Occasionally I’m asked about cameras. What I like what I don’t like etc. The above picture was taken by my wife with our Panasonic LX3. This camera has been hard to find since it hit shelves a couple of years ago. They’ve just released a new version, the LX5. The LX3 has been a great camera and I look forward to getting a few more years out of it. The main thing that separates this camera from your typical point and shoot camera is its lens. Without getting too technical, I’ll say that in most cases the lens is more important than the camera. The lens on the new LX5 looks pretty impressive because it’s a little faster than the LX3 and it covers a longer focusing range with its 3.8x optical zoom vs the 2.0 optical zoom on the LX3. At $500, it’s not a throw away camera, but it’s significantly cheaper than the money pit that is DSLR photography. To the majority of my friends thinking it might be time to purchase a DSLR, I might recommend picking up one of these bad boys and taking a photoshop class or spend some time going through tutorials on Youtube. You’ll probably be happier with the results. Read more about the Panasonic LX5 at here .