Panasonic Announces Its 2010 Flagship Camcorders: The HDC-HS700 and HDC-TM700

See the full photo gallery for the HS700 and TM700.

– Panasonic announced its 2010 flagship camcorders in the U.S.: the HDC-HS700 and HDC-TM700. Both are high definition models with a three-CMOS sensor array, native 1080/60p recording, and a new wide-angle Leica Dicomar lens. Other updates to last year’s models include an upgraded image stabilization system, extended zoom, and enhanced wind cut feature. The TM700 is the replacement model for last year’s excellent HDC-TM300, our choice for 2009 Camcorder of the Year.

The three ¼-inch CMOS sensors are the same size and resolution as seen in last year’s flagship camcorders (6.21 megapixels, effective), but Panasonic claims that an improvement in technology has increased low light sensitivity in the 2010 line. Panasonic is also advertising an upgrade in optical image stabilization (OIS). We saw this new stabilization in action at CES and it did seem improved from last year. We’ll have to wait until we get these models in our labs before we can say whether the sensitivity or OIS is really improved.

A more obvious improvement in the HS700 and TM700 is the new F1.5 Leica Dicomar lens, which has a minimum focal length of 3.45mm, compared to last year’s 4.0mm. More significantly, the new lens has a much larger wide angle and a 46mm filter diameter. The 12x optical zoom is the same as last year, but this year Panasonic has added an 18x Intelligent Zoom.

Rounding out the new features is a Wind Noise Canceller, which seemed to result in dramatically reduced wind noise when we experienced it at CES. Hopefully, this will make wind cut more helpful than the usual helmet-in-a-tornado protection that we find on consumer camcorders.

In addition to these new updates, the 700-series will carry over many popular elements from the 2009 line, including microphone and headphone ports, an electronic viewfinder, 5.1-channel surround sound, and the fantastic lens control ring. Also returning this year is Panasonic’s excellent iA (Intelligent Auto) features, such as AF/AE Tracking.

Pricing and availability for the HDC-HS700 and HDC-TM700 are yet to be announced. The HS700 records primarily to a 240GB internal hard drive, while the TM700 records primarily to 32GB of internal flash memory. Both camcorders will also include a card slot, compatible with SD, SDHC, and the new SDXC memory cards. Panasonic announced its own SDXC cards up to 64GB earlier this year.

See the full photo gallery for the HS700 and TM700.