Panasonic HDC-SD700, HDC-HS700 and HDC-TM700 coming soon

Panasonic is introducing 3 new models to it’s HD camcorder range. The HDC-HS700, HDC-TM700 and HDC-SD700 form the new Panasonic 700 series.

All 3 models will feature an ultra wide 35mm lens, Panasonic’s unique 3MOS sensor system using 3 separate sensors to capture individual colours separately and a 12x optical zoom.

A new features for these models is Panasonic’s newly developed POWER OIS (optical image stabilisation). Using a set of gyrosensors which detect any hand-shake and applies tiny corrective movements to a corrective lens to eliminate blurring. According to Panasonic the new POWER OIS is about 5 times more effective at eliminating low-frequency hand-shake leaving you with a clear, beautiful image when shooting across the entire range from wide-angle shots to telephoto zoom.

All 3 models record full high definition footage at 1080/50p (1920 x 1080, 50 progressive) for the ultimate in image quality. Shooting at this quality setting will tend to eat memory. A 64GB SDXC card will hold between 27 and 28 hours of footage at 1920×1080i, changing the setting to 1080p will reduce this to just 5 hours 20 minutes. This won’t pose a problem for the hard disk equipped HS700 but the two solid state based models will require more memory than previous models when shooting in this full HD mode.

The only real difference between the 3 models is the storage format. The HS700 can record onto both it’s 240GB internal hard disk or external SDXC, SDHC or SD memory card media. The TM700 offers 32GB of internal solid state memory or external memory card and the SD700 offers just memory card recording only.

Like many other of Panasonic’s more recent high end camcorders these models feature a manual ring which can be used to control a number of settings while recording, giving a little more control than having to adjust these settings using buttons alone. Other features include 5.1 surround sound recording with a wind noise canceller, face detection, hot shoe and 14.2MP still image capture.

The HDC-HS700, HDC-TM700 and HDC-SD700 will be released during March 2010. As soon as we find some retailers with stock we’ll offer price comparison tables to help you find the best deal.