Various posts & questions about Panasonic DV / GS / MX camcorders

Matthew Kent · September 12th, 2005, 11:32 PM

Wasn't sure where to post this, but figured since I used the GS-150 for most of this project, people might be interested how it looks used on a short film.

A friend and I decided to enter a film contest here at my school last week. We just wanted to see what we could do with a camera, 7 days, and iMovie. We ended taking first place in the competition, which I'm still having a hard time believing. Anyways, just thought I'd make a post here about it since this site has helped me so much in educating me as to what tools are available on a students budget.

Let me know what you guys think

The Incident at Telegraph Hill

Brandt Wilson · November 7th, 2005, 10:52 AM

Hello again,

The saga continues. Two nights ago I was capturing some footage onto my powerbook, my son touched the closed tape transport door VERY SOFTLY and I started getting some heavy banding and horrible screeching sounds.

When I had reset everything, I couldn't capture to the laptop. I discovered that the timecode was not changing on the camera.

After further investigation, I've discovered that the camera has full funcionality in camera mode, and most functionality in VTR mode, except that the motor doesn't engage when I select Play.

Any ideas on this one?

Steve Law · December 5th, 2005, 02:00 AM

so ive bene meaning to buy a camcorder for ever, and today i will go out and purchase this thing. i know it's not the best out today and for an extra few hundres i could get a 400, but im on a budget due to it being xmas time right now. im a noob to video, so i thought i should start off with something affordable.
i'll be using this camera for:
skateboarding
live local bands
short films
other random stuff.

so, someone tell me. should i buy this camera? or should i just go for an Elura 85 instead? i need some decent low light performance for filming at club shows.

Tommy Haupfear · December 5th, 2005, 10:37 PM

For around $500 I think the PV-GS65 is a great buy and from what I've seen it does noticeably better in low light than the Elura 85. I'm not talking about night and day difference but the colors keep longer in the PV-GS65 in dim lighting and with less noise.

Not sure if it matters but the Elura does offer a higher resolution 16:9 mode.

Good luck and let us know what you go with!

Marco Leavitt · December 13th, 2005, 09:39 AM

Does this camera have a LANC jack?

Is there a way to prevent the camera from going to sleep when paused?

Does it have real 16:9? I'm really confused about this. I've seen people express doubt about it in previous posts. But the test that Camcorderinfo.com did measured 524.1 horizontal lines of apparent resolution and 219.9 vertical lines in 4:3 mode, compared to 545.1 to 256 in widescreen mode. That sure sounds like real 16:9 to me.

Which is better in low light, the GS250 or the Optura 60? Camcorderinfo.com declared the GS250 the winner, but the Optura 60 has slower shutter speeds available which I doubt they factored into their test. I think that the Optura 60 actually does pretty well at a 30th of a second. Comparing the GS250 (using gain) and the Optura 60 (at a 30th of a second), which camera wins?

Which has more accessible controls, the Optura 60 or GS250?

Which camera has a better contrast range, Optura 60 or GS250?

Thomas Hartz-Olsson · December 23rd, 2005, 05:21 PM

Hi,

My younger brother got this small ccd-cam for his birthday, but I just CAN NOT figure out how to activate the nightvision function. You know the one where it uses infrared light.

I've browsed alot through the manual, but the only thing I can find is a nightfunction, where the shutter is just cranked way up. Result = alot of light, but unuseable camera.

In front of the camera there's a blue/purple'ish plastic shell covering a bulb of some kind. I definately looks like an infrared function, but maybe it's just IR for a remote?

Can someone please clarify?

Riley Harmon · December 28th, 2005, 11:24 PM

Okay, I have a pv-dv953 with standard battery. It seems the battery is crapping out. For some reason, it will only take half an hour to charge and then when i put the battery in camera it starts out with about 75% charge and rapidly goes down to 0...what to do..

Tommy Haupfear · December 29th, 2005, 02:02 PM

Is this the battery it came with? If so its probably time for a new one as two years is about max of regular use. I have even less luck with laptop batteries which I barely get 12 months out of.

Andreas Griesmayr · December 30th, 2005, 12:14 PM

thank's to help from Allan and others in this forum who helped me to decide which cam to buy I own since about a year my first video cam, a japanese Panasonic GS400. I am very happy with it, but I'd be much more so if there was an option to change the menu to English.
Therefore my questions:

- Has anybody successfully changed the menu to English yet?

- Or does anybody have the English manual for the japanese GS400? Yes, manuals specially made for people who cannot read japanese but use the japanese GS200 or GS400 do exist, though only in the form of Xerox copies. They feature the original japanese characters as found on the menus in the cam and translates them to English. When I had bought my cam I was shown such a manual for the GS200, the one for the GS400 was not in stock and I did not order it then because besides having to wait 2 weeks and paying 25 bucks - then - I had thought that I would not need it. It should be much more useful then the manual for the US model NV-GS400 which I am using after downloading from a link given in this forum. It's biggest shortfall being not listing the final options of each menu in it's 'list of menus' as it asumes that one reads them directly on the cam's menu displayed on it's LCD...

If anybody had this manual I would appreciate very much if it could be made available for download.
If not but there are others interested I will try to get it on my next trip to Japan ( which could be still a few months from now ) and to make it available for download.

Erik Hedin · January 5th, 2006, 01:18 AM

Is it worth it to get the new one with a year warranty for 175 dollars more? You could look at it like the same price as the GS150. Just wondering the deal is at newegg.com? I wish I could get a GS400 but maybe later :-)

Thanks for the great forum!

Brandon Glossop · January 5th, 2006, 10:47 AM

I have a Panasonic pv dv953, and I cannot connect it to my computer. I've tried my computer, my friend's computer and my mom's computer with s-video, firewire and usb, and nothing seems to be working. There's a tape in my camera, it's on, set to play, but nothing happens when I plug it into my tower.

It used to work with firewire on my mom's computer, but now it won't work at all. Do the settings need to be set to something specific for it to work?

Vamshi Dharan · January 13th, 2006, 10:38 AM

HI EVERYONE WHISH U AL A HAPPY NEW YEAR.
I AM VAMSHI FROM SOUTH INDIA. I AM GETTING IN TO CINEMATOGRAPHY. SO I THOUGHT OF BUYING A HANDY CAM TO TAKE LOT OF SHORT FILMS. AFTER GOING THROUGH LOT OF REVIEWS I BOUGHT GS 150 GC. I TOOK 3 SHORT FILMS IMMEDEATLEY WITH OUT WASTING TIME. I HAVE A COMPUTER IN HOME IN WHICH I HAVE ADOBE PREMIER PRO. MY FRIEND EDITS IT. AFTER EDITING ONE SHORT FILM I NOTICED THER IS SOME QUALITY LOSS IN PICTURE. I CAN SEE PIXELS TO SOME LOW EXTENT. WHY THIS HAPPENS. I HAVE SHOT ALL THESE IN DAY LIGHT IN MANUEL MODE AND AUTO MODE TOO. WITH MEDIUM SHOTS ONLY NOT CLOSE . CAN ANY ONE GIVE ME SOME INFO ABOUT THIS. IF I WANT TO GET THE CLEAR QUALITY OF THE WORKS WHAT SHOULD I DO. WHAT ARE THE THINGS I SHOULD HAVE IN MIND BEFORE SHOOT AND WHAT ARE THE THINGS I SHOULD CONCENTRATE AFTER SHOOT. PLS GUID ME.

U CAN MAIL ME AT focusinn@hotmail.com

thakn u
lov vamshidharan

Leigh Wanstead · January 13th, 2006, 02:28 PM

Just little off topic.

It is quite rude to post your message in capital letters.

Regards
Leigh

Simon White · January 14th, 2006, 10:05 AM

GS400 - Just want to make sure I won't get any rear vignetting by using the 43mm when zooming through? ... In other words is the 43mm a clean fit with no hassles or should I go a bigger mating thread for the Raynox and use a step up ring?

Thanks, Simon

Laurence Spiegel · January 18th, 2006, 08:44 PM

When I switch to manual mode the top level adjustments are white balance, shutter speed and iris/gain.
If I want to fix one item, like shutter, and have the camera auto-adjust the exposure (iris/gain), how would I do that? It does seem to notice the last automatic value before switching to manual and carry it over.
Second if I want an exposure adjustment: say 1 value (3db) above whatever the camera would have chosen automatically while adjusting for any changes in scene brightness - is there a way to do that?
The manual does not go into detail and I wouldn't be suprised if the cam has more options than the manual explains.

Most of the time I can see a good enough workaround: set the gain manually when I begin filming and accept or clean it up later if the light level changes.
If the image appears dark in the viewfinder shoud I lean towards over or underexposure? I'm sure I could darken with an editor; I suspect you can't do much about a shadowed out detail.

I wouldn't have known about the 852 without this board. 2yrs later it's still all the cam I need, though I wish it had IR b+w mode for really dim conditions - b+w with good greyscale nuance can be quite attractive.

btw, if anyone reading wants a 43mm (no adaptor needed) .66 WA lens, Adorama has such. Not the cheapest but it claims no distortion. Same filter is avail in 49 and 52 also.
http://www.adorama.com/RXHD6600P43.html

September 12th, 2005, 11:32 PM	#61
Matthew Kent Regular Crew Join Date: May 2005 Location: Berkeley, Ca Posts: 75	Campus Film Fest Wasn't sure where to post this, but figured since I used the GS-150 for most of this project, people might be interested how it looks used on a short film. A friend and I decided to enter a film contest here at my school last week. We just wanted to see what we could do with a camera, 7 days, and iMovie. We ended taking first place in the competition, which I'm still having a hard time believing. Anyways, just thought I'd make a post here about it since this site has helped me so much in educating me as to what tools are available on a students budget. Let me know what you guys think The Incident at Telegraph Hill

November 7th, 2005, 10:52 AM	#62
Brandt Wilson Major Player Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Portland, OR Posts: 220	NV-MX8 VTR playback failure Hello again, The saga continues. Two nights ago I was capturing some footage onto my powerbook, my son touched the closed tape transport door VERY SOFTLY and I started getting some heavy banding and horrible screeching sounds. When I had reset everything, I couldn't capture to the laptop. I discovered that the timecode was not changing on the camera. After further investigation, I've discovered that the camera has full funcionality in camera mode, and most functionality in VTR mode, except that the motor doesn't engage when I select Play. Any ideas on this one?

December 5th, 2005, 02:00 AM	#63
Steve Law Regular Crew Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 29	PVGS65 - I'm gonna buy this one... so ive bene meaning to buy a camcorder for ever, and today i will go out and purchase this thing. i know it's not the best out today and for an extra few hundres i could get a 400, but im on a budget due to it being xmas time right now. im a noob to video, so i thought i should start off with something affordable. i'll be using this camera for: skateboarding live local bands short films other random stuff. so, someone tell me. should i buy this camera? or should i just go for an Elura 85 instead? i need some decent low light performance for filming at club shows.

December 13th, 2005, 09:39 AM	#65
Marco Leavitt Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Albany, NY 12210 Posts: 2,652	GS250 questions Does this camera have a LANC jack? Is there a way to prevent the camera from going to sleep when paused? Does it have real 16:9? I'm really confused about this. I've seen people express doubt about it in previous posts. But the test that Camcorderinfo.com did measured 524.1 horizontal lines of apparent resolution and 219.9 vertical lines in 4:3 mode, compared to 545.1 to 256 in widescreen mode. That sure sounds like real 16:9 to me. Which is better in low light, the GS250 or the Optura 60? Camcorderinfo.com declared the GS250 the winner, but the Optura 60 has slower shutter speeds available which I doubt they factored into their test. I think that the Optura 60 actually does pretty well at a 30th of a second. Comparing the GS250 (using gain) and the Optura 60 (at a 30th of a second), which camera wins? Which has more accessible controls, the Optura 60 or GS250? Which camera has a better contrast range, Optura 60 or GS250?

December 23rd, 2005, 05:21 PM	#66
Thomas Hartz-Olsson Regular Crew Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Copenhagen, Denmark Posts: 63	Nightvision on Panasonic NV GS-17? Hi, My younger brother got this small ccd-cam for his birthday, but I just CAN NOT figure out how to activate the nightvision function. You know the one where it uses infrared light. I've browsed alot through the manual, but the only thing I can find is a nightfunction, where the shutter is just cranked way up. Result = alot of light, but unuseable camera. In front of the camera there's a blue/purple'ish plastic shell covering a bulb of some kind. I definately looks like an infrared function, but maybe it's just IR for a remote? Can someone please clarify?

December 5th, 2005, 10:37 PM	#64
Tommy Haupfear Wrangler Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Greenville, SC Posts: 1,415	For around $500 I think the PV-GS65 is a great buy and from what I've seen it does noticeably better in low light than the Elura 85. I'm not talking about night and day difference but the colors keep longer in the PV-GS65 in dim lighting and with less noise. Not sure if it matters but the Elura does offer a higher resolution 16:9 mode. Good luck and let us know what you go with!

December 28th, 2005, 11:24 PM	#67
Riley Harmon Major Player Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Oklahoma Posts: 424	Panasonic Battery Okay, I have a pv-dv953 with standard battery. It seems the battery is crapping out. For some reason, it will only take half an hour to charge and then when i put the battery in camera it starts out with about 75% charge and rapidly goes down to 0...what to do..

December 29th, 2005, 02:02 PM	#68
Tommy Haupfear Wrangler Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Greenville, SC Posts: 1,415	Is this the battery it came with? If so its probably time for a new one as two years is about max of regular use. I have even less luck with laptop batteries which I barely get 12 months out of.

December 30th, 2005, 12:14 PM	#69
Andreas Griesmayr Regular Crew Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: Amstetten Austria Posts: 140	has anybody successfully changed japanese menu to english? thank's to help from Allan and others in this forum who helped me to decide which cam to buy I own since about a year my first video cam, a japanese Panasonic GS400. I am very happy with it, but I'd be much more so if there was an option to change the menu to English. Therefore my questions: - Has anybody successfully changed the menu to English yet? - Or does anybody have the English manual for the japanese GS400? Yes, manuals specially made for people who cannot read japanese but use the japanese GS200 or GS400 do exist, though only in the form of Xerox copies. They feature the original japanese characters as found on the menus in the cam and translates them to English. When I had bought my cam I was shown such a manual for the GS200, the one for the GS400 was not in stock and I did not order it then because besides having to wait 2 weeks and paying 25 bucks - then - I had thought that I would not need it. It should be much more useful then the manual for the US model NV-GS400 which I am using after downloading from a link given in this forum. It's biggest shortfall being not listing the final options of each menu in it's 'list of menus' as it asumes that one reads them directly on the cam's menu displayed on it's LCD... If anybody had this manual I would appreciate very much if it could be made available for download. If not but there are others interested I will try to get it on my next trip to Japan ( which could be still a few months from now ) and to make it available for download.

January 5th, 2006, 01:18 AM	#70
Erik Hedin Tourist Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 1	GS 250 Refurb 570 or New for 745 Is it worth it to get the new one with a year warranty for 175 dollars more? You could look at it like the same price as the GS150. Just wondering the deal is at newegg.com? I wish I could get a GS400 but maybe later :-) Thanks for the great forum!

January 5th, 2006, 10:47 AM	#71
Brandon Glossop Tourist Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 1	Computer not detecting my pv dv953 I have a Panasonic pv dv953, and I cannot connect it to my computer. I've tried my computer, my friend's computer and my mom's computer with s-video, firewire and usb, and nothing seems to be working. There's a tape in my camera, it's on, set to play, but nothing happens when I plug it into my tower. It used to work with firewire on my mom's computer, but now it won't work at all. Do the settings need to be set to something specific for it to work?

January 13th, 2006, 10:38 AM	#72
Vamshi Dharan Tourist Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 1	Panasonic Nv-gs-150 Gc HI EVERYONE WHISH U AL A HAPPY NEW YEAR. I AM VAMSHI FROM SOUTH INDIA. I AM GETTING IN TO CINEMATOGRAPHY. SO I THOUGHT OF BUYING A HANDY CAM TO TAKE LOT OF SHORT FILMS. AFTER GOING THROUGH LOT OF REVIEWS I BOUGHT GS 150 GC. I TOOK 3 SHORT FILMS IMMEDEATLEY WITH OUT WASTING TIME. I HAVE A COMPUTER IN HOME IN WHICH I HAVE ADOBE PREMIER PRO. MY FRIEND EDITS IT. AFTER EDITING ONE SHORT FILM I NOTICED THER IS SOME QUALITY LOSS IN PICTURE. I CAN SEE PIXELS TO SOME LOW EXTENT. WHY THIS HAPPENS. I HAVE SHOT ALL THESE IN DAY LIGHT IN MANUEL MODE AND AUTO MODE TOO. WITH MEDIUM SHOTS ONLY NOT CLOSE . CAN ANY ONE GIVE ME SOME INFO ABOUT THIS. IF I WANT TO GET THE CLEAR QUALITY OF THE WORKS WHAT SHOULD I DO. WHAT ARE THE THINGS I SHOULD HAVE IN MIND BEFORE SHOOT AND WHAT ARE THE THINGS I SHOULD CONCENTRATE AFTER SHOOT. PLS GUID ME. U CAN MAIL ME AT focusinn@hotmail.com thakn u lov vamshidharan

January 13th, 2006, 02:28 PM	#73
Leigh Wanstead Trustee Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: NZ Posts: 1,276	Just little off topic. It is quite rude to post your message in capital letters. Regards Leigh

January 14th, 2006, 10:05 AM	#74
Simon White New Boot Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Sydney OZ Posts: 12	43mm Raynox HD 6600; thread size ok? GS400 - Just want to make sure I won't get any rear vignetting by using the 43mm when zooming through? ... In other words is the 43mm a clean fit with no hassles or should I go a bigger mating thread for the Raynox and use a step up ring? Thanks, Simon

January 18th, 2006, 08:44 PM	#75
Laurence Spiegel Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Brookline MA Posts: 57	How to set semi-auto mode on DV852? When I switch to manual mode the top level adjustments are white balance, shutter speed and iris/gain. If I want to fix one item, like shutter, and have the camera auto-adjust the exposure (iris/gain), how would I do that? It does seem to notice the last automatic value before switching to manual and carry it over. Second if I want an exposure adjustment: say 1 value (3db) above whatever the camera would have chosen automatically while adjusting for any changes in scene brightness - is there a way to do that? The manual does not go into detail and I wouldn't be suprised if the cam has more options than the manual explains. Most of the time I can see a good enough workaround: set the gain manually when I begin filming and accept or clean it up later if the light level changes. If the image appears dark in the viewfinder shoud I lean towards over or underexposure? I'm sure I could darken with an editor; I suspect you can't do much about a shadowed out detail. I wouldn't have known about the 852 without this board. 2yrs later it's still all the cam I need, though I wish it had IR b+w mode for really dim conditions - b+w with good greyscale nuance can be quite attractive. btw, if anyone reading wants a 43mm (no adaptor needed) .66 WA lens, Adorama has such. Not the cheapest but it claims no distortion. Same filter is avail in 49 and 52 also. http://www.adorama.com/RXHD6600P43.html

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