Panasonic PV-GS19 Camcorder Review by David Kender Published on Jul 21, 2005 10:00 AM

Video Performance(6.0)
With a 1/6” CCD and 680K resolution, identical specs to its highly-rated big brother, the PV-GS35, this camcorder already has a lot going for it. At 3000 lux, the equivalent of a partially sunny day, our video performance tests showed it to have remarkably crisp color differentiation. Note the clean lines and sharpness from one color tile to another. The colors did tend to run a little dull in the green-yellow part of the spectrum. The blues and reds appeared much more strongly. The grayscale was particularly strong, with the white tiles practically popping off the screen. Dullness aside, this is excellent performance for a camcorder with a street price of under $300.

The similarly priced Canon ZR200 produced a brighter picture overall, but did not have the sharpness that the PV-GS19 did. The Sony DCR-HC21 was far too noisy, with none of the color accuracy or definition of its competitor.

Video Resolution(9.6)
With the Panasonic PV-GS19, video of a standard resolution chart was captured in the camcorder's 4:3 and 16:9 modes. Stills from the video footage were then exported to Imatest Imaging Software in order to determine the true resolution. In 4:3 mode the camcorder gave us approximately 307.2 vertical lines of resolution at its best, with 311.5 horizontal lines of resolution, yielding a true resolution of 95692.8. The camcorder's 16:9 mode is not true widescreen; it merely letterboxes the image, so testing was unnecessary.

Low Light Performance(4.0)
Low light performance for the PV-GS19 was better than one would expect on a camcorder of this price, which has become something of a theme in this review. At 60 lux, roughly the equivalent of a room lit by a single window, the PV-GS19 performed identically to the PV-GS35. Compared to 3000 lux, noise increased overall, with excessive noise in the blues. The grayscale stayed strong. The colors dulled but the color differentiation stayed strong in all but the greens. This is the same part of the spectrum that was weakest in 3000 lux, so the loss of information was at least consistent.

The PV-GS19 definitely fared better than the Canon ZR200, which became much noisier at 60 lux. It was also better than the JVC GR-D270 (Review, Specs, $379.99), which showed blue noise across the spectrum. The Sony DCR-HC21 could not compete.

At 15 lux, most of the loss of color information occurred in the reds and violets. The blue-green area was a little better. The best performer was white, which was nearly as bright at 15 lux as it was at 60 lux. 15 lux seemed to be the great leveler amongst the competition. All the previously mentioned camcorders began to lose great deals of color, but retained some semblance of recognition – all but the Sony DCR-HC21, which was virtually black & white.

Wide Angle (24.0)
The wide angle measurements of the Panasonic PV-GS19 were taken in both its 4:3 and 16:9 modes. The camcorder produced identical measurements of 49 degrees for each mode. The camcorder does not, therefore, possess a true widescreen mode.