Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I normally shoot with an SLR--Canon 5D Mk IV or sometimes a 7D Mk II. I've owned several small cameras aimed at pro photographers, like the G12, G16, G7X and G7X Mk II. All are great little point-and-shoots, but I've found I never have a use for them. The images aren't good enough to sell and I'm not one for snapshots; they're too noisy to use shooting bands in bars (my hobby) and don't have enough reach to get near the stage. The G7X Mk II would probably take a decent landscape shot but that means a tripod to keep the ISO down. . .and I just don't bother. But this camera, with it's zoom capability, offers something different. The image quality isn't quite up to the other point-and-shoots but y'know, it's not bad. It requires good light, with it's f/6.9 aperture at full zoom, and I wish it could shoot raw. But given those limitations, it still allows me to shoot things I can't or won't shoot with an SLR. That claim of a "40X zoom" is a little duplicitous--they're multiplying from the widest range and not from the 50mm we usually consider normal. It's really more like 20 times, from 24-960mm equivalent. However, that's like mounting a Sigma 150-600 on a 7D Mk II--and that's a serious commitment to the shoot. With the SX730 I can wander down to the beach and have a realistic chance of snapping a bird photo, or a surfer. Holding the camera steady at full zoom is the biggest challenge, but I'm getting the hang of it and I'm pleasantly surprised just how good the image stabilization is. I think there's another mode I could try that would improve that, too, but I've hardly left P and Av. The macro capability is good; my closeup of the flower looked great in Lightroom but lost some detail when compressed--I think that's where the lack of raw data really hurts. The photo of my old film camera what slightly sharpened in Lightroom, along with color/contrast/clarity but I think you can see it's pretty good--and I shot that at full zoom and 1/25th of a second! (It took a few tries, though.) Shooting in shade I was able to bring down the highlights and raise the shadows, so the bit depth must be pretty good. The musician shot. . .well, the camera had just arrived and I didn't have the focus down--I think it could do a sharper pic. The nice thing is, I shot the show with a 70-200 on my full-frame, which means I was able to get shots like this from 5 times the distance. Can't wait to try it in a big concert venue (where I probably couldn't bring an SLR anyway). It'll require good stage lighting, though; no question. I've only had it a couple of days and used it on two shoots; photos are attached. I see other reviewers have had faulty copies--mine has been flawless so far. Battery life seems to be about 250 shots. Haven't done much with the video yet. To summarize: this doesn't come close to a 5D4 image but it's pretty close to the G7X Mk II in good lighting, and that zoom range allows shots the G7X just can't do.