Sony DCR-SR40 Camcorder Reviewby David KenderPublished on Dec 11, 2006 11:00 AM
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Picture & Manual Control
Automatic Control (9.0)
The Sony DCR-SR40 makes it easy for you to operate in auto mode. In fact, that’s probably the preferable mode, as the manual controls are lacking. This camcorder, like most Sony camcorders, is blessed with good automatic responses, thankfully. Exposure, focus, white balance, and shutter speed, all shift rapidly to changing conditions. Their accuracy is generally good, but like the DCR-SR80, the SR40 had a hard time achieving the proper focus in extended zooms.
The Easy button is located in the LCD cavity.
Like all Sonys, the DCR-SR40 offers a number of simple image-improvement features – not true manual controls, but they are one-touch controls that give the user some sense of enfranchisement. Two of the most popular include Spot Meter and Spot Focus. Both create a frame around the picture on the touch screen LCD. See a spot that you want in focus different from where the auto focus has placed it? Well, just touch that area of the screen and it shifts. Spot Meter works the same for shifting exposure. These controls work best for larger objects or generalized areas. Small details or multiple planes of focus can become difficult.
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The mode dial |
Overall Manual Control (3.0)
This is not the camcorder for manual control enthusiasts. We may take that a step farther and say that this is not a great camcorder to learn on; if you plan on pursuing videography as an active hobby. The ideal camcorder for that would be one that offered the option for manual controls but would otherwise do an adequate job in auto mode. Quite to the contrary, Sony camcorders perform exceedingly well in auto mode but lack most of manual controls we consider vital: aperture, shutter speed, and a good manual focus control.
However, there are an assortment of simpler manual controls, including exposure, white balance, and a barebones manual focus control.
Let’s start with a tour of the menu. Sony, despite a lack of manual controls, makes excellent menus for their camcorders – clear and comprehensible with an intuitive structure. The menu is entered by pushing the onscreen P-menu button. This will take you to the top level of the menu: 16 large push buttons spread over three pages to provide fast access to the most popular options. These include exposure control, Spot Meter, Spot Focus, manual focus, and more. The P-Menu can be customized to add or delete buttons for any function of the camcorder, and in this sense, it can become extremely useful for on-the-go shooting.
Pushing the very first button, Setup, brings you one level deeper in the extended menu. Here you’ll find five categories: Camera Set, Picture Applications, HDD Set, Standard Set, and Time/Language. The buttons get smaller here than they do in the P-Menu, and pushing the wrong button is more likely. This is hardly helped by the small, 2.5” LCD screen, smaller than any other Sony HDD camcorder.
The Camera Set sub-menu contains all manual controls not contained in the default setup of the P-Menu, which includes auto shutter on/off (when “off” the shutter locks at 1/60th), NightShot and Super NightShot, digital zoom on/off, widescreen on/off, SteadyShot on/off, and more. The Picture Applications menu contains all of the digital effects and faders. HDD Set includes information about the hard disk drive. Standard Set contains audio controls, input/output settings, and display and LCD settings. Finally, the Time/Language contains… you guessed it, clock settings and menu language controls.
The touch screen menu has a lot of fans and just as many detractors. We fall in the latter party, generally. While the touch screen controls make menu navigation speedy, and the plainly labelled buttons are certainly easier to understand than Panasonic’s menu of cryptic icons, they have even more problems. Constantly touching the screen builds up fingerprints in no time. Not only is this aesthetically displeasing, but it makes evaluating the image quality that much more difficult. Imagine trying to find the correct focus with finger grease all over the screen. To make matters worse, the SR40’s 2.5” LCD is the smallest in the Sony HDD line, which means smaller onscreen buttons.
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The primary zoom toggle (left) and the LCD zoom controls (right) |
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The DCR-SR40 offers two zoom controls. The first and most familiar control is a toggle located on the back right of the top. We didn’t like the design of the toggle very much. The profile is too low against the body to get a good grip. And in an effort to either streamline the look or to keep anything from snagging on the switch, there are two ridges along the front and back. The top of these ridges are right on the same level as the top of the toggle, making it even harder to get a good grip. We prefer a nice, tall toggle, snags be damned. The better grip a zoom toggle offers, the more control you have in your zoom speed and accuracy. As with most toggle, this is a pressure-sensitive control that allows you about three zoom speeds.
The second control is the Sony-standard zoom forward and back buttons on the LCD panel These controls are useful if you adopt a two-handed grip, with your left hand on the LCD, or when you need to hold the camcorder overhead and the toggle is out of reach. They are not touch, sensitive, however, and move the zoom at a medium pace only.
Zoom Power/Ratio (20.0)
The Sony DCR-SR40 lens produces a respectable 20x optical zoom power and an 800x digital zoom. This is zoom is a good deal more powerful than the 12x zoom found on the DCR-SR60 and DCR-SR80. The stronger zoom, however, is made possible by the smaller sensor on the SR40, so there is a steep cost in terms of video performance and resolution. A 20x optical zoom is ample for most shooting situations, and because digital zooms reduce video resolution very quickly, we recommend leaving this feature set to off.
Focus (4.0)
Manually focusing with the DCR-SR40 is no great joy. Because so many obstacles stand in the way of you determining the correct focus, the majority of the time you’ll be better off letting the auto focus take charge. Here’s the problem: manual focus controls consist of two touch screen buttons, a mountain icon and a person icon. The buttons are large, obscuring much of the image you are trying to focus. Secondly, there is no gauge to tell you where in the focal range you are. Third, the resolution of the screen is only 123K and 2.5”, hardly enough to provide an accurate portrayal of the image as it will appear on a large TV. Finally, even if this was a fantastic LCD, it’s still a touch screen control, meaning that every time you touch it, you’re adding to a layer of oil and dirt that further obscures the image.
The real question is, why bother putting it on in the first place? The answer: because there are times when manual focus is necessary, and it’s good to have the option, even if it proves to be completely unreliable.
Exposure (Aperture) (4.0)
The exposure control on the DCR-SR40 works in a similar way to the focus. Manual adjustment is found in the menu. When activated, it creates two touch screen buttons (- and +) with a scale of 22 increments in between. Though it is not stated anywhere, we can tell you that these increments represent unspecified EV steps. It’s fine for quick fixes in overly dark or overly bright images, but does not give you the flexibility of independent aperture and shutter speed controls.
Shutter Speed (0.0)
There is no manual shutter speed control on the DCR-SR40. Some Canon camcorders offer a Shutter Priority mode, and all Panasonics feature fully independent shutter and aperture controls.
White Balance (7.5)
The DCR-SR40 does allow manual white balance adjustment. Located in the menu, you need only point the camcorder at a white surface and push the Set button. It takes the camcorder about 5 seconds to shift to the proper balance. For quick adjustments, the DCR-SR40 also offers two white balance presets, Indoor and Outdoor, as well as an auto mode. These presets should be considered quick fixes only, as they only estimate the color temperature of an “indoor” or “outdoor” environment, which may vary considerably from the environment you find yourself in at the time of shooting.
Gain (0.0)
The Sony DCR-SR40 has no manual gain control. Only Panasonic offers this control in the consumer market.
Other Manual Control (0.0)
The Sony DCR-SR40 does not offer any other manual controls.
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