The MEGA Optical Image Stabilization, which Panasonic puts into all of its cameras, moves the lens to compensate for the slight hand movements most people make when taking a picture. It's hand movement that leads to most blurry pictures, a common complaint for amateur photographers. With MEGA Optical Image Stabilization, pictures come out clear, even when using the zoom feature or shooting in low light.

The LZ5 also has Panasonic's Venus Engine Plus, the processor that manages image capture and energy use for the cameras. The LZ5 comes packaged with Panasonic's Oxyride AA batteries, which feature longer life and power than alkaline batteries. With Venus Engine Plus and Oxyride, users can get the most out of their picture-taking experience. With Venus Engine Plus and Oxyride, the LZ5 can take up to 235 images. (The LZ5 can also use regular alkaline AA batteries.)

The LZ5's 2.5-inch LCD is greatly improved over the previous cameras in the LZ series, with higher sensitivity for viewing in low-light situations as well as easy viewing from angles, which helps the user when holding the camera overhead for a high-angle shot.

In addition to the 5-point, 3-point high speed, 1-point normal speed and Spot autofocus, the LZ5 can be set to 1-point high-speed autofocus. This setting reduces autofocus time by about 40 percent compared to previous models. An autofocus assist lamp is also added for the first time to the LZ series cameras.

New features include an additional six scene modes, bringing the total to 14. That, plus Simple Mode, which offers easy shooting to novice photographers, makes these two cameras ready for just about any picture-taking situation.

The LZ5 has 14 megabytes of built-in memory, so it is ready to take pictures right out of the box. For additional picture-taking capacity, the cameras take SD Memory cards. Picture files can be transferred from the internal memory to an SD card and vice versa. Pictures can also be transferred to a computer using the included USB cable.