LZ8 Exposure Compensation doesn't work in P mode

[tomeeh]

Hi.

I'm a new user of Panasonic DMC-LZ8.
Just at the beginning I've noticed, that when switch into P (AE) mode, and disable the flash (forced flash off), the Exposure Compensation doesn't work. I did following: I took 3 pictures. First-one with default EV (EV=0), then I set EV = +2, took a picture, and I set EV = -2, and took the last picture. In the end, all three pictures are identical! Do you have the same problem, or is my Lumix broken?

[genece]

I have heard other people say the same thing about various cameras and its usually that auto ISO is turned on. Check the exif and see if the ISO changed. And also that the setting really was applied, sometimes we feel we made the setting but we did not.
It will all be in the exif.

[tomeeh]

Thank you, genece, for your valuable reply.

That's the story:
When I took pictures for the previous post, the option "intelligent ISO" was set to OFF, and "ISO Sensitivity" was set to AUTO, but it was inactive (that is I coulnd't change the "ISO Sensitivity"). When playing back, all 3 pictures had ISO 400. After I changed "intelligent ISO" to "MAX 800", finally I could see the difference in the pictures for different Exposure Values. It is somehow suprising for me, since initiall setting "intelligent ISO = OFF", "ISO Sensitivity = Auto" means for me: take ANY ISO, without any limitation. But in fact, the camera limited the ISO to 400. But now I know, I have to change the values of intelligent ISO...

There is another interesting thing here:
While I was taking the pictures with initial settings for the first post here, I kept the camera in hands. Result: camera has chosen ISO 400 and shutter 1/8 s. for all 3 pics. Then I used a tripod and made 3 pictures with different exposure values (-2, 0, +2) in the same lightining conditions. This time the shutter speed was decreased to 1.6 seconds for higher EV values. So one could say - if you have a tripod, the EV works anyway!
I think the explanation is: Panasonic checks the shaking. If it notices the camera is beeing shaked (=kept in hand), then the minimum shutter speed is limited to 1/8 sec to avoid blurry photos. Since, in dark conditions, the aperture was open to max value anyway, there is no other parameter that could increase the exposure. So the camera decides: it is better to take underexposed picture, than a blurry - one.

One could say - I prefer to have a full control of parameters. Well - then you have to switch from P (AE) to the Manual mode. That's it!