Well this is the first journal I've ever written here on DA.

I thought "well it's 2009, we have a new president and I've got a new camera. So why not!".

Se here I am.

I recently got a Panasonic Lumix LX3. I've grown tired of lugging big D-SLR's around everywhere. Especially for street or urban stuff and simple recon missions.

I spent weeks studying everything on the market. I wanted/needed:

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Wide Angle - did I say WIDE!!!!??!!!!

A fast lens with decent edge to edge quality/contrast/sharpness.

Full manual control to keep everything in check.

A real hot shoe for external flash.

Manual focus of some sort.

A decent screen with real ability to focus check.

To be usable at least up to 400 iso - 800 preferable without too much noise intrusion.

It MUST shoot RAW.

Must fit in a coat pocket.

Has to be relatively inconspicuous - black and unassuming for those "you can't take a BIG camera in there mate" times.

Cannot cost more than $500.

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So it was an interesting search. Within about 3 days I'd narrowed it down to the LX3, it's massively expensive cousin, the Leica D-Lux4, the Canon G10, Fuji F100fd, Canon SD990is, Panasonic TZ5 and one or two others than quickly became "also rans".

The race commenced and within a few days the list had narrowed to the G10, the LX3, the Fuji (believe it or not!)and the Leica.

The Leica was eliminated because of the price and the fact that it is exactly the same camera as the LX3 but has a Leica badge on it and comes with PhaseOne software and a wrist strap - for another $400 - Ouch!

Then the Fuji well away because although the output was amazing for a little box it didn't do RAW and manual control was pretty limited. I'd buy one in a heart beat to live in the car though!

So all we had left was the G10 and the LX3.

Both have great IQ, awesome feature sets, full manual control, nice lenses and shoot RAW compatible with most major editors like CS3/4 and Lightroom.

I tried them side by side a couple of times and the G10 was so impressive. It's built like a Black Hawk, it's very fast to use, everything is at your fingertips and it's RAW is fully compatible with my D-SLR's in canon's DPP software.

However, in the end I really couldn't see me carrying the G10 around any more than I'd carry around a D-SLR and a 50mm. Also when it really came down to it the LX3 nudged it off the top spot with sheer quality of images. The higher ISO's of the LX3 are simply more detailed and info friendly. It does have slightly more noise at 800 but the detail easily slays the G10 after some careful Noise Ninja. The lens is razor sharp. Contrasty and being at f2 you can actually get some bokeh going with portraits.
Plus that 24mm wide is just killer. Combined with a real 16:9 sensor (not a letterbox masking pretender) it's just superb for street, urban portraits, landscapes and interiors.

So that's what's sitting next to me.

I'm going to spend a few days playing with it and learning it's quirks and then I'll grab a model and head out to shoot something. You'll get to see for yourselves why I chose it.

Whatever you shoot I wish you happy shooting, modeling, drawing, animation, designing and DA'ing.

Cheers all,

GM