Panasonic Lumix DC-FZ82

Best Value Superzoom – I'll get straight to the point, this is the best value superzoom camera you can get. It shoots 4K with a 15 minute recording limit. You can get up to 336X magnification with digital zoom enabled, however the optical and best quality limit is 60X. The autofocus is not reliable, especially at night, if it had a focus ring to adjust the focus that… Read more ·  1

would of been amazing but you can live on manual focus and toggle autofocus on demand with a button press.

Night quality is about as dark as an iPhone however when you zoom into bright areas you can see the brightness in that area so it's actually pretty usable.

You can get shots of the moon which is amazing! Although the quality can get grainy when digital zoom is used, but it's still good.

You can watch demonstrations of the camera in action in our video review here: youtu.be/y3fQGwznFOY

The LCD screen is usable but ideally you need a bigger screen to better see what's going on, there is HDMI output but it doesn't output a live feed just plays back recorded media.

It charges and transfers files via USB which is useful as the tripod mount screw hole is next to the battery door so to get to the battery/SD card area requires more work than it should. That being said battery life is decent, continual recording will last around an hour, but for me I've don't use this camera to shoot continuous so I've so far never had any problems recording events.

After occasional (probably 10-20 times) use over 6 months the camera just refused to start, we've been quoted a 2-4 week repair timeframe under warranty. Hopefully this isn't a widespread issue.

You can vlog with it, 20mm is a little tight and with no mic input the audio quality is very mediocre, but it is a bit of fun.

The zoom is very slow, a manual zoom ring would of been great, but for the price, I can't complain too much.

It's very light at 600grams, compared to the newer 1.5kg Nikon P1000.

Overall, yes for the price, value, weight, usage, I'd recommend this camera.

Great bridging camera – I found this camera while looking to step up from a basic point-and-shoot. It bridges the gap between compact and DSLR nicely and takes wonderful photos. Optical zoom to 60x; extra optical zoom setting to 122x without losing quality. At 645 g it is a bit heavier (and bulkier) than a compact, but I did carry it around my neck all day on many… Read more

occasions on a recent overseas holiday without too much discomfort. Takes excellent pics in low light. I'm currently fiddling with macros - but haven't quite got that worked out yet, so can't comment. It was a replacement for a broken DC-FZ80 which is very similar - actually I haven't yet worked out what's different! With the FZ80 I slipped over on a rock and the camera impacted on the rock in a small puddle, so I guess it isn't too water and impact resistant.