I am looking at Panasonic's AG-DVX100 CineSwitch camera and am wondering if any of the users have this. I have found a few reviews but was still unsure at whether picture quality was as good as the 24p claim. Thanx in advance. JC
Hi! I have been using this camera for a few months now... I filmed a documentary with it. Well, it is an excellent camera, really. There are six "preset modes" that one can configure at ease. But basically there are two special parameters that stand out over the competition. The first is the 25p (i have the Pal version) mode. It looks goooooooood. The movement is very cine-like if you want to put it that way. But even more important I guess is the cine-like colour switch. (can't remember the technical name now). It gives a very pleasent look to shotings both in interlaced and 25p modes. But the best comes out when you use 25p+Cine-like colours. It looks SO totally different to normal video. It looks EXCELLENT. Actually there is a problem: in progressive mode you don't have autofocus. And that is extremely silly. Because sometimes you need to shoot in moving conditions (where you need autofocus) and other times you have the time to manual focus and setup a bit more the shooting. And if you change mode inside the same documentary, you CAN really see the difference. It is HUGE. The picture quality is outstanding, really. Some drawbacks of this camera: The stabilization system is not as good as I expected, although I can't say if it's better in other cameras. And the mic sounds good (very omnidirectional) but is rather quiet, I mean, it records at quite low levels. And if you push up the gain, then there is a lot of noise coming in. But I definetively recommend you this camera, I was hesitating between the Sony PD150, the Canon XL1s... and discarded both for the price tag and because the XL1s was too bulky and akward to handle (too much weight in your hand). It is a pitty, because it looks sooooooo goooooooood! ;-) Hope this answers a bit your question, do not hesitate to ask more details about the camera. Cheers!_X_X_X_X_X_[small]http://www.solsonic.com http://www.madridcool.com[/small]
