Ron Phillips Photography

Sometimes you just can not or do not want to carry your DSLR and every lens you own. Maybe you’re traveling and you might not feel comfortable having all your gear travel with you on your trip. You want great photos and you want to travel as light as possible.

Whatever your reason today’s compact point and shoot cameras are very capable of capturing your vacation photos and delivering excellent quality and letting us be as creative with our images as our skill dictates.

Hunt’s Photo & Video has its perks. Besides being a great place to work we sometimes get to play with cameras provided by the manufactures who offer us the opportunity to try out their products.

A few months ago I received a point and shoot Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS100 to play with. Many of the one on one classes that we do at Hunt’s Photo and Video involve instructing folks on using there new point and shoot camera before they head off on their vacation.

A Hunts Photowalk provided a great opportunity to test out this tiny little point and shoot and gave me a good idea of what you might be able to do with the camera while on vacation.

The Lumix DMC-ZS100 can photograph utilizing the full set of shooting modes found on bigger systems. The camera has an aperture range of F2.8 to F8 and an ISO range of 125 through 12800.

Setting the camera to aperture priority and using F8 for good depth of field and ISO 125, it was time to try some low light photography.

Sometimes you might not have a tripod so what follows are my images using anything possible as a substitute tripod.

Trash Can as substitute tripod

Trash Can as substitute tripod

A camera bag as substitute tripod

Fire pit seating ledge as substitute tripod

Resting atop of a camera mounted on a tripod for the ultimate balancing act as substitute tripod

On a recent 5 day workshop, I had the chance to really play around with the Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS100 and photograph an assortment of subjects.

Shooting at F5.6 with an ISO of 125 in clear mid-morning light, a shutter speed of 1/2000 made hand holding the above shot easy. Aperture 5.6 on a 1-inch sensor, has the same effect in depth of field that F8 would give to a larger sensor.

For getting good sharp images shooting wide at F5.6 on aperture priority would be my goto setting using this camera for travel landscapes.

The camera was fun to use at close range photographing a variety of subjects.

Armed with some basic photography knowledge you can easily create wonderful and creative images with any camera. Having a small fit in your pocket point and shoot camera that has the ability to control the basic functions of exposure is even better!

After getting to know the mighty little Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS100  I will happily give the camera a try the next time I am doing street photography. The small size and excellent zooming capabilities would definitely be a benefit while photographing in the street.

Thank you for your support and as always don’t just take a photograph, make a photograph.

Ron Phillips