New Gear: Panasonic Lumix FZ300 Camera Has a 24x F/2.8 zoom Lens

By now, I should be used to Panasonic’s FZ series and the long-reaching lenses, but reading the press material for the FZ300 and seeing “25-600mm (equivalent) F/2.8” still seems pretty crazy.

The FZ300 has a 12.1-megapixel High Sensitivity MOS sensor as well as the new Venus Engine image processor, which gives it a maximum ISO setting of a rather modest 6400. They have, however, added native 4K video, giving it the ability to capture footage at 3,840 x 2,160 at 30 fps. Like the GX8, it also has the new 4K shooting modes that are designed to help you pull 8-megapixel stills from 4K video.

The electronic viewfinder is a 1,440K dot OLED affair with 100% field of view coverage and .7x magnification. The back of the camera is equipped with a 3-inch static-type touchscreen to handle navigation of the menus and other controls.

Panasonic also seems to have continued their focus on making this camera faster in just about every aspect of its performance from the phase detection autofocus to the 12 fps burst mode.

We’re looking forward to seeing how it compares to its predecessor when it comes through our test lab.