forums about this line of cameras - they are not great in low light. One tip might be to set the Noise reduction to a lower setting. On dpreview an experienced user of the FZ100 suggested

Contrast +1
Sharp +2
Saturation -1
Noise Reduction -2
If too noisy or grainy reduce Contrast to 0 if still noisy reduce Sharp to +1

Something similar might help with the FZ45

[Boatman]

Tommy:

I have a GH2, which is different than the FZ45, but I might be able to help. I'm pretty sure the FZ has an electronic viewfinder. This will 'gain up' in low light and you will see a bright image in the viewfinder, but this is not what your photograph is going to look like. This may be what is throwing you off.

Your best solution, assuming the camera has these features, is to turn on the in-viewfinder histogram (graph). There should also be a thumb-wheel adjuster that will allow you to increase or decrease your exposure, which will not change the image you see in the viewfinder, but it will brighten or darken the image you get as a photograph. What you want to do is adjust your exposure compensation (+EV) so that the graph moves to the right without going off of the scale. This will give you your maximum exposure without blowing out your highlights. As long as you don't blow out the highlights, even if you overexpose the image you can darken it back up in post processing. You probably can't do this in iA mode. Use the P mode instead.

As for not being able to work in low light, the FZ45 has an f2.8 lens, which is not bad. The issue you may see is that having a small sensor your images may be quite grainy at higher ISO settings. You should find that up to ISO400 the camera does quite well.

[Tommy Kovacs]

Thank you all for the invaluable contribution. Couldn't thank you sooner for I was on the high seas and communication is rather restricted. Thanks again.