Panasonic SDR-S15 SD Camcorder
Panasonic is a very well reputed manufacturer of electronic appliances. It has been competing very hard with its counterparts in producing good quality goods over the years. One of the finest products from Panasonic has been their range of camcorders. A lot of revolutions have been taking place over the years in the production and the quality of the camcorders. And there have been a lot of miniaturisation has taken place even in the case of the camcorders. In order to keep with the developments in technology and also with a view to provide latest of technologies to the people, Panasonic has released a new cute looking camcorder, the Panasonic SDR-S15. Although there are many camcorders in the market, none of them is as cute as this one.
Design:
Built and Display:
The Panasonic SDR-S15 SD Camcorder looks as if it is a plaything. It is very cute and small in size, very comfortable to carry and to hold in the hands. Its dimensions are (W x H x D) 43 x 59 102 mm and it weighs just about 165 grams. So, by any standards, this is a very comfortable camcorder that is available out there. It is very easy to hold too, if you close your hands around it to make a fist, the camcorder itself would almost disappear. It feels a little bit plastic-y, but not so much as to upset you. Less noteworthy is the fact that the S15 is available in reddish brown, black, silver and pink.
The flip-out screen is nice and all the main control options are positioned at a comfortable place for operation with your thumb and fingers, so you do not need to reach out for those buttons with the second hand.
The SDR S15 Flash memory Camcorder has a very generous 2.7 inch wide LCD display with 123,200 pixels, gives you a very good picture of the images and the videos beforehand and during operation. But, there is no viewfinder to help you compose your shots. This means you have to rely on the LCD monitor, which can be difficult to see in bright sunlight.
Connectivity:
There is an interface for the AV out and another one for the USB 2.0 Hi-speed. These can be very useful when playing of the videos and pictures is needed. With these interfaces, the camcorder can be connected to a TV or a PC, to play and store videos and pictures. The SDR-S15 falls down in only offering standard-definition MPEG2 video capture and having a USB cable socket instead of an arm that plugs directly into a Mac. However, this pocket camcorder features a few neat image-enhancing tricks that the others do not.
Memory card slot:
With no internal memory to fall back on, there are optional yet essential SD/SDHC card slots in the camcorder’s base that provides you internal memory to store all the media. These cards may vary in their capacity and they can always be upgraded. You can also have a new card for your camcorder, but that should be an SD card too. This memory card compartment is shared with a rechargeable lithium ion battery, and there is a screw thread just in front for mounting the device on a tripod.
Features:
When it comes to the features, it is not a toy though. Everything works in perfect order and just considering the fact what it costs, there are some surprisingly very advanced features packed in it as well.
Intelligent Auto Mode:
There are lots of features to talk about when it comes to the Panasonic SDR. The best of them is the Intelligent Auto Mode, with which you can shoot amazing videos. This feature is a mix bag of several important functions that enhance the picture quality and automatically switch on the options that make your videos look better. One of such is the Face Detector, which automatically detects the faces of the people in the scene and hence adjusts the exposure settings in view of scanning the faces of people more effectively. Another one is the Intelligent Screen Selector option that, when switched on, automatically adjusts the shooting conditions and also accordingly selects the scene settings. The On- Screen display comes out in many languages such as English, French, German, Polish, Spanish, Italian, Turkish and Swedish.
YouTube Uploader:
Another interesting feature is that of the YouTube Uploader. With this option, uploading of your videos on to YouTube becomes a lot easier. For this, you are required to only set the camera up to the Web mode, and then the cam records the videos and then converts automatically the videos into formats that are compatible with that of YouTube. This enables faster uploading and then sharing them with your dear and not necessarily near ones. The SDR-S15 ultra compact size camcorder has a feature that eases the process of copying recordings from either of a memory card and a hard disk drive to a DVD. By simply connecting the camcorder to a DVD burner and then pressing the burn button, you can burn the DVD out of an external memory device. This DVD can in turn be played on any DVD player.
Quick start option:
There is also a Quick start option that allows your cam to start the recording in just 0.6 seconds after opening the LCD screen. This is a near instantaneous start up and along with this, you are also allowed to have a shot composition and review. This is by far, the fastest. The PictBridge software is the one that allows easy copying of the pictures and printing them easily by directly connecting to a printer. It is also very fast in recording on to a DVD, within 2 seconds. You get all this in pretty good MPEG2 quality.
There is a built-in LED Video Light to compensate for any dullness in the light conditions. These features are indeed very useful and they add to the value of the camcorder.
Performance:
This is the most important area of any camcorder. The Panasonic SDR is a decent performer and the extra features and options on offer only enhance the same. With the stereo audio recording and zoom microphone features, it contributes to a much better audio performance than most of the cameras that you would get in this price category. And with the aid of the very effective electronic image stabiliser, you will be able to achieve reasonably steady shots all the way through its 10x optical range; about which we have discussed below. The latter is a yet another very grown-up feature they you do not get to see in cameras that are this cheap.
Zoom:
The camera is a pretty good one. The Panasonic lens is good and has up to 10x zoom. Also, there is an option for digital zoom, with which you can zoom up to 25x and then the Super Digital Zoom option zooms the pictures up to 700x. But this also effectively reduces the image quality significantly.
Lens:
The camera‘s focal length lies between 2.3 and 23.0 mm. The F value of the lens is about 1.8 for WIDE and 2.4 for TELE. With this camera, you can also capture 35mm films. There is a 35mm film camera equivalent with the specifications as 44.4-444 mm for motion images and about 43.4-434 mm for still images. It has an automatic focus option but you can always change it manually. The iris can also be set to automatic or it can be adjusted manually. The Electric Image Stabiliser can give you better pictures by stabilising the objects seen through the lens. The camera has a shutter, whose speed is about 1/25.
Lighting:
The camera has a standard illumination of 1440 lx. But the minimum illumination is about 6 lx for low light conditions and 2 lx for colour night view mode. White balance option is also available. With this you can change the colour balance of the images. This option is, by default, set as automatic but it can always be altered manually, if needed. There is also Backlight compensation facility that compensates the poor light conditions, and hence ensuring that the quality of the image is not damaged.
Imaging and Recording:
The camera is designed to capture images in JPEG format. The size of the image is about 0.30 megapixels (640 x 480). About 999 images can be stored in it. As discussed above, the PictBridge helps in printing these images easily. Talking about the recording section, motion pictures are recorded in MPEG2 format. The audio is recorded in MPEG1 AudioLayer 2 format. The recording modes are XP (10 Mbps), SP (5 Mbps), LP (2.5 Mbps). There are two types of microphones, the Stereo mic and the Zoom mic and the speakers are dynamic in type. There is an indication for the Media remaining in the memory.
Video Quality:
Dipping into the Panasonic SDR-S15’s basic on-screen menu options reveals five pre-optimised scene modes covering common subjects including sports and portraiture. However, it is very disappointing that the video quality of the camcorder is sadly lacking. While the camcorder shoots at 704 x 576 pixels resolution at 50 fields per second, which turns out to be 25fps once you see it onscreen, it is hardly surprising to find that the details captured lags behind 720p cameras, such as the Flip Mino HD and also the 1080p cameras like the Toshiba Camileo S10.
We had our test done with the Panasonic SDR S15 Camcorder with MPEG2 Recording both indoors and outdoors. We did our tests outside on a cloudy day and the indoor lighting were 100% artificial. The end result was dull and bereft of life. The focus seemed to be extremely soft and though the colour noise was not much of an issue in low light, there was noticeable distortion where straight edges looked bent and the chromatic aberrations in the form of purple fringing were rife.
Power Consumption:
The battery is Lithium-polymer type. The Panasonic SDR-S15 Mini HD Camcorder needs a supply of 5.0 V (for AC) and 3.6 V (for DC). On an average it consumes about 2.9 W of power for full charging.
Warranty:
Panasonic offers a warranty period of one year from the date of purchase.
Verdict:
The Panasonic SDR-S15 is a good camcorder to have. It is better than many when it comes to the design. It really is small and extremely portable. It has a lot of advanced features, which were discussed earlier. The performance is good, but not as good as the camcorders from the other brands. Particularly as the cost is a bit low, it is common that not a mind blowing performance is expected from it. This is the only minus in the video quality. Features wise, it is excellent. So, due to its performance issues, it is not suitable for the professional shooters or photographers. It may serve as a good one for the novice users. Overall, it is a very handy camcorder, if you are not a professional.
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Panasonic SDR-S15 Digital Video Camcorder – Specification Details
| Manufacturer | Panasonic |
| Model Name | SDR-S15 SD Camcorder |
| Model Number | S15 |
| Camcorder type | Mini, HD Camcorder |
| Dimensions (W x D x H) | 43 x 59 102 mm |
| Weight | 165 grams |
| Colours | Reddish brown (SDR-S15EB-T), black (SDR-S15EB-K), silver and pink (SDR-S15EB-P) |
| Monitor | 2.7-inch TFT LCD |
| Video Resolution | 640 x 480 |
| Still Picture Resolution | 640 x 480 |
| Image Sensor | 1/6″ CCD |
| Lens (focusing) | Optical auto focus |
| Zoom | Yes. Up to 25x |
| Exposure control | Auto |
| White balance | Auto, Sunny, Cloudy, Fluorescent, Tungsten |
| Motion Detection | Yes |
| Shutter type | Electronic |
| Frame rate | 30 fps |
| Flash light control | Flash for still picture (Auto/On/Off) LED light for video recording (Auto/On/Off) |
| Video compression format | AVI |
| Audio input | Microphone |
| AV out/earphone phone jack | HDTV component-out and normal
AV out + earphone-out |
| Speaker | Yes (stereo) |
| Digital voice recorder | Yes |
| MP3 player | No |
| TV playback | Yes |
| Self timer | 10 sec delay |
| Auto power off | No |
| PC interface | Mini USB |
| Power adaptor | Mini USB |
| Accessories | AC Adaptor, AC Cable, DC Cable, Rechargeable battery pack, AV cable, USB Cable and VideoCam Suite V2.0 software |
| Battery | Li-ion rechargeable battery |
| Warranty | One Year |
May 11th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
Dear Sirs,
I too am happy with this camcorder {Panasonic SDR-S15} only the disc that came with it to store and edit- (VideoCam Suite 2.0) is not very easy to use and somehow I have managed to copy everything many times over! I cannot understand or get it to edit things.