Panasonic LX100 Flash

Coverage, Exposure and Range
A fairly weak flash for an external clip-on unit, with somewhat narrow coverage. Average positive exposure compensation required.

Coverage. Flash coverage is somewhat narrow and uneven at wide angle, leaving dim corners in our flash coverage test image at 24mm equivalent, though we've seen much narrower coverage from other units. We no longer test at full telephoto is coverage is invariably better, making wide angle the worst case.

Exposure. Indoors under incandescent background lighting, the Panasonic LX100's bundled flash produced a bright exposure of our Indoor Portrait scene at ISO 200 with +0.7 EV flash exposure compensation. The typical amount required for this shot is +0.7 EV, so the LX100's performance is about average here, but higher values did not produce a brighter image. The camera's slow-sync flash mode required no compensation for bright results, though the longer exposure resulted in a very warm cast from the ambient background lighting.

Manufacturer-Specified Flash Range Test. Panasonic rates the LX100's bundled flash Guide Number at 7m at ISO 100, or 10m at ISO 200. That works out to about 5.8 feet at f/5.6 and ISO 200, as shot above. As you can see, the Panasonic LX100 captured a slightly dim target, so the bundled flash did not quite perform to specification. Here we shoot with manufacturer-specified camera settings, at the range the company claims for the camera, to assess the validity of the specific claims. The specified range has been calculated for the sensitivity and aperture used in the test shot above.