New ZS100 owner with questions

John McCormack wrote:

Bob A L wrote:

New Panasonic owner that will likely have lots of questions, can I come in and play? Just arrived today and think it's gonna be a fun plaything. Don't take that personal as all my cameras are my playthings. Anyway, old guy here that's pretty minimal in needs and operate pretty basic. I spend a lot of time with something new attempting to get it set to my liking, and then pretty well ignore changing much outside of normal exposure. Spent almost all day going through menus and trying to get basically set up and it totally wore me out. Fun, but I hate it too. Why can't all manufacturers use the same terms and format for menues?? Found enough to get started in manual, and lucked into some of the settings after never finding them in manual. Anyway started with the basic what seems to be favorite on this forum of +2, +2, -5, +1 and have since changed to +1 for contrast, +3 sharpening, and -1 on noise reduction, but still subject to refinement. But now for the start of the questions.

How does the i.-Zoom work? I tried the digital zoom and don't think I will use it much, but the i.-Zoom appears to have merit. I notice that in exif the focal length reads in 35mm Equiv with max showing as 500mm, where the digital zoom read as 250mm + 4x digital zoom in exif. Does the i-zoom have any detrimental effect on focal lengths below 250? Believe it also has a digital zoom that just crops the sensor to produce a 10mp image, which way is best if more than 250mm equiv is needed?

EX and i.zoom are explained clearly by Graham Houghton in his video here: https://youtu.be/UwBFTAnMGsI

Also, I finally managed to get it set up to run in Aperture preferred mode and having the thumb wheel changing aperture and the ring around the lens controlling zoom, but not completely sure how I got there. I would still like to have quick access to ISO setting in aperture preferred mode. Is there a simple way to access this? Then would like to have a set up for manual with easy access to aperture, shutter speed and ISO, but haven't figured that one out yet. Any suggestions welcome.

Do you have a .PDF copy of the ADVANCED user manual? It is available on the Panny site here: https://eng-ca.faq.panasonic.com/app/operating_manuals

Have you tried saving your Aperture preferred settings in a Custom menu? It's the easiest method I know of. See page 127 in the Advanced User Manual.

Would also love to have a way to just disable the lcd completely with a button to bring it up if needed to set something, as that's the only time I want it on. Don't think this is possible though.

You should be able to set a Fn button as the controller for the LVF so that pressing it will turn on/off the EVF. On the ZS100 it's the Fn4/LVF button to the right of the eye sensor.

Do you have a .PDF copy of the ADVANCED user manual? It is available on the Panny site here: https://eng-ca.faq.panasonic.com/app/operating_manuals

I'll stop here, but if you guys don't get tired of an old man asking stupid questions, I'll be back.

Thanks in advance

Thanks for the input. Yes I have both manuals, one in print that came with camera and also have pdf copies of normal and advanced downloaded to my computer. Way too much info for this old man to comprehend in a day for sure. I downloaded these before ordering camera and tried to study it before camera arrived, but I need to have camera in hand when going though the manual. I tend to be a hands on kind of person especially  when it comes to learning.

In your suggestions about the lcd, you said could turn off evf, but it's the lcd I want to turn off. I have found the button on back that can at least temporarily turn off the lcd, so guess that's what I'll do. Guess I was hoping for a way to disable the lcd with a button to activate it if I needed to change a setting.

I'll check out the video (provided it's not long) and see what he has to say on the zoom question.

Thanks again, and I'll be back with more ?'s for sure.