Panasonic SDR-S7EB-K

.../> If you install the Panasonic software, which I suppose most people will, you are at the mercy of the company and what it thinks you should (and shouldn't) do. I haven't gone down that road, so I cannot comment on Panasonic's efforts in that direction. I do know that Canon's software is the despair of many, and frankly I was not about to risk our already fragile Windows setup when I could probably do better without proprietry programming.
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...the clips. You either whip out the SD card and transfer the files via a card reader, or plug the camcorder straight into the PC via the supplied USB card, enabling Windows to see it as another drive and do essentially the same thing. This interferes with Windows absolutely minimally.

Transferring the clips to the PC is a vastly quicker process than having to play the videos out into an editor, which is required by any tape system. ... more

Having wended my way steadily through the years via Standard 8 (remember that anyone?), Hi8 and Digital 8 video, we last owned a Canon DV camcorder. This was an improvement so far as weight was concerned over the Sony Digi8, but the Canon still weighed half a kilogram, and having dropped it on a wet beach (with entirely predictable results, nacht), and as I am suffering advancing wrist arthritis, something lighter still was called for next time around.

The next stage up was a DVD camcorder, and, more lately, one with a hard drive. In my most recent search SD card camcorders started as distinctly peripheral vision items, if you take my meaning. They were cutting edge (of which I've never been a fan, frankly), they were robust, etc., etc. - but, inevitably, they were expensive. Nevertheless the huge advantages possible with an flash card system were robustness, and lack of both bulk and mass. I thought that the price premium, if not too great, was probably worth the convenience and likely reliability.

It was not that I was intending to use the thing as a cricket ball, you understand, but life being something that happens when you are planning other things, minimising the possibilities has advantages. The Canon eventually failed in its tape-loading, and I have to say that looking at the wickedly complex internals of the thing made me sympathetic to systems which had a minimum of moving parts. Indeed I began to wonder just how it had managed to survive in working order at all. In retrospect, when mechanisms can be jammed literally by a single sand particle, beach-work seemed a tad unwise.

So, having scouted a number of possibilities, including the Canon and JVC ranges, which I liked, I lighted upon the Panasonic. Both the size and weight (or lack of both, if you follow me) struck me all of a heap. The thing is about the same bulk as a couple of large Swan-Vestas matchboxes placed side-by-side, and typically weighs less than my wallet. With a nice streamlined body it drops into a pocket with ease, which is actually something of a danger, but we'll come to that in a moment. At least I can forget my wrists.

This particular model, it must be emphasised, is not high definition. I wasn't interested in HD for two reasons: we don't need it for family shots and, as a rock-bottom minimum, HD doubles the price. It also produces planet-sized files, and frankly I have better things to do than wait ages while the things load, are edited, and then rendered, quite apart from all the other upgrades necessary to play and view them. They also hoover up hard-disc space like you wouldn't believe. If you decide to go HD fine, but just be prepared, in my considered opinion, to endure a lot more hassle and also to spend a lot more wonga.

In use
The first large change from previous camcorders is that it has no eyepiece. Composing is done entirely with the fold-out LCD panel. This bothered me at first because previous experience showed that sunlight made the things very difficult to see. Not here. The variations in brightness available were more than adequate for outside work, but do have some impact on the battery life.

This panel has to be opened to switch the camcorder on, done with a five position wheel, and when this wheel is covered by the panel it is nigh-on impossible to turn the thing on accidentally. Full marks for that one, Panasonic. Close beside this wheel is the operation LED, red for on and pulsing green for standby. Again, more on this in a moment.

Opening the panel also exposes most of the other buttons for navigation, the menus and several other functions. The only controls on the case itself are two for recording and a rocker for the x10 zoom (which also doubles as a volume control on playback). Oh, and of course there is the lens-cover slider, which does not affect the electrical operation in any way.

The LCD panel can be controlled both for total brightness and contrast, which is an essential when the camcorder is used in bright sunlight. A cover at the rear of the camcorder conceals a power socket (for battery charging), a proprietry A/V port and a mini-USB port. Another cover underneath opens to reveal the battery and the SD card. Also underneath is an access LED which lights up when the SD card is being accessed, and the manual says that on no account should either the battery or card be disturbed if the light is on. Seems a no-brainer to me.

Operation
Opening the panel and rotating the control wheel to video record starts it up, and if you have forgotten to open the lens protector it'll politely remind you. The composing panel can be rotated a full 270 degrees to allow 'over-the-head' recording and, spinning it back, self-portrait video (although why people like doing this defeats me entirely; perhaps if you are one of the beautiful people it has some purpose...). It can also be folded back against the camcorder body, display out, so that recording can be done looking at the side of the camera. The roll-over design of the panel exterior then allows one to spin the operation wheel.

In more conventional use the camcorder can either be held at waist level, and the right index finger then quite naturally finds the recording button on the side, or it can be held at shoulder-height, the body of the camera sitting on the palm heel, the thumb automatically covering the rear recording button. It's quite well thought-out. Either way the alternate fingers find the zoom rocker fairly easily. Again, high marks for this.

Closing the panel puts it into standby mode, shown by the operation light pulsing green, and from this it will start recording 0.6 seconds after reopening so you don't miss anything. Standby mode uses half the normal 'on' - non-record - power.

Focussing seems good, but it will not work nearer than about 10cm on wide-angle, and this stretches to about a metre in x10 zoom. So long as you are not into macro it is adequate. There is a digital zoom, which, candidly you can take or leave. I have only ever found one digital zoom to be of the remotest use - on an HP still camera - and the digital zoom here is a utter waste of menu-space, frankly. I have never understood why the manufacturers make such a issue of them.

If anything the camcorder is a tad too light, and needs a bit of ballast in operation, especially in rough conditions. The electronic anti-shake isn't terribly effective, just about coping with walking along provided one moves smoothly. I toyed with the idea of buying a model with optical anti-shake, but eventually settled for robustness over quality. For steadiness I use an old extendable window-cleaning pole with a home-made camera mount (4 inches of 22mm plastic water tube in a compression stop-end with a 3/16W bolt through the cap) slipped over the top. The camera+mount can be popped off when not in use, and the pole then used as a walking stick, and later reassembled when required. Works a treat. The short mount can even be used 'gun-style' if required.

It is tempting to drop the camcorder into a pocket when not in use, which is fine provided you don't bend over (if it's in a shirt pocket), and you don't sit on it (when it's in a back pocket, and as I did to a digital compact some years ago when I slipped on some rocks - it survived, amazingly, but perhaps a health warning is in order here). Probably the best compromise is a belt-mounted case worn at one's side.

Battery life is adequate, but effectively there is only about 40 minutes actual recording time available, so a spare wouldn't go amiss. An 8GB SD card holds about an hour and fifty minutes at XP (highest quality), and proportionally longer at lower quality settings. The SD cards should be grade 4 or above (although the manual says grade 2 will work, which puts the cost of an 8GB card at about £30, otherwise you pay double that). The battery is charged in-camera - nothing wrong with that, except that you cannot charge a spare while also using the camera, of course.

No remote controller is supplied, but in view of the download options this may not be a problem. It isn't for me.

Menus
These are comprehensive and give plenty of control, and are accessed from a button which is exposed when the panel is opened. Most of the quickly required stuff - backlight compensation, for example - is easily accessible from the navigation 'diamond'. Advanced settings are more deeply buried.

Technical stuff
If you install the Panasonic software, which I suppose most people will, you are at the mercy of the company and what it thinks you should (and shouldn't) do. I haven't gone down that road, so I cannot comment on Panasonic's efforts in that direction. I do know that Canon's software is the despair of many, and frankly I was not about to risk our already fragile Windows setup when I could probably do better without proprietry programming.

Alternatively it is quite possible to directly transfer the clips. You either whip out the SD card and transfer the files via a card reader, or plug the camcorder straight into the PC via the supplied USB card, enabling Windows to see it as another drive and do essentially the same thing. This interferes with Windows absolutely minimally.

Transferring the clips to the PC is a vastly quicker process than having to play the videos out into an editor, which is required by any tape system. HD and DVD-based camcorders also usually score well here, of course. The clips are all separate files, rather like ordinary still-picture files (although very much larger) so all the chopping up of the video, usually done by the video editor, will be a thing of the past. The video clips are dated and timed, so the software should have no problem sorting them out, although you may have to do some judicious prodding to achieve this. Having imported the files into the editor you will need to drag and drop them onto the time-line, but this is hardly PhD stuff, let's face it.

Just beware of a catch. The files are .MOD files, which are actually .MPG files but without some vital information. The extra dope is contained in associated .MOI files, and separating the .MOD/.MOI pairs can get you into all sorts of tangles. If you settle for a 4:3 ratio screen there seems to be no problem. The .MODs only work at 4:3 without the .MOIs because 4:3 is a default which most video editing software will assume unless specifically told otherwise. If, however, you want widescreen (16:9) video then the .MOI files are vital because they contain the extra information to enable the .MODs to produce widescreen.

However, for the record, I have transferred (4:3) .MOD files direct to a Laptop hard drive under Windows XP, imported them into Ulead (don't buy this, it's awful) and then edited them quite happily, eventually cutting a normal DVD. So there would appear to be no intrinsic problems here.

If your software jibs at .MOD files, change the extensions to .MPG and that'll probably sort it. You need to be able to see the extensions in Windows, which hides them by default (on the PC go to 'View' on the folder menu and change the 'Hide extensions' setting by clicking in the box, and then 'Rename' the files. Windows will object and say that the files could become unusable, which is rubbish, of course. Just close the warning window and go ahead and rename.) I think I am right in saying that most video editors these days recognise .MOD files anyway, and should, if the .MOI files are also transferred, read these as well, so the whole thing ought to be pretty transparent to the average video user.

One other minor point concerns the SD cards themselves. ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS (got me?) reformat the card when you have transferred the current clips to the PC. I simply cannot over-emphasise the importance of this. This strong recommendation applies to all storage cards used on any digital system, even the ubiquitous memory pens. Sooner or later, if you don't do this, the card capacity reduces and you will start to lose clips, eventually ending up with a holiday-full card which cannot be accessed. The explanation for this is a little arcane, so I won't try to do it here. Just reformat yer card, cobber.

Recommendations
Would I buy another if we lost this one? Given all the previous considerations, yes, unquestionably. It weighs diddly-squit which makes it perfect for distance walking, and it has download options which beat the daylights out of tape-based systems. There is no hard-drive or DVD drive to fail. If the SD card gives up you simply hoik it out and stuff another one in. It is also absolutely silent in operation, of course, having no mechanical things in it except the lens focussing. But it would be nice to have a view-finder. Just joking. 

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