Exceptional progress.

The Panasonic DMC-FZ1000. Click the image for the interactive Panny site.

This Panasonic fixed zoom lens DSLR is one of a handful of superzooms on the market (Sony’s RX10 is another) which heralds the demise not only of flapping mirror DSLRs but also the day of interchangeable lenses. It differs materially from earlier superzooms damned with small aperture and highly variable speed lenses, poor optical quality and minuscule sensors.

The sensor in this body is 1″ diagonally, and compares to the 1.80″ of FF and 1.25″ of MFT. Given that MFT (my reference is Panny’s GX7 which I use) easily prints to 18″ x 24″ the 1″ sensor in this body should be much the same, being fractionally smaller. And while the lens’s maximum aperture of f/2.8 drops to f/4 at the long end, only the churlish would complain once the realization dawns that the zoom range is a stunning 24-400mm. Early test site reports suggest the lens is excellent. All of this in a 1.2lb. package with 4K video included into the bargain for some $900. Stunning progress in machine and sensor design and construction.

Meanwhile, the duopoly of Nikon and Canon (no one can take Sony seriously as a pro FF competitor for their paucity of lenses and consumer image) insist on tinkering at the margins with their FF DSLR designs. They will milk those margins for as long as they can until one day they wake up and find their customers have left for greener pastures. By complacently avoiding ‘creative destruction’ they are sowing the seeds of their own demise.

Given the rapid advance in sensors I would expect a camera of like look and heft to sport an f/2.8 20-200mm world class lens with an EFT and 4K capability in a year or two, all at the cost of one used C or N ‘old tech’ DSLR FF body and with no more need for interchangeable lenses.