Customer Reviews

Panasonic HDC-TM90K 3D Compatible Camcorder with 16GB Internal Flash Memory (Black)

5 star:		(59)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Length:: 0:37 Mins

The video is a test of stabilization of on then off then on again up to 60x while balancing the camera on my car door.

I was looking for quality, optical zoom power, and stabilization at high power when I found this camera.

The higher priced Sony and Canon models have lower optical zoom of 10x or 12x compared to this one of 26x. Up to 40x still looks superb. The zoom is fast and variable.

Has great stabilization and an icon to touch that really locks on and holds the subject still. No more tripod needed in most cases. Also the AF lock will hold moving objects in focus when touching the LCD monitor.

You don't need a wide angle attachment either with the 28mm lens. Also, the lens with 1.8 gathers plenty of light.

It has a manual/auto control button on the camera body.

I will use this at outdoor events and anything of interest. Videos look professional with the stability.

The battery is good for at least an hour of video with on and off shooting.

Stills are good enough quality for me at 5mp.

There are 6 quality settings available depending on your computers processing power.

So far I haven't found anything bad about it other than it doesn't come with any features like high speed, time lapse or auto record.

I've had this camera for a couple of weeks and have a mixed opinion. Here is a summary of both the good and bad.

Pros:

1) So far the video quality is mostly very good (but see aqua green color issue).

2) Image stabilization feature seams to work very well.

3) Very responsive controls (such as when switching modes, etc.)

4) Small and usable form factor.

5) Low-light is better than expected (if not zooming too much). This is much better than my old CANON HF100.

6) Battery life seams good.

Cons:

1) About 10 to 20 percent of photos and video have an aqua green tint to the entire scene or just white/grey portions of a scene. For example, in the white portion of a game jersey. It's not all the time, but for me, it's just a little too frequent. This is the biggest issue for me with this camcorder. (- 1.5)

2) PRE-RECORD active icon is in middle of screen. This makes it difficult to see someones face (for example). Either there needs to be a clear display button or the icon needs to be moved to the edge. (- .5)

3) noticeable but minor fan noise both while recording and in the clip (much more than my canon though)

4) Left Touch menu pops up when initially opening the LCD. Feels like it's in the way when you want to start recording. It should default to the minimized state. (minor)

5) Touch controls arrows operate backwards for me (i.e. press right and it goes the left menu page) (minor)

6) Battery sticks out just a little making it slightly uncomfortable to get to record button. (minor)

I'm ended up returning due to the aqua green color issue. I tried an exchange first but that unit exhibited the same problem. It was not an easy decision with so many good things going for this camera, especially with the image stabilization and low light performance. I will continue with my older canon for now. I would definitely repurchase if the aqua green is ever resolved. If your okay with an occasional misfire of aqua green then definitely consider this camera.

My Panasonic HDC-SD5 died after 3+ years, and I decided to get this unit as a replacement. I've only had it a few days and will post a follow up, but initial impressions are very good. It is small - really small, smaller than the SD-5. This is generally good, though operation has taken a little getting used to. If you have hands like Andre the Giant, this could be a problem. The images from the 1080p are breathtaking, though I am a little worried about what I am going to do with all these huge data streams (I don't as of yet have the software to edit these files). I haven't really had a chance to compare the various AVCHD bit rate formats to check quality. That will take a little time and I would welcome any suggestions or feedback from others.

The layout is generally an improvement over my earlier camcorder. You don't have to remove the battery to charge; the camera comes on automatically when you open the LCD and the touch screen, once you get used to it, is pretty intuitive. I'm working my way through the various menus and settings, but honestly, the iA (intelligent automatic) delivers such solid results, I haven't experimented too much. The zoom and stabilization system really blew me away - the range, sharpness and stability when you are zoomed in vastly exceeds my earlier camera. It masks almost all hand shake - unbelievable really.

Haven't taken many still shots - I don't really think that is what these are cameras are for personaly. Images are better than the SD-5 (which isn't saying much), but not better than a good point and shoot.

Negatives thus far I suppose would be that I worry about having only a touch screen interface in bright light conditions - it may be hard to see what I am doing. There may be a non-touch screen control option, but I haven't located it yet. The manual is not extraordinarily helpful - big surprise there, right?

Overall, I'm very pleased. I'm off on a vacation and will try to really give battery, etc. a work out and then follow up.

Happy shopping!

This is a small camcorder that has a big clear picture. Coming from DV and moving to HD has made all my DV movies look outdated! The TM90K Has a lot of options but is easy to use.

The TM90K's touch screen layout is easy to use and the menus do not get in the way of the recording. The Panasonic menus are selected from a column on the left side of the screen so you can still see the image you are shooting and it has large enough buttons that are easy to select. On a different brand named HD camcorder I tried out, the menu selections were so small that my finger would consistently choose the option either above or below the one I was trying to choose, also there was another brand named touch screen HD camcorder that i looked at, when bringing up the on screen menus, it would darken the picture on the screen and overlay the options across the darkened screen.

This camcorder works great as a point and shoot as the full auto mode is quick to focus, adjusting the white balance, and removes hand shakes very well. If your looking for more control, there are some preset scene selections to choose from in certain conditions(Sports, Portrait, Spotlight, Snow, Beach, Fireworks, Night Scenery...), as well as separate adjustment controls for white balance, shutter speed, IRIS and focus. One fun setting to play with is smile shot. When enabled, the TM90K will take a still shot of a detected smiling face automatically while its recording in the movie mode.

A little bit about HD recording settings. Basically the higher the resolution, the more space it takes on your memory card and this results in less time that you have to record on a card. I know it sounds simple, but it is important to remember when selecting full 1080/60p recording mode.

For viewing the movies and photos from the camcorder there is a HDMI port and a composite jack to hook up to your TV or projector or whatever.... For moving files to other media, the TM90K offers a direct burn to DVD/BD if you have a stand alone recorder that accepts a USB input. It also connects to a computer via USB.

imovie (mac only) will recognize this camera and will import the media files. The TM90K also has a special iframe movie recording mode that is made just for imovie. The HD movie files are .mts files and can be played back with the free VLC media player that can be downloaded from the web.

There is software that comes with the camcorder for editing movies in Windows and it supports all versions of xp, vista and 7 only. No support for 2000, NT or below. I have found software on the web that you can purchase and download to edit and convert .mts files. Remember to backup your files before you play around with them!!!

My settings and what I do with the TM90K's HD movie files:

I record in the "HG1920" quality AVCHD mode.

I like to use a program called "MTS converter for Mac" to convert the .mts movie files using the divx HD codec for quicktime. I use the following settings: Resolution 1280x720, Frame rate 30p or 60p bitrate 8000 or 12000, Audio - encoder mp3 at 44800MHZ at 168 kps. you may need to play with the settings a little to see what will play back on your computer smoothly. divx is also a free download. I paid $35 for MTS converter and i am using quicktime pro 7 to edit my movies and set in chapter markers before sending them to idvd to burn a standard DVD. I backup on an external Drive the .mts files and the divx movie files.

This is an amazing little camera. It's small and light, I always kept it in my pocket while on vacation.

Strengths:

1) Size and weight - it fits into a jeans pocket. You can always have it with you, and not even feel it.

2) Amazing quality, crystal clear image.

3) Great still image camera. Usually they are not good on camcorders, in this one that's not the case. Not like an SLR, but very good nevertheless.

4) Great image stabilization, even at top (40x) optical magnification.

5) Top AVCHD quality is fantastic - I made blu-ray AVCHD disks with a blu-ray burner (with software that came with camera), and they are fantastic. Around 3 hour capacity in single layer, 6 hour on double-layer blu ray. Built in memory (16GB) is good for around 3 hours, I also had an external 16GB SD card for another 3 hours (get class 6 SD).

6) I saw no difference between top AVCHD (which is apparently 1080i60) and 1080p60 modes. If you record sport events, you may see it, I don't know. Note that 1080p60 is not compatible with blu-ray, but you can always convert it to AVCHD. Conversion using just your computer is DEAD slow, but the software will ask you to use the camera as an external processor. Use it. If you record in AVCHD (which I recommend), no conversion is necessary. Most blu-ray players sold today (90%?) support AVCHD.

7) You can also burn regular DVDs using the provided software, and that also looks very good on a DVD player with upconverter, but of course not as good as blu-ray. DVD capacity (single layer) is around 1.5 hours or so. Double layer DVD 3 hours. If you record AVCHD to a single layer DVD to be played on a blu-ray player, capacity will be around half an hour, so it's an inexpensive way to distribute shorter HD videos. I judged quality on my 52" LCD HD TV.

As for the comments about greenish color... You may see it in really low light, greenish or bluish, the kind of conditions that my 6 year old, then top of the line ($800) consumer camera (Panasonic PV-GS250) would have noise all over. I assure you it's a non-issue, one has to be really picky to even notice that.

I am very happy with this camcorder. I am new to video cameras but not computers. the video quality is very good and of all the video cameras I looked at this one has the best controls. I purchased a canon first but it got so hot after only 10 minutes I returned it. The canon only shot in 1080i. I bought this one and shot a test video in 1080p and plugged in the camera to my panasonic 1080p 50 inch hd tv with a mini hdmi and was amazed at the video quality especially outdoor shooting. This camera doesn't heat up near as bad as the canon but it does get warm. I won't go into everything else covered in the other reviews but I will just add this. Even though this camera shoots in 1080p 60 fps, the only programs that will render video at this setting are very expensive. The cheapest I found is sony vegas pro, and that program is almost 600.00. What I do is use a lower setting in the camera then edit the recording with Corel videostudio pro x4. You can download a 30 day trial of sony vegas pro and also corel videostudio pro x4 from sony and corel and see for yourself. I have gotten good results even at the lower camera settings with the corel program. The problem with cheaper software video editing programs is they only render 30 fps. Sony vegas pro does 60fps. The corel program is only 49.00 on their website. The Corel program is very user friendly and the Sony vegas pro is not. Get this camera and try for yourself. I record in hx 1920 and edit with Corel and the video looks very good on my big screen. You will like the editing tools in Corel also. Until the cheaper video editing programs start rendering in 60 fps, This is the only drawback for me with a full 1080p camera like this. That aside I have gotten great results with this camera.

Have been using this camcorder for couple of weeks. And i am really happy with it.

Pros:

a) 28 mm wide angle (This is very helpful shooting indoors)

b) 26 x optical zoom

c) good low light performance

d) good audio capture

Cons:

a) HD AE 3.0 Writer is not upto the mark. (It wont' work Windows 7 64-bit Enterprise edition). (I.e. crashes when u select 'copy to pc' icon in toolbar) and down-conversion (e.g. to 480p) functionality is not good (i.e. interlacing artifacts can be seen)

Notes:

Be aware that 1080/60p requires higher end CPU to playback on PC. However, I am playing the video files on WD Media player. and down-conversion can be done easily by HandBrake (if you need to)

Got the unit 2 days ago when the price was lower. The first thing I noticed about the unit was how small it is. Tiny. This is my first tapeless camcorder. I'm very impressed. I have a MAC desktop and laptop and my worry was getting footage into iMovie and Final Cut Pro. My worries were erased. Both apps welcomed the footage with open arms. And what footage it is....simply beautiful. The main feature I wanted was an external mic imput. This unit has it. Mini HDMI output is really sweet. Fancy face and smile reconition features that I may use at some point. The touch screen is very intuitive. I was shooting video right out of the box. The still picture mode takes pics that rivals my Canon Power Shot in quality. The manual is a little thick but clearly written (to me). No desire to get the optional 3D attachment at this time. Not sure what Canon, Sony, and JVC have in this price range but it better be good to compete with this. I'll give it 4 stars because of some minor nicpicking on my part, but overall, very happy.

This is an amazing camcorder! This is my first experience with an AVCHD camcorder and I'm loving it. When hooked up to my 1080P television playback is incredible. I did notice the Wind cut feature did not work well on a very windy day (I didn't think it would that day).

Here is a list of potential issues.

1. The camcorder recording at 1080P/60fps is not natively supported by iMovie.

2. You must have a PC or Mac that is capable of supporting this camcorder. With the included software my older PC (AMD X2 64 3800+ 2GB RAM) will not play the 1080P/60fps movies clearly. My video card is not an issue, it's the processor.

3. The included software only runs on PC and not MAC.

4. Panasonic does not include a mini hdmi to standard hdmi cable.

5. If you want a simple camcorder that creates .mp4 or .mov files, this is not the camcorder for you. Get a pocket camera that shoots 720p.

iMovie with 1080i highest quality output to .mov is pretty good. Windows Movie Maker (Windows 7) exporting at 1440 x 1080 is better quality. I've only had this a few days but I can't wait to read other reviews. If you own this camcorder, please post a review.

I rated this a 4 because of the issues listed above. My next purchase will be a new PC.

I just used my new HDC-TM90 on a two-week trip in Utah and Arizona.

The good: The camcorder size is great to take on hikes, and could fit in the pocket of my pants. I took it in some rough spots, and it handled the jostling without a problem. The 40x intelligent zoom worked perfectly even in high winds and without a tripod, due to the excellent stabilization - shaking was never an issue in the video. Color reproduction and sharpness of the video were very good. The low light capability was excellent. Battery life was excellent. The memory size of the video (I recorded in AVCHD Type A) was very reasonable, I needed about 48GB for two weeks, which is exactly the total of my 32GB card and the 16GB internal memory. The HD Writer AE software is ok for very basic editing (selecting and trimming of scenes, and basic titles).

The not so good: I did not take a stills camera with me, relying instead on the camcorder for 5MP stills. Unfortunately, the quality of the photos was quite horrendous, very unsharp, as if processed through some artistic filter. In potraits, the background looked as if painted. The video/photo switch was hard to operate. The HDC can take photos while in video mode, but the quality of those was even worse. So, no, this HDC will NOT replace even a $200 point&shoot camera. The sky was a challenge for both video and stills. Depending on the composition, a choice had to be made between well-exposed sky, or well-exposed landscape or subject. A CPL filter should help (I just ordered one), although the 41.5mm threads don't make finding one that easy (I had to get a 41.5 to 52 mm adapter - i first tried the 46 mm one, but it obstructs the view at the wide angle setting). Camera_ace on ebay has those adapters, and will shortly offer a 41.5mm UV filter. In my opinion, some sort of filter is a must in dusty environments, as the HDC's automatic lens cover starts hanging up at the first sign of dust. I had to constantly help it open or close by hand. Finally, the manual focus control would have been far more handy with dedicated buttons, instead of going through menus; and wind noise was a significant problem in the recorded video, even though the wind noise filter was always on when recording. Overall, a great video camcorder with no photo capability, so don't forget to bring your camera along.