For the advanced amateur photographers, Konica Minolta has a DiMAGE Z-series, from which the Z20 ultra-zoom camera is the less expensive one, featuring high performance 5 megapixel sensor with an 8x optical zoom lens (equivalent to 36 – 290mm) and a full range of manual exposure, metering and focus options. Besides from the futuristic silverish design, for the mid-range Z20, you can notice the large handgrip, the elongated round body, and the flash mounted over the lens barrel.
For a camera with such zoom power, the lack of image stabilization is quite an issue ourdays. The viewfinder is the same resolution as the monitor screen but it uses up a large amount of battery life compared to other viewfinders and can only be used when the LCD is deactivated (by the way, the LCD is quite small: 1.5 inch). All of the buttons and wheels are well placed for an easy use and the camera is also comfortable to hold.
Start-up time is very fast at around 1.5 seconds- it’s not a bad time, but Z10 for example is faster. In continuous shooting mode at the highest quality setting it can shoot three frames in just over 3.5 seconds, but then has to pause for a few seconds to write to the card. Comparing it again with the Z10 and the Z5, movies are recorded in high quality (but lower than Z5) Motion JPEG with audio (z10 does not have a microphone for audio recording). Picture quality is in the range of acceptable, with not too much noise and accurate colors, and, before saying that this camera is a budget alternative to the more powerful DiMAGE Z5, (an excellent performance for the money), I’m also mentioning that the 1cm close super macro will please you.

Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z20Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z20Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z20 Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z20
Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z20 Specifications

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