Experimenting with a new camera

During our trip West and North the lens cover on my Panasonic TZ40 camera (which operated automatically began to be uncooperative.  At times it wouldn't completely cover the lens (not good for keeping the lens clean) and at others it wouldn't fully retract (giving a black blurry slice in the images).  My experience with camera shops (and/or manufacturers) is that they charge a fortune to even investigate such matters.

So it was new camera time.  I'll keep the TZ40 available for situations such as running where small size (in essence fitting in a pocket) is very useful.

In essence I like the massive zoom available on Panasonic cameras and a birding colleague had commented aboout the 60X zoom available on the larger FZ70.  So one was acquired.  There are a couple of convenient things about this:

• It takes the same sized battery as an FZ40 of which I have an old one lurking around so I now have plenty of battery capacity; and
• It has the same size output slot as the TZ40, so I now have a spare connector which is very useful when going traveling.

I tested the new device on 10 August, and while I still need to fine tune a couple of things it worked rather well.

It has a macro-zoom feature which is good on eucalypt blossom.

This is pretty much a point and shoot of a Black Swan.  I was about 3m away from the bird and most amused by the bendy neck.

This isn't the sharpest image possible of an Australasian Shoveler but it was taken at about 80m range with a background of sunlit water.  And I need to sort out the autofocus setting a tad,

 These geese have taken up residence on the Molonglo.

 These geese were just passing through.

I have no idea what they were up to: probably something along the lines of "have outboard motor will go and make a noise somewhere".   What I am interested in, is that I'm fairly sure there were 4 in the boat the first time they went past!