New Camera Tryout

I bought a new camera the other week, a cheapo that was on sale and I figured, hey, for 100 bucks let's see how she flies.

Below are scenes from a dinner. The first shots are taken with my surprisingly trusty Canon A85, a shockingly good camera even in these days when its paltry four megapixels seem ancient; the second with the newcomer, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LS70, a smaller seven megapixel camera.

All attempts were made to take the same shot with the same settings. Alas, as the evening wore on and the drinks accumulated, I don't know how faithful we were.

As for the dinner: superb! I am not at liberty to extol its virtues or reveal its name as I have a weighty conflict of interest. Suffice it to say, were I free to gush, gush I would.

Part 1: Bread.

- Canon

- Lumix

The colors of the Canon are definitely more true to life and the flash - which I am often loathe to use, created more distortion in the Panasonic. I do not immediately detect a quality difference given the number of megapixels in the Panasonic model.

Part 2: Tarte Flambee.

- Canon

- Lumix

Notoriously unphotographable, that Tarte, the Lumix beat out the Canon on this one because the picture I took with Canon and flash was so bright I thought the cheese might have been radioactive. I didn't touch these photos up in any way though now I'm tempted to do some levels adjustments to see which photo looks better post-edit.

Part 3: Foie Gras.

- Canon

- Lumix

My dinner date, Ed, pointed out to me that the Panasonic models have a special shooting mode for food, so we tried it out. I don't think there's any question which photo is better. The detail on the Canon shot is pretty out of this world. Both the greens and the sea salt have exceptional clarity and the color is spot-on.

Part 4: Lamb.

- Canon

- Lumix

The food scene mode is suffering mightily as trusty Canon trots out another bang up shot. The shots are a little small on the screen, but the Canon succeeds in capturing the grains of couscous as well as the glistening hunks of lamb. The Lumix - not so much. It looks like a big unappetizing blur.

Part 5: Dessert.

- Canon

- Lumix

Ouch. Yet again one of these cameras is bitchslapping the other. In the top shots I can see grains of cocoa powder, berries, and color differentiation. In the second I can't.

Final verdict: I won't be using the Lumix for food shots. In fact, I won't be using the Lumix. It's a perfectly serviceable point and shoot that I suspect will be better suited to daylight and the casual shooter. As such, it will be gifted to mom and dad (who currently do not own a digital camera), and I will return to lusting after a DSLR while contemplating simply moving to the Canon A-series older brother the 7-megapixel A570.