Panasonic VDR-D300 review

Panasonic VDR-D300 Review

Reviewed by: Denny Atkin

Reviewed on: 31 March 2006

The VDR-D300 can record on three types of mini-DVDs: DVD-R/RW and DVD-RAM. DVR-R discs can only be written to once, while both DVD-RW and DVD-RAM can be overwritten. DVD-R and DVD-RW offer the advantage of being compatible with most set-top DVD players. DVD-RAM discs are compatible with few set-top players, but they allow you to delete, split and combine scenes right in the camera, as well as create playlists by stringing together existing scenes. When you finalise a disc, you have the option of including a basic, industrial-looking DVD menu.

If your computer has a DVD drive, file transfer is very easy -- just drop the finalised disc in the drive. Otherwise, you can use the included USB cable to move video and stills to your PC -- the camcorder mounts as a drive for easy transfer.

The VDR-D300 features composite and S-Video outputs for display on a TV or dubbing to a VCR or DVD recorder, but it lacks the corresponding inputs for transferring older digital tapes to DVD.

The stereo zoom microphone sports a wind-noise-reduction mode. There's a jack for an external microphone but no headphone output. An accessory shoe lets you connect external add-ons, such as a microphone or a light.

The Panasonic VDR-D300 can record still images at resolutions as high as 3.1 megapixels to an SD/MMC card. There's also an unusual 2.2-megapixel 16:9 wide-screen still mode which could prove useful when shooting pictures for use in titling wide-screen DVDs.

Performance
The Panasonic VDR-D300 is a solid performer overall, with automatic white balance, focus and exposure all reacting quickly and accurately as we panned across a variety of subjects.

The zoom rocker is responsive and easy to control. Happily, the rocker is free of the annoying clicking sound that we've heard in other models. The manual zoom is controlled with the joystick, which is workable but not as fluid or precise as a focus ring. Optical image stabilisation works well throughout the 10x optical zoom range, but camera shake becomes evident once you start reaching into digital zoom range.

The 69mm (2.7-inch) LCD uses a wide-screen aspect ratio. The display is sharp and detailed, though blues were occasionally faded compared to their real-life counterparts. It remains viewable even in bright sunlight, particularly when you press the Power LCD button to increase the brightness. The colour viewfinder is sharp and detailed as well, but its 4:3 aspect ratio means that wide-screen footage is compressed and distorted when viewed through it.

The Panasonic VDR-D300's microphone quality is very good. If you find the cameraperson's voice overwhelms the subject's, you can use the microphone zoom function, which increases sensitivity as you zoom in. The wind-noise-reduction feature works well.

Bundled batteries typically don't let you go too long between recharges, but the one included with the VDR-D300 is good for as much as 1 hour 20 minutes of shooting with the LCD on. An optional larger-capacity battery offers nearly 2.5 hours of recording time, a fair old stretch when you consider that mini-DVD discs store only 30 minutes of full-quality footage.

Image quality
The Panasonic VDR-D300's image quality is among the best that we've seen in a consumer DVD camcorder. Image sharpness is above average for a DVD camcorder, approaching that of MiniDV cameras such as Panasonic's PV-GS65. We noticed far fewer of the video-compression artefacts typical of DVD-based units. Outdoors, video looked very good, with accurate, saturated colour and no visible chromatic aberration or colour fringing. The only noticeable visual oddities were some very subtle jagged edges we saw when we zoomed in tight on rounded objects.

Indoors, the three CCDs come into play to offer far better colour in low-light situations than you'd get with single-CCD cameras. In dimly lit rooms, there was noticeable graininess in the footage, but colour remained accurate and saturated down to a light level where most single-CCD cameras would be displaying a grey, muddy image. Only when lighting conditions were closer to dark than dim did we see a significant loss of colour. The MagicPix mode attempts to compensate for this by lowering shutter speed, but it's mostly useful for still subjects due to blurring of moving objects.

Still images had good colour but lacked sharpness in heavily textured areas. In particular, indoor shots with flash had a noticeably fuzzy quality to them. Overall, still quality is decent -- acceptable for candid shooting, but you wouldn't want to use it as your primary still camera if you plan to make larger prints.

Edited by Lori Grunin
Additional editing by Nick Hide