As you've been able to see from some of our articles published yesterday, Panasonic has decided to let a few digital cameras out of the bag, all of which are designed for the amateur segment, given their compact form factor, specific functions and ease of use. And probably the most user-friendly of all the new Panasonic digital cameras is the LUMIX DMC-FX580 model, which features a touchscreen display, plus some interesting extras on the side.

First of all, you should know that what we're talking about here is a 12.1-megapixel compact camera, equipped with a 25mm ultra-wide-angle LEICA DC lens with F2.8 brightness and a 5x optical zoom. These are pretty standard specs, but, as mentioned earlier, what really takes the cake is the control system.

Hence, despite featuring a touchscreen display, the FX580 in fact uses a hybrid operation system, made of the new touchscreen interface and a conventional operation system with the cursor key for intuitive control. For example, users can set the Auto Focus (AF) and Auto Exposure (AE) at the desired part of the frame by simply touching the subject on the screen while recording, while in manual exposure mode, aperture and shutter speed can be adjusted by moving the slider. The touchscreen can also be used for carrying out fine adjustments to white balance and color temperature.

Since this digital camera is targeted mostly at amateur photographers, who just want to “point and shoot,” the LUMIX FX580 features Panasonic’s iA (Intelligent Auto) mode, a system of technologies, such as MEGA O.I.S., Intelligent ISO Control, Face Detection, AF Tracking, Intelligent Exposure and Intelligent Scene Selection that engage automatically, without the user having to adjust any settings, and improve the quality of the photos according to the characteristics of the environment the photo is taken in. Moreover, the new FX580 sports Face Recognition technology, which allow users to register certain faces that appear more often in pictures, the camera auto-focusing onto them in the future.

The DMC-FX580, whose body is manufactured of aluminum (for both lightweight and strength), is available in silver and black and will arrive in stores starting with April 2009, for a MSRP of 400 US dollars.


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