Flash
LX100: A Review by Kowcher /041 by
kowcher, on Flickr
The LX100 comes packaged with a small external flash (GN10/ISO200m), that draws power from the LX100, so no extra batteries to deal with here. There was a little quirk on the one supplied with the review unit. The ON/OFF markings seemed to be reversed. When set to OFF, the camera would detect the flash and vice versa. I personally have no real use for a small flash like this, but can see how it might come in handy on a casual trip/outing.
As the product page lists the Panasonic flashes (DMW-FL580L / DMW-FL360L) that are compatible, I assumed it uses the same flash protocol as the GH3, but it didn't seem to recognize the Metz 58 AF-2 (Oly/Panny) when mounted. It did work as a dumb flash with no TTL support. Interestingly, with the supplied flash unit, I was able to trigger/control the Metz wirelessly with TTL support, using the built in wireless flash control (up to 3 groups). *Shrug* Not too sure what was going on.
Shutter
Specs:
Still Image:
Approx. 60 - 1/4,000 sec (Mechanical Shutter)
Approx. 1 - 1/16,000 sec (Electronic Shutter) Time (Approx. 120 sec)
Motion Picture:
Approx. 1/25 - 1/16,000 sec
Approx. 1/2 - 1/16,000 sec (M Mode / MF Mode)
To be honest, I wasn’t very interested with the electronic shutter and had set the LX100 to mechanical shutter since day one. Anyway, I found the mechanical shutter pretty quiet once the shutter sound option is turned off. Who wants the camera to play a fake recorded sound anyway?
Although Panasonic doesn’t publish it as an official specification, I've read that the LX100 also has a leaf shutter, like its predecessors the LX5/7, which allows it to flash sync at any mechanical speed. Didn’t manage to test this in much detail, but I *think* I did manage to get it to sync up to 1/4000, with YN-RF603II triggers + SB900 / Metz 58, for a couple of shots, with flash duration likely being the bottleneck. The RF603II supposedly have a max sync speed of 1/320s, so I'm not exactly sure why it worked. Perhaps someone more knowledgeable on this can explain it. 1/500 seemed to be the sweet spot where the exposure was fairly consistent.
LX100: A Review by Kowcher /040 by
kowcher, on Flickr
Exif for this sequence: f/2.8 1/500s ISO200, with a SB-900 triggered via RF603II.