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The SZ7 looks like a typical ultra-compact camera, but Panasonic has somehow managed to cram a 10x zoom lens into its 21mm deep shell. This is a stunning achievement. Canon goes even further with the Ixus 500 HS, which measures 19mm and has a 12x zoom lens, but it uses a cropped sensor design to achieve this feat. There are no such compromises with the SZ7, which has an extremely flexible 25-250mm (equivalent) lens, focusing light onto a 14-megapixel, 1/2.3in back-illuminated CMOS sensor.
It’s disappointing that the company feels compelled to claim a 20x Intelligent Zoom – this looks to us like plain old digital zoom, which magnifies without adding any extra detail. Annoyingly, it can’t be turned off in Intelligent Auto mode, so we had to zoom carefully to avoid going into this part of the zoom range.
The SZ7 can’t match the stunning good looks of the Ixus, but it’s still a reasonably handsome camera and its metal shell seems built to last. The screen is a big let-down, though, suffering from severely washed out colours when viewed slightly from above. We tend to hold compact cameras with our elbows to our sides to help hold it steady, and from this position the screen looked awful.
We also noticed an odd, echo-like smearing of colours when recording videos. This wasn’t a problem with the screen, though – the recorded videos were smeared too. It was only visible in highly specific circumstances, with low light, fast motion and sharp, high-contrast subjects. As such, it wasn’t a big issue in practice, but it’s disconcerting nonetheless.
Otherwise, the SZ7’s videos were excellent, with crisp, smooth details and a high quality stereo soundtrack. They’re recorded in AVCHD or MP4 format at 1080p for up to 30 minutes per clip. The zoom motor was barely detectable on the soundtrack and the autofocus motor was completely silent.
The camera handled our photo tests with confidence, too. Performance was superb, taking a shot every 0.8 seconds in normal use. The headline 10fps continuous mode lasted for just four shots, but the ability to shoot at 5fps with continuous autofocus is unprecedented at this price. It slowed to around 1.6fps after five shots, but that’s still a fine result. There’s not much to report about the controls and menus – they’re straightforward and effective, and include all the key options we expect. Our only gripe is that the custom white balance mode can be selected from the Quick Menu but its calibration is only possible via the main menu. This had us stumped for quite a while.
Noise reduction works hard in low light, but messy edges around darker areas reveal this camera’s limitations – click to enlarge
Comparing image quality with the similarly specified Canon Ixus 500 HS, the Panasonic delivered sharper focus into the corners of frames – a remarkable achievement considering that the Canon doesn’t even try to focus light onto the edges of its sensor. There were some chromatic aberrations, giving red and blue halos around high-contrast lines, but they rarely made a big impact in practice. The Panasonic also exhibited less noise in bright light, but indoors there was little to choose between them, and in very low light the Canon broke out into the lead. It also displayed warmer, more flattering colours. Overall, though, the Panasonic takes the prize for image quality.
With reasonably sharp focus throughout its 10x zoom range, the SZ7 is a marvellous feat of optical design – click to enlarge
We could live with the video smearing issue but we’re less inclined to put up with the screen’s poor viewing angles. We prefer the SZ7 to the Ixus 500 HS, but the Ixus 230 HS is still the best compact camera we’ve seen to date with its 8x zoom and immaculate image quality.
