Panasonic has introduced the AJ-SPC700, an affordable shoulder-mounted camcorder for electronic news gathering. The camera uses three 2/3-inch IT CCDs with 520,000 pixels and operates in both 25 Mbit/s DVCPRO/DV and 50 Mbit/s 4:2:2 DVCPRO50. Recording is to P2 cards.
The AJ-SPC700 switches between 4:3 and 16:9, provides 750-line resolution and has a sensitivity of F11 at 2,000 lux. Five P2 slots provide 160 minutes of recording in DVCPRO or 80 minutes in DVCPRO50 when fitted with the new 8 GB P2 cards scheduled for the fourth quarter. Panasonic says the camcorder will launch in September 2005 for US$12,995.
