Panasonic SDR-H18: Hard Disk Drive and SD Memory Card Video Recording

The Panasonic SDR-H18 is Panasonic's camcorder whose major selling point is that is has a hard drive. Since the Panasonic SDR-H18 is not DVD or tape-based, expect it to cost a little bit more than its competition.

The Panasonic SDR-H18 has only a CCD optical sensor, and not 3CCD so don't expect any heart-stopping video brilliance. The basic specifications of the Panasonic SDR-H18 include: 32x optical zoom, 1000x digital zoom, 1/6 inch 680,000 pixel CCD sensor, .3 megapixels still resolution, MPEG-2 video output, 30 GB hard disk drive, supports SD memory card, 2.7 inch LCD display, built-in microphone and weighs only 15.2 oz.

The Panasonic SDR-H18 is pretty much easy to grip, you can easily operate it just using one hand as most of the frequently used buttons such as backlight, white balance, and shutter and iris controls can be controlled with the joystick so you can easily operate or reach it with your thumb. Those with smaller palms might have trouble handling the Panasonic SDR-H18 since the hard drive block would be harder to grip for them.

Now on to its video recording capabilities. The Panasonic SDR-H18 produces relatively good video quality, there's little to no noise when viewed on the big screen, of course, noise quality would depend if you're using manual settings and the lighting conditions, however, when I tried it outdoors on sunny conditions, it produced clear videos and does a good job of capturing colors though a little bit on the lighter side. However, the Panasonic SDR-H18 doesn't really do quite as well when recording in very low light conditions, there's no image when in a dark room and if there's very little light, expect the picture to be grainy. Also, I don't think there's an attachment for putting a flash or external light so if you're going to shoot in dark rooms, be ready for someone to hold a light source or your other hand to hold a flashlight.

The autofocus on the Panasonic SDR-H18 is really great. It focuses rather quickly and locks in on the subject in milliseconds. Another great thing that I love on the Panasonic SDR-H18 is that you can adjust the white balance while video recording so if you're taking videos outdoors and then going indoors, you can adjust the white balance accordingly for better videos.

All in all, the Panasonic SDR-H18 is a good quality camcorder and if you're one of those people who like shooting extended videos, you would be thankful to its spacious 30GB capacity since you won't have to replace any DVDs or tapes when your storage runs out. I think this would have a place for every home or parents who just love taking videos of their kids but if you're a budding director, there are better camcorders out there that would suit your video shooting needs.