timwarr.net

So following the arrival of my TZ10 with built in GPS, here are my thoughts on it so far…

Firstly a sample image I took:

Which was located here by GPS (spot on!):

View Larger Map

The camera overall:

• I love the compact size considering it still has 12x optical zoom.  This means that I am much more likely to take it with me anywhere I go.  The first rule of getting great photos!
• One gripe is I cannot find a decent case for it.  Ideally I would like one of those silicone skins as a I will drop it on a mountain at some point!
• The ‘Intelligent Auto Mode’ seems to be remarkably simple and work very well.  I use it most of the time.
• As with the TZ7 – the mode dial is a pain and always shifts when you put it in a case, so you have to check it each time before taking a photo.  It is a pity panasonic did not fix this.
• The manual settings are pretty good for a compact camera. But a little fiddly to use (cold fingers and small buttons do not mix).  It is also a pity that there is no manual focus lock.
• The ‘Panorama Assist’ mode is very good.  It locks focus, white balance, aperture and shutter speed.  More on why this is so useful for me later…
• The Auto Bracketing of exposures feature is great and I have been having some fun trying HDR.  It is a whole other world!
• Battery life has been pretty good all considered. Although I would recommend always having a spare battery with you.  Shame on you Panasonic for doing firmware updates preventing the use of non-Panasonic batteries!

The GPS:

So this was the main reason for choosing this camera.  Panasonic call it all ‘Travel Mode‘.  Is it any good?  Is it fast enough? What about battery life?  Actually I think panasonic have done a really good job on this.  Having it all built into the camera is great and simple.  The problem of the time it takes to get a GPS signal/location before taking a photo is solved by the the GPS continuously logging locations even when the camera is turned off.  So when you turn on the camera to take a photo there is no delay as it already knows where it is.  To save on battery power it stops checking for GPS locations when the camera has not been used for a while or it has not got a GPS signal for a while (e.g. when it has been indoors overnight).  All of this seems to work pretty well.  The only issue is that if you drive to a new location with the camera having been off for a while, you a liable to still have the photo tagged with a location you were in a while ago.  The solution I have found is to turn the camera on briefly when you arrive somewhere new so that it starts search for GPS signals and knows where it is when you take your 1st photo later.

It has been great being able to come home at the end of a trip, upload all of my photos (I use Picasa) and immediately see them on a map (as the latitude/longitude is included in the EXIF for each file).  I need to do some more experimenting about the best way to share my photos on map (Picasa Web Albums are a little limiting)

I have not really explored the tagging of images by place name or Point of Interest based on the Navteq POI data in the camera.  I am not so interested in this yet…

So all in all I give it the thumbs up!