Panasonic HC-X900 review

Like its predecessor, the Panasonic HDC-SD900, the Panasonic HC-X900 is a full HD camcorder has three separate sensors for red, green and blue light; these help it capture more accurate colours and more detail, while reducing noise, compared to single-chip camcorders. The camera supports 1080/50p video as well as 1080i and PAL. The new model adds updated image stabilisation and an auto-stereoscopic screen for glasses-free 3D viewing with the optional 3D adaptor.

It’s a medium-sized camcorder which feels well-balanced in your hand, and all the major controls, such as zoom and record, are within easy reach of your fingers. You can either view the action using the flip-out resistive touchscreen or you can use the electronic viewfinder. Even though we’re now used to super-sensitive capacitive screens, the HC-X900’s resistive model is still responsive and it's easy to select the function you need. The touchscreen makes it easy to preview your footage, as it's uncluttered by too much information. There's also an electronic viewfinder for if you have trouble using the screen in direct sunlight.
The HC-X900's three 1/4.1in sensors deliver fantastic video in daylight, but footage does suffer from noticeable noise in darker environments, as was the case with the HDC-SD900. In good lighting, the three colour sensors capture scenes accurately, and even when surveying a panoramic scene, such as that from our rooftop, objects to the extreme left and right of the screen retain their colour and definition.

The camcorder's sensor specifications are identical to those of the previous-generation HDC-SD900, but the camera does add 'pixel shift technology', where the green sensor is slightly offset relative to the red and blue, which helps the sensor to capture four pixels instead of one each frame. This, Panasonic claims, means the camera captures four times the pixel count of Full HD so has more information to use when processing the final video image, leading to greater accuracy. Even so, it isn’t greatly different from that captured by the HDC-SD900. Brighter colours look slightly more natural, but when they’re compared to footage captured by the HDC-SD900 last year, the difference isn’t overwhelming.

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Panasonic HC-Z10000 review

3D video cameras have traditionally fallen into two broad ranges: low-budget models that you can use for a bit of fun, such as the Sony Bloggie 3D, and high-end professional models for film and TV. With its Z10000 Panasonic has taken a different tack, producing a high-end 3D model with plenty of control that's designed for enthusiasts.
At just shy of £3,000, the Z10000 can't be described as cheap, but for the level of control, range of inputs and quality there's simply nothing else at this price that's even remotely similar. You also have to take into account that this model is a proper 3D camera, using dual 3MOS sensors (six 1/4.1in sensors in total). That means there's a one 3MOS sensor for each eye's image, so you can shoot Full HD progressive video in 3D, rather than using a compromise, such as the side-by-side system budget models use, where each eye's image gets half of a 1080p resolution.

Dual XLR inputs let you attach high-quality microphones for better sound recording.
From the outside, the HDC-Z1000 is an impressive-looking bit of kit. Its large body houses the lens assembly at the front for the dual 3D lenses, plus there are two XLR microphone inputs (with phantom power) for audio, so you can use proper microphones and capture better-quality audio than by using the built-in Dolby Digital 5.1 microphone array.
As this model's aimed at the enthusiast market, there are also three lens rings for zoom, focus and iris control. Zoom controls also sit on rocker switchers on the side, when using the camera in a traditional hand-held grip, and on the carry handle. Dual XDHC memory card slots are nice to see and you can configure them so that the second card's for overflow shooting or for a backup, so you can protect any precious footage from memory card failure.

Discrete controls for most commonly-used features, let you take full control of the video you're shooting.
The side of the camera consists of a set of dedicated buttons for most of the common controls, letting you quickly switch between automatic and manual modes for iris and focus, toggle the optical image stabilisation and switch between the white balance modes (auto, 3200K, 5600K, two user modes and a lock on the current automatically detected setting). There are also three programmable user buttons, but it's a shame that there's no quick method to adjust the shutter speed

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Canon Legria HF R36 review

This review is of the Canon HF R36, however it also applies to the Canon HF R306, which is identical in every respect except it lacks the R36's built-in 8GB of memory
Canon’s HF R36 is a Full HD compact camcorder with a 1/4.85in CMOS sensor, 32x optical zoom, 51x intelligent zoom, a 3in colour touchscreen monitor and a whopping 8GB of internal storage space. That specification is already pretty good for a camcorder of this price, but Canon has gone even further by adding Wi-Fi connectivity, which means you can transfer recorded videos to your PC without a USB cable and stream videos to DLNA-enabled TVs and games consoles.
In fact, the HF R36 has many built-in features that are perfect for families that want to have fun with video, but don’t necessarily want to use a computer. Story Creator lets you create video stories using pre-designed patterns, various digital filters make your videos look like old black and white movies or a 70s TV show, and Memory Save lets you back up your images and videos to an attached hard drive from the USB host port.

Of course, image quality is the key feature of any camcorder. When shooting from our rooftop in bright daylight, the HF R36 captured enough detail to make a satisfying family movie. It adequately captured the texture and staining of paving stones, pebbles and walls within five metres of the lens, but from around 15 metres the camcorder captures less detail, so that individual bricks are no longer apparent, although individual patches of colour are. Overall quality isn’t bad for a camera of this price, although the automatic focus is a little too soft and there's some noise, even in daylight.
The camera's CMOS sensor is supported by a 32x optical zoom lens, which works well up until half of its full extension. After that, objects have a pronounced halo effect and more noise is introduced. You can further extend the zoom digitally to 51x and 1020x. The former is Advanced Zoom, which is a hybrid optical and digital zoom which gives you a zoom boost without degrading quality too much.
There are also has a number of image stabilisation options, including Dynamic IS and Powered IS. Dynamic IS aids stability when walking with the camcorder and Powered IS adds stability when using the zoom, although you can have both activated at the same time. The image stabilisation is reasonable for a camera of this price (it's not a patch on the Panasonic HC-X800's stabilisation, for example), but we recommend using a tripod where possible.

The HF R36 has a 3in touchscreen monitor instead of a viewfinder. Sadly, its horizontal and vertical viewing angles are poor, which can make it difficult to film at interesting angles. The touchscreen is also used for adjusting options, although the menu you see depends on the mode to which the HF R36 is set. The menu icons are clear and menu options easy to read, but they could be better organised. Even after some time with the HF R36, we still struggled to remember where certain menu options were located.

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Samsung HMX-QF30 review

The Samsung HMX-QF30 is ostensibly an updated version of the HMX-QF20, but little seems to have changed. The HMX-QF30 has a 1/4in sensor, just like the HMX-QF20, as well as a 20x optical zoom and 40x digital zoom. It also has a maximum pixel count of 5.1 megapixels and an effective pixel count of 1.75 megapixels. Both camcorders also have a built-in Wi-Fi adaptor, although the HMX-QF30 can do more with it.
The HMX-QF20 allowed you to upload your videos and photos to social networking sites such as Facebook and YouTube, but the HMX-QF30 lets you transfer videos to your mobile and broadcast live on the internet with the Ustream web service.
Physically, the HMX-QF30 is as long as a typical compact camcorder, but it’s not very high. This, combined with the thin, unpadded handstrap, makes it uncomfortable to hold and use. Having all the major buttons on the back, such as record and zoom, exacerbates the problem, because you must use your thumb to control them rather than your index finger. This can cause you to nudge the QF30, adding judder to your videos and slightly altering the angle. This might not be a problem if you have small hands, but we think most adults would find it uncomfortable.

TOUCHSCREEN

The HMX-QF30 has a 2.7in colour touchscreen monitor, which is bright, clear and colourful. Its 230,000-pixel is a little, and although icons do look low-res, they’re also colourful and convey their purpose well.
Even though it’s a relatively small screen, the icons are sensibly arranged along the left- and right-hand sides of the screen, with recording time displayed along the top of the monitor. This leaves much of the display clear to view your scene, and you can remove the icons with a simple tap of the screen.

Sadly, we found the touchscreen difficult to use and often unresponsive. It sometimes wouldn’t recognise our swipes, for example, and it would often prove nigh on impossible to traverse a menu because it interpreted our swipe as a selection, taking us into another menu. We found this infuriating.

IMAGE QUALITY

The HMX-QF30 records videos in the MP4 format. This keeps file sizes low, but it also introduces quite a few compression artefacts. The HMX-QF30 can record at a resolution of 1,920x1,080 and a frame rate of 50fps interlaced. At this setting, the bitrate is a fairly low 15.5Kbit/s. Other than Full HD, you can also shoot in “web quality” and 1,920x720 at 50fps progressive.
There’s more mosquito noise than we expected to see in our outdoor footage, as well as the effects of compression such as blocky detailing and jagged edges. There was also quite a bit of chroma noise around certain objects.
We noticed a lack of detail, with some surfaces appearing washed out. We could see the mortar between the bricks of a wall at a distance of 10 metres, for instance, but it looked a little indistinct, with no texture detail or staining on the bricks. Certain surfaces looked a little washed out, too. The detail became more noticeable when we zoomed in on the wall, but the effects of compression were still evident. Often, the automatic focus had slight trouble focusing, and would noticeably pulsate in and out of focus ever so slightly.
The Canon Legria HF R48 isn’t perfect in this respect, but its footage does look sharper, and although there are some compression artefacts, they’re a lot less noticeable.
Even so, we think the footage is acceptable for a camcorder at this price, and it reproduced colour pretty well. It performed similarly in our studio footage, although the chroma and mosquito noise was more evident in this darker environment.

LOOK MUM, NO WIRES

There are two ways of using the HMX-QF30’s built-in Wi-Fi adaptor. One is to connect your smartphone to the camcorder directly in order to transfer photos or you can connect it to your router in order to upload photos and videos to social networking sites.
You can also use the the Samsung MobileLink app with it, which is available from the App Store and Google Play, and is used to transfer videos to your smartphone or tablet. Transferring photos is as easy as selecting them on the camcorder, then your phone and then clicking a button. Transfers were fairly slow, but the app is slick and simple.
As with the HMX-QF20, you can upload directly to Facebook, Picasa and YouTube. You must connect to a router in order to do this, which can be tricky, as you can easily ‘mistype’ the network password thanks to the touchscreen’s small keyboard and lag.
The HMX-QF30 has no connections other than A/V and Mini HDMI outputs and a Mini USB output, not even a headphone output. Considering the price of the HMX-QF30, this isn’t such a bad omission, and many users won’t notice the lack of ports.
If you already have the HMX-QF20, the HMX-QF30 probably isn’t worth the upgrade, but if you simply want a cheap Wi-Fi-enabled camcorder it could be a good buy, especially if you’re shooting quick footage for the web. There’s a lot of compression and noise, and the more expensive Canon Legria HF R48 provides better video quality and a better user interface. If you can spend more on the Canon Legria HF R48, you should do so.

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Canon Legria HF R48 review

The Canon Legria HF R48 is a fairly compact Full HD camcorder with a ¼.85in CMOS sensor, a built-in Wi-Fi adaptor and 32GB of built-in storage for your videos and still images, in addition to an SD card slot. This is a large amount of storage, and is great if you’ve forgotten your SD cards.
Although small, the Legria HF R48 is comfortable to hold, which is due in part to the handstrap’s padding. It feels light but not cheaply made, and the touchscreen’s hinge feels sturdy, giving us confidence that it won’t break easily if handled by younger family members.

IMAGE QUALITY

We were pleasantly surprised by the image quality of the Legria HF R48, given its price. There’s a lot more detail in daylight shots than we’d expect. You can see the grime on a handrail for instance, as well as reflections in panes of glass and the water-staining of painted surfaces, but it isn’t perfect. If you look closer, part of the handrail looks blocky, and we can’t see the texture of individual bricks in the wall opposite. Even so, these are things you’d only notice if you took the time to look. It certainly won’t stop you enjoying your footage. Colour reproduction was similarly good, although overcast skies appeared to have a blue tinge. We saw minimal noise, except when we trained the HF R48 on a cloudy sky.

We were also pleased with the footage shot in our studio. There was still a great amount of detail in all but the darkest scenes. We could clearly see the toy train reflected in the fan blades, for example, but we couldn’t make out much detail on the darker parts of the train itself. Although noise was predictably present, it wasn’t too intrusive.
We also noticed a pulsating shift in focus when we activated a rotating fan LED, which caused the text on a pack of stickers to move in and out focus slightly. Again, you’d have to look closely to notice it.

The HF R48 also rendered the fur of our toys better than expected. Not as well as the much more expensive Panasonic HC-X920, but slightly better than the Panasonic HC-V520. With the HC-V520, some of the fur lacks detail, looking like a rough coloured surface, while other parts look like plump clumps of rice. You can tell the surface is fur, but it doesn’t look too realistic. The Canon Legria HF R48 renders the fur similarly, but has just enough detail to make the fur appear more realistic.

FEATURE-PACKED

The Canon Legria HF R48 has a wonderfully smooth and incredibly responsive touchscreen interface that’s packed with lots of sensible, well-organised options. The first level displays five icons that you can highlight with a cursor. Each icon represents a set of menu options, but click through the icon and you’re presented with a list of natural language options. Any menu items that are not relevant to the camcorder mode you’re using are greyed out, so you don’t have to worry about them. It’s certainly a lot better than the user interface seen on last year’s Canon Legria HF R36.
The R48 also has a built-in 2.4GHz 802.11n Wi-Fi adaptor that lets you control the camcorder remotely, upload videos to your smartphone or tablet and connect it to your router so that you can access it through your computer. In the latter scenario, the R48 operates as a media server, so you should be able to watch videos on your smart TV, too, as long as it supports media streaming from a server.

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Sony DEV-5 3D Recording Binoculars review

The Sony DEV-5 uses two 1/4in Exmor R CMOS sensors to create a set of 3D recording binoculars that let you photograph or video outdoors in environments not suited to a camcorder or camera. The DEV-5 is of obvious interest to those with an interest in wildlife video and photography, but would also suit those wanting to record and enjoy sports events or other outdoor occasions.

We used the DEV-5 in a torrential downpour and it suffered no ill effect, although we did have to wipe the lenses every so often. The lenses are partially protected by a plastic surround, but this only protects it from rain and snow so much. A plastic lens cover protects the lenses when the DEV-5’s not in use, but it isn’t detachable. This means you can’t lose the lens cover, but it also means it gets in the way occasionally.
Unsurprisingly, given the amount of technology crammed into it, the DEV-5 is not small, measuring 88x155x219mm (HxWxD). It also weighs 1.2Kg, which is more than twice the weight of the Sony TD20VE 3D camcorder. Surprisingly, the DEV-5 only feels heavy when it’s hanging around your neck, but this is probably due to the unit being very well balanced in use. It felt so heavy when strung around our neck that we held it up to give our spine some relief, but it felt light when held up to our eyes. We expected it to be front heavy and to have to compensate for this, but it wasn’t.

You must set up the DEV-5 for your eyes before use, but the DEV-5’s controls and the viewfinder’s menu make this easy. The DEV-5 uses a 3D electronic viewfinder, although it can operate in 2D if you prefer (there’s a button on the DEV-5’s top panel). To set it up for your eyes, you must physically adjust the position of the diopters (the eyepieces) using a wheel located in between and above them. Once adjusted, you must also complete a simple visual alignment test through the viewfinder. Each diopter also has a ring that lets you adjust the viewfinder’s focus to suit your eyes. We had no problem adjusting it to suit our longsighted eyes.

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Pansonic HC-V520 review

Panasonic is well known for its award-winning 3MOS camcorders, such as the Best Buy-winning HC-X920, which uses three separate sensors to capture fantastic-looking footage, but Panasonic has always provided excellent entry level camcorders too, the latest of which is the Panasonic HC-V520 - an evolution of last year's Panasonic HC-V500.

It's a compact camcorder with a single 1/5.8in BSI MOS sensor, a 50x optical zoom, Panasonic’s excellent Hybrid Optical Image Stabilisation system and a built-in 802.11n Wi-Fi adaptor that lets you stream video to your TV or PC among other things. The HC-V520 is also capable of capturing Full HD footage at a respectable maximum bitrate of 28Mbit/s in the AVCHD 2.0 format and recording audio in two-channel Dolby Digital Stereo.
Although the sensor size remains the same, the HC-V520’s 50x optical zoom is longer than the HC-V500’s 38x optical zoom. The built-in Wi-Fi adaptor is certainly new. Otherwise, the HC-V520 looks and feels similar to the HC-V500.
Physically, it feels like an entry level camcorder, with its plasticky, slightly cheap feel, but in some places it actually feels better built than the more expensive HC-V720. On our review models at least, the HC-V520’s zoom lever felt sturdier than the HC-V720’s lever. Even the Mode switch on the rear of the camcorder felt tougher. Even so, the HC-V520’s port covers and SD card cover feel a little too cheap for a £425 camcorder.

As for connections, the HC-V520 provides the bare necessities and nothing more. It just has a Mini USB for transferring your footage and images to your PC, and Mini HDMI and AV outputs for connecting it to your TV or projector. If you need a microphone input, a headphone output and an accessory shoe, you should consider the Panasonic HC-V720 instead.

IMAGE QUALITY

In daylight, the HC-V520’s image quality didn’t seem to have improved much on that of the HC-V500. Compression artefacts were evident, with certain surfaces and textures having both a fuzziness and blockiness about them. In our daylight rooftop footage, for example, the noise is very noticeable on the edges of the railings and various other objects, such as the construction materials on the building site opposite our office (often referred to as Gibb's effect or Mosquito noise). Chroma and luminance noise was also present. The HC-V520 certainly performed better in outdoor and brightly lit indoor locations than dark environments, comparative to our expectations that is, as evidenced by the prevalence of luminance noise in our low-light test.

You can see a hint of mosquito noise in this shot, around the railings
Compression effects were also noticeable on various textures, such as the fur of some of our toys. Part of our toy chicken’s fur is hit by a light source that changes in intensity, and this appeared flat, slightly blocky and without texture. The fur appears fairly well rendered in other parts of the toy, although it lacks the detail seen in the HC-X920’s footage. Although we’ve highlighted various compression effects and noise, the HC-V520’s captured footage still looks good for a sub-£500 camcorder. Colours are well reproduced and it captures a decent amount of detail. For overall video quality, there wasn’t that much difference between the HC-V520 and the HC-V720 despite the latter unit’s larger sensor.

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