Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX7 Review

The playback screen with information display enabled. Upper right corner has the image size 2560x1920, image quality Fine, battery 2/3 charged, folder name (100) and image number. The current image # / total # of images. Time and date is on the bottom status line.

Pressing the DISPLAY button will put the extended exposure information over the image and includes a histogram, the exposure mode, aperture, shutter speed, ISO speed and flash mode.

Toggling the zoom lever to the Wide angle position brings up the thumbnail index mode with nine images displayed per screen.

Toggling the zoom lever to Telephoto allows you to enlarge the current image up to 16X in four steps. At any point you can use the 4-way selector to scroll around inside of the enlarged image.

Playback Menu options:

Rotate - Rotate portrait mode images
Protect - Protect/Unprotect one or all images
DPOF Print - Select one or all images for later printing
Slide Show - Auto playback of all images or just those selected for DPOF printing
Audio Dub - Add up to a 10-second audio note to a still image
Resize - Create a smaller resolution image
Trimming - Create a smaller image from a zoom-cropped larger image.
Format - Format the memory card

The Rotate option lets you easily rotate portrait mode images for proper display on the camera LCD and/or TV set. Rotation is in 90° increments, either CW or CCW direction.

The Resize option lets you "down size" larger images. A 5-megapixel image can be resized to 3-megapixels, 2-megapixels, 1-megapixel or 640x480 size. This can be used to make smaller images for email use or by overwriting the original image you can free up space to save more pictures.

The Trim option lets you crop an image and save it as a smaller image. You enlarge the image just like zoomed playback mode and scroll until you have the image centered and then save only that portion of it. The actual image size saved is dependant on how much you enlarged the image before trimming, it is always smaller than the original image. Trimming cannot be used with HDTV resolution images, movies, flip animation, pictures with audio attachments or rotate images (they can be trimmed if you first rotate them back.)

Ten-second audio memos can be recorded and attached to an image. This audio can only be played back when connected to a TV, the internal speaker of the camera is only used for "beep" sounds.

Movies are played back fullscreen on the LCD or a television set if the audio-visual cable is connected. The audio is heard only when connected to a TV, the internal speaker of the camera is only used for "beep" sounds.

As with still image playback, you can press the Display button to show extended exposure information for the movie clip.

Setup Menu (same in record or play mode):

Monitor - Adjust the LCD brightness
Auto Review - Auto review after capture (off, 1s, 3s, Zoom)
Power Save - Auto power off delay, 2m, 5m, 10m, Off
Economy - Save battery power by turning LCD off automatically after 15 secs.
Beep - Camera beep sounds, On or Off
Clock Set - Set the time and date
No. Reset - Reset file numbering counter
Reset - Reset all settings to factory default
USB Mode - PC Mass Storage / PictBridge
Video Out - Video output signal format, NTSC or PAL
Scene Menu - Display scene menu Automatically when selected or never
Language - Menu language; English, French, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Japanese