Panasoznic Lumix

Will this point and shoot camera give me decent photos? It's a 8x zoom and 16 mp. Will it capture good night photos and beach shots? It was a gift last year and just wondering if it will be ok for our cruise in August.Any advice will be much appreciated.

Panasonic makes quite a variety of cameras. All of them [with practice] will take good pictures.

I'm quite fond of my FZ-50 and LX7 cameras, both with nice Leica designed lenses.

My Lumix does very well, but I can't remember which one I have. I got it almost 3 years ago. Has a lot of special settings. I also travel with my Nikon 5000 and the Lumix photos look almost the same.

Under the right circumstances, most cameras will give you a good photo.

When you get into the extreme environment (low-light, action, long distances, etc.) then the quality of the photo may become degraded.

At that point, whether a given camera gives you a good photo or not depends on many factors... your skill level, the camera's capability, and luck.

You can usually help the situation by buying a camera with more capability. For instance, a camera that does well in low light tends to have a faster lens, a larger sensor, and a better processor. These cameras can help level the playing field, but that does not mean a camera that is lacking in these attributes cannot take good photos, especially in the hands of someone that can get the full potential out of the camera.

And in contrast, the best camera in the world will not automatically give you the best results.

My best advice is to become familiar with your camera so you know it's capabilities and limitations. Use your camera as much as you can now, so you will know if it will be up to task for your cruise. Only then will you know if it is worth replacing it, or if it will be OK.

I know it's not much of an answer, but one of the huge misconceptions camera buyers have is Model A will automatically result in better photos than Model B, but the truth is that the camera at best only provides 1/3rd of the result (the environment and skill level/luck being the other two).

Until you are comfortable with using your camera and knowing it's limitations and capabilities will you be able to determine if it is up to task or not for your needs.

I have a pocket sized ZS19 and a larger FZ-200 and love both.

Used to have FZ-28 and FZ-40 before upgrading to FZ-200.

You can find my pictures elsewhere on this board! :D

What model do you have?

It's a DMC-FH 27.