Panasonic Palmcorder MultiCam PV-GS35 Mini DV Camcorder
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- Recording System: NTSC
- Camcorder Type: Digital
- Recording Media: Mini DV
- Optical Zoom: 30x
- Weight: 0.9 lb.
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User ReviewRead All Reviews »
Happy so far.
Pros
Optical Zoom is great, Joystick menus are a plus.
Cons
AC Power/Battery Charging poorly designed, still photos.
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
As an entry level camera, this one is high on features and ease of use. A little more thought by Panasonic might have avoided some foibles.
I bought the Panasonic GS35 mostly for its impressive optical zoom and relatively low price for the features. I have been generally pleased with ease of use, although I have only taken a few hours of video, mostly in outdoor conditions.
The camera's joystick feature is quite nice, and makes navigating menus during operation very seamless.
I was disappointed in the quality of still shots taken with the camera, although with some more research, I probably should have expected. It is still quite useful to be able to snap that priceless moment during video, but unfortunately the quality is really only suitable for email or other computer use. Prints would be extremely grainy.
My major gripe with this camera is the power adapter. The port for the AC power adapter is underneath the battery, requiring the battery to be removed for the camera to run off of wall power. This naturally does not allow the "oh, nuts" realization of low battery power and still a seamless transition to AC power. In addition, the charger for the battery is on the transformer block of the AC power adapter (nice thought), but is bypassed when the camera is running on the same transformer. So, you also cannot charge the battery and run the camera at the same time. I suppose it might be worth it to buy a second AC power adapter just for battery charging purposes, but still it seems like an avoidable design flaw.
The video editing software that comes with the camera seems to be fairly powerful, although a bit daunting to use at first. This is my first foray into digital video/editing though, so perhaps my naivete plays into my difficulties.
All in all, I think I would buy this camera again, although it does seem to have some shortcomings that could have been avoided.
The camera's joystick feature is quite nice, and makes navigating menus during operation very seamless.
I was disappointed in the quality of still shots taken with the camera, although with some more research, I probably should have expected. It is still quite useful to be able to snap that priceless moment during video, but unfortunately the quality is really only suitable for email or other computer use. Prints would be extremely grainy.
My major gripe with this camera is the power adapter. The port for the AC power adapter is underneath the battery, requiring the battery to be removed for the camera to run off of wall power. This naturally does not allow the "oh, nuts" realization of low battery power and still a seamless transition to AC power. In addition, the charger for the battery is on the transformer block of the AC power adapter (nice thought), but is bypassed when the camera is running on the same transformer. So, you also cannot charge the battery and run the camera at the same time. I suppose it might be worth it to buy a second AC power adapter just for battery charging purposes, but still it seems like an avoidable design flaw.
The video editing software that comes with the camera seems to be fairly powerful, although a bit daunting to use at first. This is my first foray into digital video/editing though, so perhaps my naivete plays into my difficulties.
All in all, I think I would buy this camera again, although it does seem to have some shortcomings that could have been avoided.
