Panasonic PV-GS320 Camcorder Review

by David Kender
Published on Jul 9, 2007 10:00 AM

 
Intro Performance
Format
 Auto / Manual Controls
Still Features Handling and Use
Audio / Playback / Connectivity Other Features
Comparisons / Conclusion Photo Gallery
Specs and Ratings
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Compression (5.5)
The Panasonic PV-GS320 captures video in the old favorite compression, DV. The DV compression standard has been around for years and has a lot of advantages. For consumer camcorders, DV generally offers the highest video quality in standard definition. The data rate is 25Mbps, compared to 8.5Mbps for DVD and hard disk drive (HDD) camcorders, which uses MPEG-2. Also, DV is an intraframe compression, which means that each frame is completely independent from the next, making for easy editing. MPEG-2 is interframe, which captures fewer full frames and uses predictive algorithms to guess at motion in between those frames. Interframe compression is more efficient in many ways, but intraframe tends to handle motion better.

Media (6.0)
The Panasonic PV-GS320 shoots video to MiniDV tapes, a staid and stable format slowly making its way to extinction. MiniDV tape, like the DV compression, has a lot of benefits. Tape is generally sturdy, and if a section of tape is damaged the rest of the footage is often salvageable. The same cannot be said for DVDs and HDDs. However, tapes require that old analog chore of fast-forwarding and rewinding, something that we modern technologists are no longer used to doing. Also, in order to edit, the footage must be captured in real time to the computer: 60 minutes of recording means 60 minutes to upload it to your computer. DVD and HDD camcorders are far more efficient in this capacity.

Editing (8.0)

The Panasonic PV-GS320 records in the DV format, which has been around for so long that nearly every non-linear editing (NLE) software can work with it. A Firewire (a.k.a. DV or i.Link or IEEE1394) connection is required. As mentioned above, DV footage must be captured in real time. Every minute of footage is a minute of capture time, which requires more patience than many YouTubers can muster.

 

 

 

 



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