PHOTO QUALITY. This 18-megapixel advanced point-and-shoot camera captured images with good quality. Pictures were sharp, which means you can see most details and subtle patterns in the image. In low-light situations without a flash, pictures were not quite as sharp as those of most recommended models. We judged this model excellent for outdoor performance, such as shooting landscapes in the daytime; good for indoor performance, such as photographing a well-lit basketball game in a gym. And good for low-light performance without a flash, such as capturing a birthday party. Photos taken in our low-light performance tests displayed some image noise; subjects retained some of their correct detail and color.
FLASH. The Lumix FZ80 captured flash shots that were good. In our distance test, we found the camera's flash could illuminate most subjects that are closer to the camera, but had some problems with distant subjects. The flash also has good, relatively even coverage.
LENS. It has a very long 60x zoom lens that can be great for travel and sports shooting when you need to zoom in far to capture your subjects. The lens also has very wide-angle (20mm) capability that's very useful for landscapes and group portraits, although you may notice a bit of distortion when you're shooting faces up close, for instance.
IMAGE STABILIZATION. This is an important feature with a long zoom lens; taking hand-held shots at the telephoto end of the zoom range can generally blur or soften images due to the slight movement of your hands. Shooting zoom set at 4x in well-lit scenes, this model did a very good job of minimizing the effects of camera shake. Shooting telephoto in well-lit scenes, this model did a very good job of minimizing the effects of camera shake. In low-light settings, it performed very well and rarely produced blurry photos. Overall, the shake reduction results from our tests were very good.
SPEED. In terms of performance, the Panasonic Lumix FZ80 powers up in a moderate amount of time. It has a short interval between shots, which can be important when shooting fast-moving or unpredictable subjects.
VIDEO. The Panasonic Lumix FZ80 takes very good video. It also captures 4K-UHD video at 3840 x 2160 60p or 30i. As for sound, it captures very good audio in stereo.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS. Like most advanced point-and-shoot models, this camera does include an electronic viewfinder, which means you have flexibility when composing your photo or video; this viewfinder has very good quality. This advanced point-and-shoot is much bigger, thicker and heavier than most in its class. Although this model has many features and controls, this advanced point-and-shoot is bulky and heavy, which may not make it the best model if you travel a lot.
