conradb212
Registered
While we did most of the underwater shooting during an August liveaboard trip on the Turks & Caicos Explorer II with our big Olympus-E620/PT-E06 rig, we also took some other underwater cameras with (Canon D10, Canon G10 with housing, LiquidImage VideoMask 320), including a Panasonic TS1. I took it with because we hoped we'd also get the accompanying DMW-MCFT1 marine case, but it wasn't available yet. The Lumix TS1 has a depth rating of just ten feet, so we could really only use it for snorkeling and poke around and under the boat.
That said, I am surprised how much better Panasonic cameras have gotten. Picture quality is terriffic, the zoom is a nice 28-128mm equivalent that starts wide, the 2.7-inch LCD is very bright, and the camera can even do very good 1280x720 720p video.
On the not-so-great side, icons and labels are tiny and very hard to read underwater and the camera is expensive (US$399 list). It's also not quite as tough as the Olympus Tough models (though sometimes I'd swear they are made by the same OEM).
Anyway, if you want to see my full review of the Panasonic TS1, with a bunch of pictures, it's here. It's a fun, handy, quality camera to take along on a trip, and I can't wait to get the deepwater case.
That said, I am surprised how much better Panasonic cameras have gotten. Picture quality is terriffic, the zoom is a nice 28-128mm equivalent that starts wide, the 2.7-inch LCD is very bright, and the camera can even do very good 1280x720 720p video.
On the not-so-great side, icons and labels are tiny and very hard to read underwater and the camera is expensive (US$399 list). It's also not quite as tough as the Olympus Tough models (though sometimes I'd swear they are made by the same OEM).
Anyway, if you want to see my full review of the Panasonic TS1, with a bunch of pictures, it's here. It's a fun, handy, quality camera to take along on a trip, and I can't wait to get the deepwater case.
