In Part 1 of my test drive, I reported on my overall feel for the Panasonic LX3, and in particular how well the camera works using off-camera flash at high sync speeds.

I received tons of emails, mostly asking me for some low light high-iso shots. So for those of you that asked, here they are! I took a walk-about at night in downtown Seattle to test it out. Nothing special here, just quick snapshots, but it should give you a feel for how the LX3 performs at higher ISOs.

The camera was set to large/fine jpeg with the in-camera noise reduction set to "standard". No additional noise reduction was used. The images are pretty much straight out of the camera, with just a touch of sharpening, as I set the in-camera sharpening turned all the way down when shooting jpeg.

1. ISO 200. Some shadow noise, but looks pretty clean.

2. ISO 400.  Still looks decent, with plenty of details.

3. ISO 400

4. ISO 800. Still useable, but the noise is really becoming apparent. See the scooter seat.

The next 4 images were all taken at ISO 800 with the camera mode set to "dynamic b&w". I wanted to show you these because I just LOVE the in-camera dynamic B&W. Do my eyes deceive me or does it look a little bit like Tri-x?  In any event, ISO 800 looks great in B&W.

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9. Back to color. ISO 400. Looks pretty crisp.

Okay, now it's time for the controlled shots of the same scene at different ISOs.

10. ISO 400

11. ISO 800. Strange, but the colors shifted when I changed ISOs.

12. ISO 1600

13. ISO 3200

Conclusion

I'm liking the Panasonic LX3 a little bit more each time I use it. Noise is considerably improved over the LX1 (which I owned a couple years ago). I'd guess the high ISO performance is 2 stops better than the LX1 and 1 stop better than my Canon Powershot A710.

However, don't expect miracles here. It's still has a puny sensor, and that means high-iso performance still stinks compared to a dslr. The noise is easily 2 stops worse than my 5D. ISO 800 looks about like ISO 3200 on the 5D. But keep in mind that these are all shooting jpeg - I haven't had a chance to shoot raw yet (cmon Adobe!). I expect noise performance to be a little bit better shooting raw.

With a little Neat Image I'd be happy making big prints at ISO 400. I'd say that ISO 800 is the practical limit for decent looking prints in color. Forget 1600 and 3200 - the camera only has those settings for marketing purposes (sort of like having a stereo that goes to 11).

The big deal, though, is the dynamic b&w mode. I haven't shot b&w in-camera since my film days, but with the LX3 I think I'm going to shoot b&w in the camera since they are just so tasty.

The bottom line - when I'm not working, the LX3 is the camera I'll use 90% of the time. Since the readers asked, I wrote about noise, but in reality, noise is not something that I ever really worry about. I just take pictures.  

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