Unacceptably grainy & washed out picture with Indoor lighting.
Pros:
A great zoom, small, weight, good capability - in sunlight only. Good sound.
Cons:
Forget about using the GS35 indoors/night: Grainy details & Washed out colours.
The Bottom Line:
You'd be better off buying a budget camcorder from another maker - but be mindful of reviews! Otherwise, an older Panasonic from Ebay would probably be a better buy.
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Overall Rating:
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Author's Review
Picture Quality (...or lack thereof)
As a former owner of a commendable Panasonic NVDS27 which was pilfered, I sought a replacement. Several reviews led me to believe that the GS35 was a good & relatively inexpensive camcorder. But, I really should have paid more attention to the reservations made about using it in low light mode... I'll put it simply: As soon as the sun goes down - forget about using this camcorder, unless you have high power studio lighting. The washed out colours & the graininess in its pictures is very, very visible and is far worse than the Panasonic NVDS27's image - despite the latter being a budget model from 5 years ago! The gimmicky indoor gain up mode and onboard light is next to useless too.
I was simply gob smacked at just how bad the GS35 is. And I've just very happily sold my GS35 on Ebay and will now have grave reservations before even considering buying a Panasonic camcorder again.
...And sound, compactness, battery etc...?
In short, I really didn't expect a worse camcorder from Panasonic than one of its budget models from 5 years ago. Yes there've been great improvements in compactness, weight, & zoom. Picture transfer is by USB 2.0. The mini-joystick control (which is used to operate its settings) was easy to learn and no problem to use. Its battery life is very good - I got over an hours usage with the supplied battery, on each charge, while mostly using the viewfinder. But as regards its sound: on reviewing tapes shot with the DS27, those made with the GS35 lacked a certain detail, depth & presence to the sound; albeit, the sound quality on the GS35 is perfectly good. It's just not great.
So now what?
I'm currently considering Canon's MVX300 which has 1.3 Megapixel (as opposed to the GS 35's 800,000); but I'm waiting to read more reviews on it. I hope that these will come in time from fellow epinionists!
I wonder if those who've praised the GS35 ever owned a camcorder before? Yes, its 30X Zoom is a good feature but you'll need a tripod with you to use it - even the digital image stabilization becomes somewhat ineffective at that zoom level. And I'll say no more about its deplorable picture quality. Indeed, if it weren't for its poor picture quality indoors & at night I'd heartily recommend the GS35, as its other features were compelling.
