Panasonic Australia (02) 9986 7400At just on $4,400, the 500A cannot really be considered a consumer DV camera, however, it is no doubt a camera a lot of consumers would like to own. However, the price and some annoying little problems stopped this camera from being the Labs Winner this month.
The 3CCD camera system produces near broadcast quality video and the optical image stabiliser ensures a good steady picture in the most nervous hands. The stabiliser can be manually adjusted to keep the image steady in difficult conditions and with a bit of practice it allows the user to take professional looking video almost anywhere.
Panasonic has opted for a 10x optical zoom, which works nicely, but it could not resist the temptation of adding a 500x digital zoom, which is just a waste. The 500A was one of the bigger cameras tested and its design gives the impression that it is all lens.
It is not as intuitive to use as the other cameras in the Labs and while it produces 3.0-megapixel still images, the photo function is confusing and at times frustrating, particularly if you want to take a snap during videotaping.
There are ways of successfully taking still photos by moving out of video mode, however forget trying to do it while taping.
Like the Sony TRV50 and the Hitachi MV270E, the 500A has a large LCD viewer complete with backlight function, and while it worked well it was not quite as good in bright sunlight as the Sony.