Panasonic HDC-HS/TM/SD60 Owners thread

Hi Jvidia - I just got mine yesterday. Only had a slow 1gb card to play with but I was still impressed. Bought a 4gb class 4 today so will play more this weekend.
I own an old sony 8mm camcorder which still works great but was replaced 3 years ago by a panasonic dv camcorder. As we are heading to the states next year I wanted to get something more advanced and smaller to carry without tapes etc.
I started off deciding on the sd60 but after reading reviews and documentation I was persuaded to go for the sd700 mainly because of the manual ring and the 3cmos. My wife had other ideas and made me see sense again! The sd700 retails in the UK between approx £650 (internet) and £800-850 (high street store) and it was clear that the Sd60 at half of this price was the way to go.
Especially when the extra cost of SD cards and spare battery were added.
I found it for £339 on the high street and as panasonic are offering a free 32gb card with it then it seemed a very good deal.
My initial reactions are that I am very impressed. The picture is vibrant and colourful and during a walk at sundown last night I was amazed at how well it coped with the low light.
I spent so much time reading about the manual controls on the sd700 that I wasn't aware that the sd60 had them too. Opening the iris in a dull room can restore the picture to almost daylight quality!
Auto modes are very good and the stabiliser worked brilliantly although it did struggle at higher digital zoom rates so I have left the settings at optical only. Walking along a rough farm track whilst filming still gave a very stable and smooth image. I can't wait to learn more about it.
The only thing I don't like is the automatic light when it is too dark. Once it comes on it can be switched off via the button but I would prefer a screen menu option as to whether it came on or not - its pretty useless anyway to be honest.
Overall I am very pleased and sure I made the right choice. It has more functions than I thought it had and when I become more proficent and need more functions then I'm sure panasonic will have an even better model than the 700. Glad my wife didn't let me get carried away and buy the 700 just yet.

dont let the number scheme fool you, those 2 cameras are completely different

Hello, new SD60 owner here. Was wondering if I still need install the HD Writer software if my computer already has Adobe Premiere Elements 7? Getting ready to start uploading some clips for editing, and wasn't sure if I needed the HD Writer to do some sort of conversion. Thanks in advance.

What about 1080p50? The SD60 does not have it.

Fellow SD60 owners,

I purchased one of these a few weeks back and I'm wondering if anyone is having the same issues I am...

First, indoor digital photos are quite green. At first I thought it was just the lcd display but they appear very green everywhere else. I know I didn't buy it to be a digital camera and I was using incandescent lighting but I get more accurate colors out of my smartphone.

Second, is there good video editing/publishing software out there for less than $40? HD Writer AE is pretty frustrating in how it is entirely wizard driven.

Thanks in advance for the replies!

PS - What are people using for a camera bag for this unit? Anyone have the Lowepro Rezo 110?

I just ordered one of these. Concerned about location of power button. Since lcd screen also acts as on/off switch, can you shoot with the lcd screen closed?

In pause mode closing the screen will turn off the camcorder.
In recording mode closing the screen will not turn it off, it will continue recording. I think that in playback mode it will continue to play as well.

Thanks Ungerman

Hello everyone!

I'm thinking about buying an SD60 for a variety of reasons, but I'm concerned about ease of use with everything buried in the touchscreen. I already downloaded the user manual and it is a little light on the details.

How do you go about locking the exposure? I had a Sony HD1000 with a multi-purpose ring, which was super easy to use and also some old consumer-grade Canon DV cameras.

The canons had joysticks that were easy/fast to use and for exposure I would point it at something close to middle gray, let the auto exposure settle on that, then lock the exposure at that level.

That way I could pan around in the room and the exposure wouldnt jump all over the place which can be very distracting for the viewer.

Is that possible with the SD60? If so, how many steps/menu items/touches does it take to get there? Do you just use your finger or a stylus to interact w the menu system?

Focus - Do you ever find that you thought you had something in focus looking at the screen but once you looked at it in full resolution on a computer that it wasn't in focus?

I am really excited about this camera but I'm a little worried after not being able to figure out how to lock the exposure after reading the manual.

Thanks!!!

-Jacob

Also, I'm assuming that if you open up the iris all the way the depth of field will be shallow enough to make doing a focus pull worthwhile. Are focus pulls possible using the panasonic touch-subject-to-focus interface?

Thanks!
Jacob

How do you all like your SD60's? Seems like a nice, tidy package that's easy to use, high quality, not overly complex, good stabilization and so on. Mine should be here early next week. I'll be using it for kids' sports inside and out, family, travel, etc.
Thanks.

I just got my SD600 in (3 chip, I think everything else is the same though).

I really wish you could configure the zoom switch to control focus for focus pulls, that would be awesome.

Hi,

I bought this camcorder (SD60) without any card. Now I bought a SanDisk 32GB SDHC memory card, but when I put it into the cam than it says "Card Locked". But it isn't and I tried to reformat it and everything, it's working fine in another things (laptop, digital camera) and another card is working fine in the camcorder (2GB SD and 8GB SDHC). I think the problem is that the card what I bought it's class 2. Any ideas?

Many thanks

There is a lock on the side of the card towards the front. If that is in teh locked position you cannot write to the card. Just slide it to the unlock position and you should be good to go.

I had this problem with a card recently, but it was unlocked. I found a sandisc help site, and it said to slide that lock back and forth three times each. Then leave it locked for something like 10 seconds, then unlock it. Did the trick.

Hopefully his problem is something as easy as that. Otherwise it might be defective and need to be returned.

has anyone managed to get a remote or lanc for this camcorder?

Hi!

Just bought a HDC-TM60.
The problem is, when i shoot a video it's blurry and skips a lot when I try to play it on my computer. I use VLC for playback. I think it skips because the movie is in HD, but my computer isn't set up for that.
Is there a way to make it shoot in SD?

Regards
J0kke

Try playing it in Splash.
http://mirillis.com/en/products/splash.html
It should play better but to get 100% smooth results will depend on rather your computer is powerful enough or configured properly.

Also, the filetype is a weird one, .mts. How can I make it into a more upload-friendly format?

@Paulo
Thanks for the response. I'm not sure my computer is the problem. When playing the movie on the camera, I still get those weird lines, looks like there are horisontal "waves" on the screen...

Was this under man made light? I think that can occur if you have the wrong shutter speed, so that it does not match the frequency. As I understand it, in the USA you want to shoot in multiples of 60. Could that be a possibility?

Also, are you using an HDMI　cable?

Yes, it was under man made light. I have no idea what the frequency is. I'm in Norway, and I'm on a boat, so the lights are kind of special..
I do not have HDMI on my computer.
Funny thing is I converted the file to .avi, and all the stuttering was gone. Completely clean.

Does any know if you can purchase the front lens? Somehow I have managed to put a scratch on it:eek:, not a major one though but can be seen in certain light. Also a manual on how to strip it down would also be helpful:)