Details have just emerged of a surprise product from Panasonic - the Lumix DMC-CM1, a slim Android-equipped camera and smartphone

The new Panasonic DMC-CM1, just announced at Photokina, appears to be a hybrid between a compact camera and a smartphone.

It packs a 20.1MP 1-inch High Sensitivity MOS Sensor and a fixed 28mm Leica DC Elmarit lens with an aperture range of f/2.8-f/11.

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Looking extremely slim, the compact weighs just 204g with battery and Micro SD card and has dimensions of 135.4 x 68 x 21.1mm.

It ruins Android 4.4 and is equipped with a mechanical shutter.

The cmaera can also shoot 4K video, and has 4K-related applications for stills – ‘4K pre-burst’ and ‘4K PhotoCapture’.

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

First Impressions

We recently visited the world’s largest dedicated photo fair – Photokina in Cologne, Germany. This was the location for the launch of the new device and, somewhat unsurprisingly it was the talk of the show.

The jury is still out on whether or not such a device as this is necessarily what the market is looking for. For example whilst the smartphone photography market has continued to grow, the compact camera market has shrunk relatively – perhaps signalling that people are happy with the performance of the camera currently located on their phone.

One thing is for sure, and that’s the fact that the CM1 is an attractively designed device which fits well in the hands and doesn’t suffer as a result of the convergence of compact and android-enabled device. As you can see from the images below,  it features a quality finish and we can’t wait to test it out later on in the year.

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

 

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on

Panasonic Lumix CM1 hands-on