Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ18

Manual Control Options
The Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ18 has a full range of automated to manual controls including Program, Aperture Priority, Shutter Speed Priority, and Manual modes, enough to satisfy any photographer. There are also manual controls for just about everything: white balance, ISO, exposure, focus along with features like bracketing. The only real limitation is the inability to switch lenses, but the 28-504mm lens covers most situations and conversion lenses can be added.

Focus
Autofocus (8.5)
The autofocus system generally works quickly and effectively. The older FZ8 doesn’t have a face detection system, but the new FZ18 includes great face detection technology. It is advertised to detect, focus on, and expose for up to 15 faces in a scene, although when we tested it, it only detected seven faces. The camera recognizes faces quickly and can track them even when they are slightly turned.

The face detection option is among the other autofocus mode options in the Recording menu. Other options include 1-point, 1-point high speed, 3-point high speed, 5-point, and spot. Also in the menu, users can turn the continuous autofocus feature on and off. Macro focus shooting is available by pushing the small button by the shutter release. There is a separate button by it that switches between autofocus and manual focus modes.

The autofocus system can focus from 0.39 inches in the Macro mode and 11.8 inches normally. Those specs are from when the lens is at its widest; when zoomed in, the macro mode can focus from 3.28 feet and normally the camera focuses from 6.56 feet.

The autofocus system is generally quick. It takes the camera about 0.3 seconds to focus before snapping a shot. This may still be too long for some photographers, but there aren’t many other ultra-zoom models that perform any better.

The autofocus system struggles in low light. It shoots out an orange assist lamp but its performance is still unreliable. There are more details in the low light portion of the Testing/Performance section.

Manual Focus (5.0)
The AF/MF button on the top of the camera switches between autofocus and manual focus. When manual focus is employed, a vertical bar appears on the right side of the LCD screen. It has a few numerical indicators alongside it. A yellow bar slides up and down the bar to indicate to the user where they are in the range. Focus is adjusted by pressing the joystick on the camera’s back. The center of the image is magnified when users push on the joystick; this theoretically makes it easier to see the focus of subjects, but the LCD screen resolution isn’t good enough to support this. Jagged edges still appear on subjects, especially those close to the camera. The manual focus can be adjusted from 0.04 feet to infinity.

ISO (8.0)
The Panasonic FZ18 slightly improves upon the FZ8’s ISO range. The older FZ8 has a range that extends to 1250, and the new FZ18 adds a ISO 1600 option. Higher sensitivity brings increased noise, which is a problem for this camera. There are more details in the Testing/Performance section.

The ISO settings, located in the Recording menu, are: 100, 200, 400, 800, 1250, 1600, and auto. There is also a High Sensitivity Scene mode that uses ISO settings from 1600 to 6400, although at the expense of the resolution – it shoots at 3 megapixels. The Panasonic FZ18 also has an intelligent ISO control with the following options: Off, ISO max 400, ISO max 800, and ISO max 1600. This feature senses whether subjects are moving and how high to move the ISO to freeze that movement. This is a cool feature, but must be taken with a grain of salt considering the noise performance.

The FZ18’s ISO range is about average compared to other similar digital cameras. The Canon S5 has an 80-1600 range, the Fujifilm S8000fd has a 64-1600 range, and the Sony H9 has a 64-3200 range.

White Balance (8.5)
Users can adjust the white balance in the Recording menu with the help of a live preview. The following modes are available: auto, daylight, cloudy, shade, halogen, custom 1, and custom 2. In the list is also a custom set option that makes it easy to frame something white and set the white balance in just a few seconds.

There is also a white balance adjustment option that allows users to choose the hue along an X-Y grid with amber and blue on the horizontal axis and green and magenta on the vertical axis. There are +/- 9 steps on each axis. These white balance options are above and beyond the norm.

The white balance performed well and made it possible for the Panasonic FZ18 to accurately portray very realistic colors. More details about this can be found in the Testing/Performance section.

Exposure (8.25)
The Panasonic Lumix FZ18 has plenty of Scene modes, a fully Automatic mode, and more Manual modes: Program, Aperture Priority, Shutter Speed Priority, and Manual.

Exposure compensation is available in the typical +/- 2 scale with steps of a third. For users who want to find just the right exposure and do it quickly, an auto bracketing mode can be accessed by pushing the top of the multi-selector. It shoots three pictures at +/- 1/3, 2/3, or 1 EV step. In the fully Automatic mode, there is only an all-purpose backlight compensation that brightens the image a bit.

Users who want to monitor the exposure can view a live histogram along with full file info including the shutter speed and aperture.

Metering (7.5)
The Panasonic FZ18 has the same metering options as its predecessor and many other compact digital cameras: intelligent multiple, center-weighted average, and spot. There isn’t a live view in the menu for this option, which makes it a bit harder to instantly judge the exposure.

Shutter Speed (8.0)
The Panasonic FZ18 has a shutter speed range typical of its class of digital camera. In the Manual mode, the shutter speed ranges from 60-1/2000th of a second. The Shutter Speed Priority mode offers an 8-1/2000th range while the Program mode shortens it even more to 1-1/2000th of a second. The shutter speed is manipulated with the joystick, which can switch between aperture and shutter speed by moving horizontally and then through the shutter speed range by moving vertically. In the Starry Sky scene mode, the shutter speed can be slowed to 15, 30, or 60 seconds.

Aperture (7.25)
The massive 18x optical zoom lens has a 10-step aperture range when the lens is zoomed to its widest 28mm. It maxes out at f/2.8, which lets in a good amount of light hit the image sensor. When the lens is zoomed in, the aperture shrinks to f/4.2, which is slightly larger than its competitors. For instance, the Olympus SP-560 and Fujifilm S8000fd both have a max f/4.5 aperture when their lenses are zoomed in. The Panasonic FZ18’s aperture shrinks as small as f/8. Users can scroll through aperture options in the Manual and Aperture Priority exposure modes with the joystick. This control switches from shutter speed to aperture by pushing left, then up and down through the aperture range.