Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS5A 16.1 MP Tough Digital Camera with 9.3X Intelligent Zoom (Blue)

On the advice of a friend I recently purchased the Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS5A16.1MP Tough digital camera. I took it with me on a dive trip to Bonaire. The intelligent features of this camera made it very useful above and below the water. In the automatic mode in would detect back-lighting and take multiple exposures to integrate for the optimal exposure of foreground and background features. The auto-focus was a bit fussy in low-light conditions with an in-experienced operator. If time isn't allowed for the camera to properly sense some low-light pictures at dinner were out of focus. The battery held up well. I purchased a back-up with a plug-in wall charger that worked well from Big Mike on amazon. I used it for shallow dives (typically second dive of the day). Keeping my depth to less than 35 feet, I put the camera into advanced underwater mode and set the flash to always on and got some really amazing pictures. It really captured the vivid colors of fish, corals, and my dive buddy. The water clarity in Bonaire contributed to easily getting great pictures. On one night dive when the water was very turbid only my macro shots looked good. I could typically get into small areas that those with larger cameras could not and take some "blind" shots to try and get some fish hiding in the coral. At the macro level I could get shots to within 8-12 inches that would remain in focus. One curious fish came within 6 inches of the lens and I could not keep him in focus. The best part was that I could put the camera on a retractable cord attached to my BC and just let it fall if I needed to use my hands. I typically kept it in my BC pocket when entering and exiting the water. I did have to be cautious to make sure the retractable cord did not become entangled with my Reg/Octo. On deck I stored it in a waterproof otter box 3000 to protect it from heavy gear. It seems to feature some good stop action as well. I was able to use it while skiing to capture great images of the kids taking some jumps under good lighting conditions. The wifi was a little difficult to figure out at first. But, I was able to directly transfer my images to my iPad after getting it set up. First, I downloaded the Panasonic Image App for my iPad. When you turn on the wifi for the camera there is an option for direct connect. I used this and then in my iPad settings I connected to the wifi sent from the camera and entered the passcode. The camera then detected the direct connection with the iPad and instructed to open the Panasonic Image app. Opening the app allowed initially does not appear to connect to the camera if one is looking at the iPad. But, on the camera I was able to manually select multiple images (a bit tedious) and then send them to the iPad. While the iPad seemed to be still searching, the camera began uploading the images which wen t very quickly. Once the images were uploaded the iPad prompted to view the images. The images were then available to any of the apps I was using to view pictures on the iPad. Overall, a very cool feature that allowed me to directly transfer images via wifi sent directly from the camera when no other wifi was available. You can also save the connection as a favorite on the camera to speed up the process in the future. You need to set the iPad wifi to the camera generated signal in order to transfer directly if the iPad is detecting multiple wifi sources. Stepwise: Download Panasonic Image app to iPad. 1. Turn on camera wifi 2. click New Connection 3. click Send images stored in camera 4. click Smartphone 5. click Direct 6. click Manual Connection 7. In iPad wifi settings, set iPad wifi to SSID sent by camera and enter password provided by camera 8. When camera indicates Wifi connection complete, open the Panasonic Image App as prompted by camera 9. Camera will prompt to connect to iPad 10. Camera indicates connection completed. click menu/set on camera 11. Option to send single or multiple images. click multi 12. tab through images using up/down/left/right keys. Select images by using DISP. button to select/deselect. 13. click menu/set to send images 14. camera indicates "proceed time" (yes/no), click yes 15. images begin uploading 16. iPad prompts to review images once fully uploaded. Save the connection as a favorite on the camera to speed up the process in the future. I found this feature very useful since I didn't bring my PC and wanted to review/share images daily. Overall, I highly recommend this camera.

I have had this camera for 3 months now. It replaced my prior Panasonic Waterproof camera that was stolen on vacation. That camera was great, and this is even better. Let's start off with the main issues. I'm so tired of people that pay for these small point-and-shoot cameras and then complain about picture quality. This camera takes very solid pictures. Is it a professional camera? Of course not. If you want that - then spend your huge $$ for a large camera that won't fit in your pocket and won't go in a pool. Besides solid pictures, the camera has a lot of size/quality settings for photo and video, and has a fairly quick trigger. The interface is easy to use, and you pop the SD card in the computer to transfer your pictures. The battery has been fine. There is built in Wi-Fi which is pretty cool for uploading pictures off the camera on the fly (for backup, e-mail, Facebook etc).. I must admit this was a bit challenging to set up, but once it was set up, it has been fine. If I had any complaint, its a very minor one that should never deter anyone from buying this camera - the battery charging. You have to remove the battery, and you have to use a charging unit that is a unit plus a cord. Compared to prior Panasonic cameras, this is a step backwards. Other cameras let you charge the battery right in the camera with the USB cable, and I've also seen the charger unit as a self-contained wall-plug-in type. Not sure why this camera doesn't have either of those. Again, really not a big deal, but figured I'd mention it. This is a great camera with great features for the price point. It has all the essentials for this type of camera.

Over the last several years I have been a hardcore Canon man (point and shoot only). I've never been into DLSR's as I like to travel light on my adventures and a point-and-shoot works better for that. Recently the GoPro Hero3 has been getting a lot of buzz and it got me thinking about getting a newer camera with better video and camera resolution. I have several outdoor adventures planned for this summer and so I wanted to upgrade before the season so that I could capture all the memories in higher resolution. I did a lot of research into the GoPro Hero3 and studied its amazon ratings and reviews carefully. The mixed reviews and troubles with the hero3 firmware led me to another possibility. A ruggedized, waterproof point-and-shoot. There were several features of the GoPro that I really liked: - Waterproof, weatherproof - Remote control via Smartphone app - Video quality - Ability to mount in a variety of ways I began to research the leading ruggedized camera offerings and found the Lumix TS5 which has barely been released. As of this review, there were only 2 reviews for it on Amazon and only a few CES 2013 videos on YouTube. I searched Twitter and found more info and actual field video footage from Europe where it looks like a few guys got their hands on the camera early. I took a chance and ordered the camera and received it last Thursday (4/11). The Lumix TS5 came with the features I really wanted, particularly the Smartphone remote control capability and GPS tagging. The reason I wanted the remote control is so that I can mount the camera to my bike helmet and be able to start/stop the video recording without having to remove my helmet first. I also wanted a good upgrade in video quality from my current Canon. The GPS tagging is a bonus and I used to do that manually by keeping my camera clock in sync with GPS time and then later correlating the timestamps to determine position when the photo was taken. Now I don't have to worry about it. So far my impressions of using the Lumix TS5 for a few days is favorable. I was a little worried about the menu interface going from Canon to Panasonic, but I have found the menu system to be very easy to navigate and haven't had an frustrations. I was able to set all the major functions up without having to refer to the manual. I am using the Panasonic Image App with my AT&T Samsung Galaxy S3 and it works well with the camera. I have tested the remote control functions and haven't had any issues with connecting the phone to the camera via WiFi. The GPS tagging works well and the GPS receiver seems to quickly acquire and maintain signal. After I imported my first test images to Picasa, I was pleased to see that Picasa automatically brought up the Google map view of the photo location. The Panorama feature will also come in handy as I usually create panorama images manually using Microsoft ICE. I can't yet talk about the battery life as I haven't had the camera long enough to really field test it on a weekend adventure (ATV, hiking, etc). My guess is that the GPS and WiFi will really eat up the battery life and I am already anticipating the need for more than one battery on an excursion. I have been looking closely at the Wasasbi batteries and am waiting for them to come out with a model compatible with the TS5. Again, the TS5 has barely been released and so there isn't a lot out there yet. I bought the Professional Mini-Ball Head Camera Mount ([...]) and bolted it to my bike helmet. I then mounted the TS5 to the helmet and used the smartphone app to remote control the camera. My intention is to be able to capture footage of mountain biking in Moab this summer. Check out my youtube videos. Just search for alpha1145.

I can't even begin to tell you how many reviews I read for different digital underwater cameras. I took a couple of months to really do my research...and it paid off. This camera is amaaaaazing. Took it to Belize for a vacation- used it for a full day snorkeling trip. We were in and outta the water all day- the camera did NOT fail. It was trustworthy, took awesome underwater pictures and was easy to use. Just read the simple directions for underwater use and you can't go wrong. Outside of the water, it was also fantastic! Beautiful pictures of mayan ruins, sunrises, sunsets, beach scenes, wildlife...the list goes on. We even got impressive night pictures of the moon reflecting on the water which is normally not easy to do! Use the intelligent setting OR have some fun and choose for yourself. Lots of neat options and you can also crop and use special features (black and white, etc) on the pictures too. Another important feature that worked like a charm: the wifi!! I was psyched that this worked so well and we were on a remote island! Once the camera linked to my phone on its' own wifi, I was able to download the pix RIGHT TO MY PHONE with NO problems. It took about 1/2 an hour to figure out; I'm no techie. However, if I could figure it out, using the insert, so can you. You can't upload directly from camera to facebook and you can't send directly from camera to email...but being able to send directly to your phone with no wires is good enough for me. You cannot beat the price for this camera. It LOOKS really nice too! I got mine in the blue and I bought an orange wrist floatie to go with it...that's a must have if you're taking it in the water. On our snorkeling trip others also brought underwater cameras...one guy's failed as soon as he got in the water. Somebody else had a cheap plastic one so you can't even see what your pix look like until developed. Everyone loved this one and was asking where I got it from. If you check out other underwater camera reviews, there are so many in which people say that it failed once underwater. There is only a VERY small percentage of reviewers that report this for this camera. This may be b/c of user error- just something to consider. I highly recommend this camera. You can't beat it!

The Video is from a group of still pictures using the time lapse picture option. Then with the camera in the review,menu option you can create a time lapse video and select a group of time lapse photos. You can edit or remove each of the pictures prior to editing. Once a time lapse video is created you will have all of the still pictures as well as the newly created video. Very cool feature! I bought this camera after mine broke on my first day of vacation. I wanted a tough, waterproof camera and this TS-5 was the best that I found after comparing it to several other waterproof cameras. This TS-5 had a larger battery, which allowed 340 pictures on a charge and that is about 100 more then the closest similar camera. By the way I bought additional batteries (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CIVVT04/ref=pe_175190_21431760_3p_M3T1_ST1_dp_1) that allowed me to take 700 pictures on a charge. This camera has a time lapse option that s a great feature when used with a tripod. You have several options such as 10 second intervals up to 30 minutes to take pictures of the changing sky or a blooming flower etc. once you have set and taken time lapse photos the camera has an option to convert it to a movie at 6 frames per second or 30 fps to create a seamless movie from the still pictures. There is also a feature that will allow you, while reviewing video that you have already recorded, to save/convert any frame to a still picture. This will also keep the newly created still picture in perfect focus. I recorded a bird drinking and flying off and was able to create still pictures of it taking flight. This was a very cool effect and is simple to use. I would recommend a tripod to use some of these options. I bought a flexible tripod, which allowed me to wrap the legs in a small tree and use the remote control function to take video of a birds nest feeding new born chicks. I found myself keeping the camera with me all the time to try to get familiar with the functions and I had a lot of fun doing it. This camera was the only one that has built in WIFI. The remote control function uses this feature. The camera generates its own wifi signal and you just have to connect your tablet, I-Pad, I-Phone or other smart phone to that SSID wifi network, did use a I-Pad and an I-Phone 4s and each worked fine. You do have to download the free Panasonic app to use this feature. With the remote control function you can take video, still pic's and zoom. You can also review still pictures only with this, not video, as well as drag and drop them to save them on your smart phone or tablet. You can setup a link to apps like Facebook and send them right from the camera if you setup a Lumix Club account (free) and it will create a Lumix folder for uploads to Facebook and other apps. Once you have connected to your own wifi setting you can go to the wifi history and rename that setting and save it as a favorite connection, this will remember your network SSID and password and connect quickly without having to re-enter your password, which can be a pain if you do this a lot. With the wifi you can automatically save pictures to your connected device as you take each picture. You can also use this to send pics to your pc without having to connect your camera or remove the mem card. However this did not work with my IMac, nor does the software that comes with the camera work on a Mac. This was not an issue for me as I did open the camera and put the mem card into the Mac and copied all pics that way. The GPS, Altimeter,depth gauge and compass features are also very cool, but I have not used all of them yet. The camera can use the GPS to tag your city and your pictures. I have not been on a vacation to take advantage of this, but I am looking forward to trying it out in a remote setting. This camera has a bunch of preset settings for different situations such as night time shots, pictures through glass, far off scenery etc. it also has an automatic setting that will automatically change according to each situation to take a great pictures. The camera powers up very fast, about 3 seconds so you can shut it off to save the battery and turn it on quickly to take fast shots. You can use burst shooting to take several frames with one push of the shutter button to make the best picture out of the many frames used. This camera focus quickly as well. I haven't even used this under water yet and I absolutely love this camera. Is has these great features plus it is a waterproof (up to 43 feet), shock proof (for a drop up to 6 feet), dust proof and freeze proof and a rugged tough camera. I would recommend extra batteries, a hard case, a tripod and a floating strap in case you drop it in the ocean. As some other reviewers stated you may want to use the heavy or thick part of the strap instead of the thin string to attach your strap to the camera.

I would highly recommend that you do NOT purchase this camera if you will be using it in the water - for example while snorkeling or hanging out by the pool. I paid $249 for this camera and planned to use it when snorkeling in Maui. When we finally put it to use, it lasted about four days into the vacation before it stopped working. Unfortunately, when I tried to return it, I was beyond the one year warranty. So, I decided to get a replacement camera, the same model, from the service department at Panasonic. I paid $220 for the replacement and vowed to be extraordinarily careful about how we handled it around the water. We tested it for a couple of days at a swimming pool to ensure it worked correctly. We then took it to Maui for use in the ocean while snorkeling - we managed to take about twenty five photos during that first day and it stopped working while we were snorkeling. I was really disappointed. It was the beginning of a two week trip and replacement camera, a brand new device, did not make it through the first day even though I was being VERY careful. The really sad news occurred when I sent it back to the service center. They informed me that since it was purchased from them, it only had a ninety day warranty. It was going to cost $75 just to figure out why it was not working. I said enough, and am going to write directly to Panasonic about the poor product they have on the market. I have not investigated any other waterproof cameras, so I don't have a good recommendation for you - other than to avoid this camera at all costs.

This camera is a workhorse. It followed with me on a bicycle across the United States Of America, then after the beating of a bike ride solo across the country it went to Hawaii with me where it encountered good surfing, bad surfing, a few drops over 10 feet, rappelling of waterfalls, a bike ride of volcano's with a mild drop, then when I got home it went white water rafting, zip lining (dropped it here) and in the end all the photos for a pocket camera were fantastic. The panorama function worked quite well (see an attached) and in the end I am very happy especially with the wifi and gps functions. Side Note, I got a speck in many photos mid way through Hawaii, it was small enough where I only noticed it when I zoomed in for a photo and it was more a shadow than a black spot. When I got home after the abuse this camera suffered I found the warranty was never going to cover this since i bought a warehouse deal from Amazon (Amazon you need to put a warning on that aspect). So I took it apart found the cause of the spec, and reassembled it. If you see a speck and have checked the lense on the outside you will want to take photos of a white paper and see if it moves over the course of a couple shakes and days. If not there might be a small piece of factory dust on the CMOS sensor like mine had. In my case this happened after a serious beating of the camera. But this is something I can easily let slide simply because of how small we are talking. Take a needle out and look at the tip of the needle ... the dust piece was smaller or the same size as that. After assembling the camera and submerging it on a rope into my lake for a few hours to test if it survived I did the white water rafting trip. So clearly it survived and I am happy. I would recommend this camera to anyone looking for a quality camera, great picture, and all the other beat the heck out of it options this contains. Panasonic won this compared to my Fuji I replaced this with. Daniel Mollino tbitovictory.com

We bought this to replace our canon power shot sd1300. Overall, the camera is very user friendly, and durable so our 2 year old can handle it without worry. Most of the photo options are available within a couple clicks, a few are hidden within the menu (multiple photos per second for example) I have tried a few other photo options, but the best seems to be intelligent autofocus, which is the default setting on the camera. Another feature that is really cool is the ability to take multiple photos per second. I found the 5 frames per second to be very useful when taking photos of your dog or children who tend to move a bit. I tried the sport setting for this and was disappointed in the photo quality; most movement photos showed blurr; maybe because the photos were taken inside. The flash is good for inside photos in dimly lit rooms, but doesn't work as well in dark areas. Video quality is on par with our video camera. There is also the option of super slow motion video, and 1080p, but if you plan on using that feature often I'd recommend a high performance SD card because the video takes longer to write to the card. With lower performance SD cards it takes longer and some of the older cards can't even handle it at all. I checked out about SD card performance on SDcard.org. There is no reason to pay $100 for an SD card unless you are taking two hour videos in 1080p or something equivalent, but you need at least a SDHC(10) or better for hd video. I have a SDHC 10 and I have to wait about 30 seconds or so after shooting video for the data to be fully written to the card. This may be more of an issue to others but for me it was't a big deal. Just know that it isn't the camera's fault. Every camera has this issue. It's the card's. Wi-fi sounds like a gimmick, but if you are taking this underwater, which we fully intend to do, it will be much safer to upload photos wirelessly, than risk water damage from opening the waterproof door to take the SD card out for uploading photos every time. It can be a handy feature. That becomes irrelevant when you still have to open the door to charge the battery, however. So, until they come up with a way to charge the battery without opening the door WiFi is still just a gimmick to me. I don't have a smart phone to test the NFC technology, but I can see where it could be useful to some people as long as they have a phone that is compatible. If this is an important feature to you, it would be wise to check with Panasonic for a list of compatible phones to see if you can use this feature. I bet the majority of people can't. I haven't been outside with the camera yet. I haven't taken it under water yet. I haven't dropped it on the ground or my tile floor yet. I will update this after I have done so.

Great little camera - took some great underwater shots. Be cautious about using the Intelligent auto - it seems to change the image quality significantly given minor environmental condition changes. The extra battery kit that I ordered also came with a compact changer and a buoyancy strap, which was a pleasant surprise, which proved quite useful in the ocean waves.

I've owned a Sony TX-10, Sony Tx-30, Olympus TG-4 and this camera out performs all of these on average. The image quality is quite good, on par with all three cameras mentioned. Video quality is much better then the TG-4 and Sony cameras. I found the video quality of the Olympus TG-4 to be terrible. The camera counldnt focus on the subject properly, resulting in annoying videos that keep zooming in and out of focus constantly. Both Sony TX cameras have a very loud motor , which captures a background noise while videoing. Again annoying ! The reviews always favor the Olympus, and on paper they seem better, but in real life practice different story. I took this camera through a lot of snorkelling, often everyday filming underwater and taking photos. The video quality on coral reefs is stunning. Very true to life colors, stable image. Great stereo sound quality. Battery life is great too, this camera outlasted both the Sony and the Olympus. The onscreen menu is also much better than both cameras. The Sony has a touch screen, which is very small and often doesnt respond when fingers are wet. Not Practical. The olympus has a descent screen, on par with the Panasonic.

This camera is a good option for a water resistant/GPS camera. It isn't overly fast at fixing on a GPS signal but when it does it works well. The compass is also a nice feature for knowing which direction your pictures were taken. I would have liked to have been able to use it as an actual compass though if you were out in the bush and needed one. This is my second water resistant/GPS camera. The first being the DMC-TS3. This one is slightly better with a WiFi option and more MP but it does take longer to fix on GPS. I have also used the Nikon and Olympus cameras and this one seems to perform better and have more options.

Love my camera. It travels with me everywhere.

Great camera. Durable and good quality photographs.