Panasonic SDR-H18 DV Camcorder

Playing along with the über-zoom craze, the H18 includes a 32X optical zoom lens, which sports a maximum aperture range of f/1.8-3.7.

Unlike the awkward body designs we’ve seen with some recent SD-based camcorders, the SDR-H18 is very comfortable to hold.

Picture quality: This was the most important quality to me.

Very sharp borders unless the subect is very close and moving quite fast like if someone runs in front of the camera while you are focused on something else.

And the picture I get from this camcorder is very satisfying.

Some buyers can’t get past the idea of not having removable storage, which is why Panasonic is so keen to point out that their new SDR-H18 can record to either its built-in 30GB drive or to a SD/SDHC flash memory card, without any difference in quality.

Solid performance at a comparatively low price make this a good choice for many.For expert Camcorder ratings and reviews, subscribe now.

While I had a hard time reaching and pressing the menu button with my right thumb, you still can access the most frequently used controls-such as backlight compensation, white balance, and shutter and iris controls-by pressing the joystick, so this isn’t much of a problem.

Of course, everything isn’t tack sharp as you zoom, but once you stop, the camera locks in very quickly.

Not a jaggie here unless used with Magicpix see below.

The problem is that all the features are in the menu that I never used, and I had to change the minitape all the time.

If you rarely shoot in low light this is a great choice that offers a lot for the money including exceptional battery life.For expert Camcorder ratings and reviews, subscribe now.

Sure, they cost a bit more than their DVDor tape-based equivalents, but the convenience of having such a large storage capacity-and not having to deal with tape-make them appealing.

Panasonic’s online specs are a bit misleading, in that they hint that this model has three CCDs when it doesn’t.

At its heart, the SDR-H18 sports a single 1/6-inch, 680,000-pixel CCD sensor.

Really low light: I tried taking pictures in no light.

That drops to 340,000 pixels when capturing 4:3 video or 350,000 when capturing 4:3 stills.

When standing with my face right next to my standard def TV, I can certainly see imperfections not visible from my couch.

Not all of the controls are easily reachable with one hand , but these are not the ones you need while shooting, so it matters rather little.

Now that I’ve had it for a couple of days, I’m going to try to give an in-depth account of my experience.

This is my first camcorder and I really love it.

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The features that I need right at the moment, such as when the backlight is too strong, is right at the finger tip.

We did notice that fluorescent lighting yields a minor, but noticeable, greenish cast-so you’re probably better off setting the manual white balance in this shooting situation.

If you have a high def TV and enjoy that level of detail, or if you plan to take movies for wide distribution, don’t get this camcorder.

Since the H18 has the same instruction manual as the higher-end H200, it’s a simple error, but one that happens way too often on the company’s Web site.