PANASONIC ZS 40 COMPACT CAMERA.
587529
A nice compact camera with multiple features for recording a wide assortment of photos. Well built and it a viewfinder....enables keeping camera steady for tele photos. Great for travel....no bulky extra lenses etc. If you want to "gallery quality" photos....stay with your SLR. Leica quality lens. A control ring makes photo settings easy to select. Good value for price.
248216
A great little camera. With lots of features.  Can't beat it for the price.
2751411
Honestly it's not that great a camera, I have two other Panasonics which I really love, the LF-1 and FZ-47, both great cameras so I expected the same good qualities in the ZS-45, unfortunately it was not to be. Not a horrible camera but the exposure accuracy isn't great, often overexposed, and most importantly the color representation isn't near as good as on my other Panasonics. So if you think like I did, that it's another great Panasonic then you'll be disappointed, but it's not horrible and I got it for pretty cheap, so I guess I got what I paid for in the end
3490476
This is really great compact camera. I'm not really into compact cameras as I usually use SLR, but the image quality is outstanding for its class. Low noise in high ISO, nice Colours and sharp image. The 3" LCD is real delight.
Menu and buttons are easy to use and set in logical order.
The downside is the absences of viewfinder and the face recognition is not really reliable.
130548
I have a high-end Olympus digital camera, but wanted another camera to put  in my pocket when taking "serious" photos wasn't important and portability was. The Panasonic has served me well...in fact it take some pretty "serious" photos itself. I'm very pleased!
1496119
I just wanted to throw my review in with the rest.
After purchasing Panasonic's ZS3 I really became enamored with the brand. The ZS3 was the finest shirt-pocket digital camera I have owned. Unfortunately, my ZS3 suddenly had fibers inside the lens - and Panasonic replaced it - with a refurbished camera. The replacement never shot as well as the original - there was a slight difference in some settings, I missed the original. When the ZS7 hit the market, I thought I would wait for the upcoming ZS10 with it's CMOS 16.1 MP sensor.
I bought the ZS10 and immediately was very disappointed with the images it produced. It has a better lens and more bells and whistles than I ever needed, but there is something in the software within that cannot produce an image that can be zoomed and cropped after downloading to the computer. I admit to being a pixel-peeper - the ZS3 begged to have the images enlarged and rewarded me with many wonderful crops/zooms. The ZS10 makes beautiful images if you are sharing pics on facebook, just not crisp on a 42 inch plasma. I know there will be cranky individuals who pan my review - oh well.
I pulled out my wallet and purchased a Sony A55 with an 18-250 Sigma zoom lens, and have been quietly happy with that combo.
My ZS10 went to my wife - she was happy with it, as she shares a lot on facebook...
Update 8/29/13 - My wife put the ZS10 in a drawer, she had taken some very important pictures at a funeral - and the mis-matched sensor/firmware/software made pizza out of her images. The files, when enlarged even slightly - show as a colorful set of blotches. She was in tears. You cannot go back and shoot things a second time. We are buying her a Nikon COOLPIX P7800 for Christmas...

Panasonic, your very best point and shoot ever is the ZS7, I firmly recommend it!
2755422
easy to use, takes nice pictures, overall its a good compact camera for the price, just hoping it will not break as I have seen happen to two poeple I know that bought kodak cameras
664948
Headline says it all! Panasonic make the best cameras around. I currently have three different models. The ZS30 has by far the best video I have seen on any camera including a NEX5 and 5D that my friend uses.
2270585
Great camera. Very small, fits in your pocket. I haven't used every feature yet but the pictures I took are incredible. Has a built-in SD card slot (used the high capacity version). The rechargeable battery is a little tricky to install, just be sure to not force it. Comes with a .PDF manual on the installation CD.
985756
I have both this Panasonic ZS3 and its direct competitor from Canon, the SX200.
Overall the two are pretty much technically comparable, but
to me, the Panasonic is overall a more pleasing camera than the Canon.
I say this with some surprise, as I own several Canon cameras and thought I would
prefer the SX200.  The slightly smaller size of the Panasonic is significant if you want to carry one of them in a pocket. For a technical comparison, see [...].
1881986
I purchased this camera as a gift for my husband. He has been very happy with it. He has used it on a tripod to film his railroad layout and got very good results. It is a good camera for a reasonable price.
3330502
Saw this camera announced at CES and as my family has been looking for a family camera to replace our Panasonic 601 MiniDV camera, it seemed like a great opportunity at a great price to get a light-weight HD cam that can go anywhere.

The feel is more solid than I thought it might be; this camera is even smaller than you think. The screen is vibrant, but it also represents my only complaint about the physical state of the camera - and it is minor; the screen does seem like it could easily break off. Probably no more than any other camera, but the size of this camera makes it seem moreso.

The image quality seems very good. I viewed the video on a 50" Samsung plasma and thought the image was better than my Panasonic DV cam footage. Now, since the media is Duo Card, you are presumably going to be  dumping footage off onto DVD or computer as needed. I supposed you could just keep buying Duo cards, but that would get expensive. For that reason, I would recommend the biggest card available right now, the 16GB Duo. Hopefully, Sony keeps the Duo cards coming in bigger sizes; I did hear about a possible 1 TB card for 2009 or 2010.

I dumped my test files into my Mac and used Final Cut Pro to edit them. I took one file and burned it using DVD Studio Pro just as-is out of the camera. Then I took the same file and opened it in Quicktime Pro and exported it as a .MOV file, then burned it to disc. The image quality between the two was, in my view, about the same, differences negligible. Be advised that if you are a Mac user the only benefit you receive from the DVD that comes with this camera is a full-color PDF manual; the software which comes with the camera is WINTEL-ONLY.

Render times for the above process was HIGH. My FCP runs on a Dual Processor G5 and it just seemed to take forever to render the footage - and it was only a couple of minutes. That must be the MPEG4 drawback and of course, FCP is not designed yet to work smoothly with MPEG4.

The camera is advertised as being designed for web-a-holics who post on You Tube, etc. We have no intention of doing that and hope it will be a great easily-portable cam for family activities and events. It certainly seems so.

The purple color is awesome. It is unique and stands out. The camera fits easily in a case designed for medium-sized digital still cameras - yes, that is how small it is - fits in an adult palm with room to spare.

BE ADVISED: Sony apparently did not feel compelled to include internal memory large enough to get even 15 seconds of video recorded. That seems just stupid. So, out of the box, you get 15 seconds of video in 720 or 1080p. So plan on buying a DUO card at the time you get the camera. Mine was purchased here on Amazon through Parts Store for $60 + $10 shipping. That is 50% off the price on the Sony Style website. FYI, Best Buy does not carry the 16GB card.
3482546
nice camra but the 40 x zoom isn't as good as advertised.
2363989
Perhaps the best compact camera that has ever been made.  It appears to be an IOS-7 in a compact case behind a compact lens.  Performs as well as my big DSLR.  Bought this one to replace one that was stolen 2 years ago and have yet to find a newer model compact camera of comparable quality.  The price was good so I bought it.  I expect it to provide years of good pics.
4156387
This camera has not too big nor too small. The optical zoom and pictures taken have good resolution. I like the wireless feature which allows transfer of images wirelessly to any blue tooth compatible devices.
3671767
Purchased this camera through Beach Camera. Happy with the company, very happy with the quality of photos from the Olympus FE-250. Colors are vibrant, the camera itself is VERY compact. I would recommend buying a case for it, I scratched it on it's first use, but probably because I was so used to tossing my old dinosaur of a digi-cam around. the only complaint is the shutter speed is quite slower than some other cameras, so if you like to take quick photos, this isn't the best bet. but if you're in the market for an easy to use, compact, nice looking camera that takes nice looking photos, I recommend it.
1191264
This camera exceeded my expectations.  It is extremely compact and with a large internal memory you do not have to be concerned about SD cards.  All features work perfectly and the result is high quality video recordings!  Well done, Panasonic!