Panasonic Palmcorder PV-GS500 Mini DV Camcorder
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- Recording System: NTSC
- Camcorder Type: Digital
- Recording Media: Mini DV
- Optical Zoom: 10x
- Weight: 0.23 lb.
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Reliable, Compact, Full-featured Camcorder with Good Video
Pros
Small, reliable, fully-featured, quality look, good performance. Good low light performance using video gain.
Cons
Manual lens cap, slow video transition effects. Low light requires switching to manual mode.
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
An impressive camcorder, solidly built and easy to use. Great picture and sound. Has many useful features, but can be used by the beginner, too. Usable low light capability.
I was looking for a reliable compact digital camcorder that had received good reviews. I needed external microphone and headset jacks for narration. I wanted AV-in jacks so I could convert video from my analog camcorder to digital video. I also wanted reasonable low-light capabilities. My target price was $500 or less.
Reliability issues reported by Consumer Reports eliminated Canon and JVC, so I focused (pun intended) on Sony and Panasonic. I eliminated any camcorder that did not have an external microphone input, a headset jack and AV-in. The previous year Sony Digital 8 met a lot of my criteria, except small size, but the tape mechanism made a loud buzzing noise that got into the audio. My list soon came down to a few Panasonic models that cost $700 or more. I was checking out the $700 PVGS120 at Best Buy when I noticed the PVGS50, previously priced at $700, was on clearance for $400. That got my attention! The main difference between the PVGS120 and PVGS50 was that the PVGS120 had three CCD chips and the PVGS50 had one. Though I am sure that there would be measurable improvements with a 3-CCD chip camera, I could not see any noticeable difference on the color display monitors in the store. For the same money, I would have bought the PVGS120, but the PVGS50 was $300 less and that made my decision easy.
The Panasonic PVGS50 is a compact, full-featured digital camcorder. It fits the hand well and weighs just under one pound and has a nice solid look and feel (including a brushed aluminum lens barrel), unlike the cheap plastic look of some of the Sony, Canon and JVC cameras I saw on display. It was rated highly by Consumer Reports and other reviewers. The controls are conveniently placed and operation is intuitive. Included accessories are a shoulder strap, AC charger/adapter, 2-hr battery, wireless remote control, wired remote with narration microphone, AV cable, S-Video cable, USB cable, 8MB SD card and a CD-ROM with software. The software includes still photo editing but not DV movie editing. The 108-page manual is comprehensive and easy to understand.
The front contains a 27mm lens, a size that will make finding filters a bit difficult. The lens cap is a manual pull-off type. I would have preferred an automatic lens cap. Below the lens is the built-in stereo microphone and jacks that serve double duty as microphone/AV-in and headset/AV-out. An AV cable is provided to connect either the in or out jacks to standard RCA jacks.
The top contains a passive accessory shoe and the latch to open the tape door. Unlike most other makes that accept tapes from the bottom (a problem when you use a tripod), the Panasonics accept tapes from the top. Also on top are the zoom and still picture buttons.
On the left side is the flip-out 2.5" LCD screen. The picture is good, even in bright sunlight. The screen can be flipped around so you can see it as you video yourself. Opening out the LCD screen reveals control buttons for the playback function. These buttons serve double duty as special feature buttons during recording. Under the buttons is a slot that holds the SD card that stores digital stills or MPEG4 video.
On the back you find a color viewfinder which can be pulled out about 3/4" from the camera to provide clearance when you use an optional larger capacity battery. The viewfinder has an optical focus adjustment to match your vision. To the right of the viewfinder is a menu selection button. Pushing the menu button brings up a menu in the picture. You turn a wheel to select menu items and push the wheel down to select the items. The menu wheel also serves as an adjuster for manual focus, playback volume and other functions. I found the menu button system very easy to use and like it much better than the new menu system found on the later Panasonic models (including the PVGS120 I looked at) which has been relocated to under the LCD panel, requiring you to flip out the LCD panel to make adjustments.
Below the menu button is a Quick Start button that allows the PVGS50 to go from power off to recording in 1.3 seconds. Having lost many great scenes in the past because my old camcorder took 5 seconds to start up, the Quick Start was a welcome feature. If the PVGS50 is already on, recording starts even quicker. Also on the back is the power mode lever that selects off, record and playback functions. The battery mounts on the back, under the viewfinder, and comes in 2-hr, 4-hr and 6-hr sizes. The camera comes with a 2-hr battery, but you will want at least a 4-hr battery which retails for about $90 but can be found online for as low as $42. Actual run times with a lot of start/stop/focus/zoom actions will be about half of the battery rating.
The right side contains a switch to select whether you record to tape or the SD card. Another switch allows you to switch to manual mode, where white balance, shutter speed and video gain can all be adjusted in real-time as you video by using the menu wheel. Also on the right is the hand strap, which is fully adjustable and can be converted to a wrist strap. Somewhat awkwardly located under the strap is a plastic cover which opens to reveal DV, USB and S-Video jacks.
The bottom of the PVGS50 has a metal (not plastic) thread tripod socket and the usual model information labels.
The 680K CCD chip produces impressive video in all light conditions except dim lighting where colors get washed out and contrast suffers, though there are some adjustments you can make to fix this. The autofocus and auto white balance work very effectively. Electronic Image Stabilization (EIS) does a fair job. Sometimes it was hard to tell if it actually reduced camera shake at all. All the usual effects and programmed exposure modes are available. I found the 6-second wipe and dissolve transitions to be far to slow to be useful. 1.5 seconds would be better. Unfortunately, the fade function is only available from a button under the LCD panel.
Like most digital camcorders, video suffers in low light situations. But you can get the PVGS50 to create good pictures in low light by adding video gain in the manual mode. Unfortunately, in manual mode autofocus and EIS do not work. You have manually focus using the menu wheel. The good news is that switching to manual mode and adjusting focus and video gain can easily be done as you video while using the viewfinder. I use a circular-polarizing filter to reduce glare and reflections on glass, but found the filter reduced light sensitivity too much in low light, even with the video gain dialed in. I remove the filter in low light shooting unless I absolutely need it to reduce glass reflections. The PVGS50 has a Magic Pix feature that greatly slows down the shutter to make video possible in near darkness, but any motion will make the video appear jerky, so this feature is only useful on a tripod and with a fixed scene.
Video can be recorded to the SD chip as MPEG4. The 320 x 240 quality is nothing like the DV video, but short videos can be emailed to friends and used in Media Player for PC playback. The PVGS50 can also be used as a web camera.
Audio can be recorded in 16-bit stereo or 12-bit 4 track. The only slight camera noise picked up by the microphone is the zoom motor in quiet videos. There is a zoom microphone feature that increases the gain of the microphone as you zoom in, apparently assuming that things you zoom into are further away. This may work fine in that situation, but if you like to zoom at a fixed object for artistic reasons, the zoom microphone feature will make your audio vary unintentionally. I leave the zoom microphone feature turned off. The wired remote contains a narration microphone, but you have to hold in a button to switch it on.
Still photos are recorded to your choice of the DV tape or the SD card. If you press the photoshoot button while in the tape record mode, it will record a 6-second still along with audio, so you could narrate the still and have that included as part of your video. If you press the VCR pause button while in tape record mode, you will freeze whatever image the camera sees, then you can press record to record that still and audio for any time length you want. When recording to the SD card, the 640 x 480 (.3MP) resolution is okay for viewing on a computer monitor, TV screen or small prints, but the stills are no match for a good digital camera photo. You can capture stills from previously recorded video by pressing the photoshoot button while the video is playing back. You can use previously taken stills as slides in your video, or use a title-making feature to record a title on the SD card, then insert it into your video. Stills can also be added to video as a small picture-in-picture.
Like many other digital camcorders, the PVGS50 has a 10x optical zoom. Newer Panasonic models, and some competing brands, have optical zooms in the low 20x range. Unfortunately, I couldn't get the features I wanted on a camera with greater optical zoom. You can increase zoom range by selecting 25x or 700x digital zoom. The 25x zoom works fine. Anything beyond 60x begins to look bad, so the 700x digital zoom is of limited value.
The wireless remote contains almost all functions available on the camera body, plus some additional ones like index search and slow motion playback.
Overall, I am very satisfied with my PVGS50. The only changes I would make would be to make the video gain automatically turn on in low light and make the video transition effects run much faster. An automatic lens cap would be nice, too.
Reliability issues reported by Consumer Reports eliminated Canon and JVC, so I focused (pun intended) on Sony and Panasonic. I eliminated any camcorder that did not have an external microphone input, a headset jack and AV-in. The previous year Sony Digital 8 met a lot of my criteria, except small size, but the tape mechanism made a loud buzzing noise that got into the audio. My list soon came down to a few Panasonic models that cost $700 or more. I was checking out the $700 PVGS120 at Best Buy when I noticed the PVGS50, previously priced at $700, was on clearance for $400. That got my attention! The main difference between the PVGS120 and PVGS50 was that the PVGS120 had three CCD chips and the PVGS50 had one. Though I am sure that there would be measurable improvements with a 3-CCD chip camera, I could not see any noticeable difference on the color display monitors in the store. For the same money, I would have bought the PVGS120, but the PVGS50 was $300 less and that made my decision easy.
The Panasonic PVGS50 is a compact, full-featured digital camcorder. It fits the hand well and weighs just under one pound and has a nice solid look and feel (including a brushed aluminum lens barrel), unlike the cheap plastic look of some of the Sony, Canon and JVC cameras I saw on display. It was rated highly by Consumer Reports and other reviewers. The controls are conveniently placed and operation is intuitive. Included accessories are a shoulder strap, AC charger/adapter, 2-hr battery, wireless remote control, wired remote with narration microphone, AV cable, S-Video cable, USB cable, 8MB SD card and a CD-ROM with software. The software includes still photo editing but not DV movie editing. The 108-page manual is comprehensive and easy to understand.
The front contains a 27mm lens, a size that will make finding filters a bit difficult. The lens cap is a manual pull-off type. I would have preferred an automatic lens cap. Below the lens is the built-in stereo microphone and jacks that serve double duty as microphone/AV-in and headset/AV-out. An AV cable is provided to connect either the in or out jacks to standard RCA jacks.
The top contains a passive accessory shoe and the latch to open the tape door. Unlike most other makes that accept tapes from the bottom (a problem when you use a tripod), the Panasonics accept tapes from the top. Also on top are the zoom and still picture buttons.
On the left side is the flip-out 2.5" LCD screen. The picture is good, even in bright sunlight. The screen can be flipped around so you can see it as you video yourself. Opening out the LCD screen reveals control buttons for the playback function. These buttons serve double duty as special feature buttons during recording. Under the buttons is a slot that holds the SD card that stores digital stills or MPEG4 video.
On the back you find a color viewfinder which can be pulled out about 3/4" from the camera to provide clearance when you use an optional larger capacity battery. The viewfinder has an optical focus adjustment to match your vision. To the right of the viewfinder is a menu selection button. Pushing the menu button brings up a menu in the picture. You turn a wheel to select menu items and push the wheel down to select the items. The menu wheel also serves as an adjuster for manual focus, playback volume and other functions. I found the menu button system very easy to use and like it much better than the new menu system found on the later Panasonic models (including the PVGS120 I looked at) which has been relocated to under the LCD panel, requiring you to flip out the LCD panel to make adjustments.
Below the menu button is a Quick Start button that allows the PVGS50 to go from power off to recording in 1.3 seconds. Having lost many great scenes in the past because my old camcorder took 5 seconds to start up, the Quick Start was a welcome feature. If the PVGS50 is already on, recording starts even quicker. Also on the back is the power mode lever that selects off, record and playback functions. The battery mounts on the back, under the viewfinder, and comes in 2-hr, 4-hr and 6-hr sizes. The camera comes with a 2-hr battery, but you will want at least a 4-hr battery which retails for about $90 but can be found online for as low as $42. Actual run times with a lot of start/stop/focus/zoom actions will be about half of the battery rating.
The right side contains a switch to select whether you record to tape or the SD card. Another switch allows you to switch to manual mode, where white balance, shutter speed and video gain can all be adjusted in real-time as you video by using the menu wheel. Also on the right is the hand strap, which is fully adjustable and can be converted to a wrist strap. Somewhat awkwardly located under the strap is a plastic cover which opens to reveal DV, USB and S-Video jacks.
The bottom of the PVGS50 has a metal (not plastic) thread tripod socket and the usual model information labels.
The 680K CCD chip produces impressive video in all light conditions except dim lighting where colors get washed out and contrast suffers, though there are some adjustments you can make to fix this. The autofocus and auto white balance work very effectively. Electronic Image Stabilization (EIS) does a fair job. Sometimes it was hard to tell if it actually reduced camera shake at all. All the usual effects and programmed exposure modes are available. I found the 6-second wipe and dissolve transitions to be far to slow to be useful. 1.5 seconds would be better. Unfortunately, the fade function is only available from a button under the LCD panel.
Like most digital camcorders, video suffers in low light situations. But you can get the PVGS50 to create good pictures in low light by adding video gain in the manual mode. Unfortunately, in manual mode autofocus and EIS do not work. You have manually focus using the menu wheel. The good news is that switching to manual mode and adjusting focus and video gain can easily be done as you video while using the viewfinder. I use a circular-polarizing filter to reduce glare and reflections on glass, but found the filter reduced light sensitivity too much in low light, even with the video gain dialed in. I remove the filter in low light shooting unless I absolutely need it to reduce glass reflections. The PVGS50 has a Magic Pix feature that greatly slows down the shutter to make video possible in near darkness, but any motion will make the video appear jerky, so this feature is only useful on a tripod and with a fixed scene.
Video can be recorded to the SD chip as MPEG4. The 320 x 240 quality is nothing like the DV video, but short videos can be emailed to friends and used in Media Player for PC playback. The PVGS50 can also be used as a web camera.
Audio can be recorded in 16-bit stereo or 12-bit 4 track. The only slight camera noise picked up by the microphone is the zoom motor in quiet videos. There is a zoom microphone feature that increases the gain of the microphone as you zoom in, apparently assuming that things you zoom into are further away. This may work fine in that situation, but if you like to zoom at a fixed object for artistic reasons, the zoom microphone feature will make your audio vary unintentionally. I leave the zoom microphone feature turned off. The wired remote contains a narration microphone, but you have to hold in a button to switch it on.
Still photos are recorded to your choice of the DV tape or the SD card. If you press the photoshoot button while in the tape record mode, it will record a 6-second still along with audio, so you could narrate the still and have that included as part of your video. If you press the VCR pause button while in tape record mode, you will freeze whatever image the camera sees, then you can press record to record that still and audio for any time length you want. When recording to the SD card, the 640 x 480 (.3MP) resolution is okay for viewing on a computer monitor, TV screen or small prints, but the stills are no match for a good digital camera photo. You can capture stills from previously recorded video by pressing the photoshoot button while the video is playing back. You can use previously taken stills as slides in your video, or use a title-making feature to record a title on the SD card, then insert it into your video. Stills can also be added to video as a small picture-in-picture.
Like many other digital camcorders, the PVGS50 has a 10x optical zoom. Newer Panasonic models, and some competing brands, have optical zooms in the low 20x range. Unfortunately, I couldn't get the features I wanted on a camera with greater optical zoom. You can increase zoom range by selecting 25x or 700x digital zoom. The 25x zoom works fine. Anything beyond 60x begins to look bad, so the 700x digital zoom is of limited value.
The wireless remote contains almost all functions available on the camera body, plus some additional ones like index search and slow motion playback.
Overall, I am very satisfied with my PVGS50. The only changes I would make would be to make the video gain automatically turn on in low light and make the video transition effects run much faster. An automatic lens cap would be nice, too.
