ProVideo Coalition.com: Camera Log by Adam Wilt | Founder | Pro Cameras, HDV Camera, HD Camera, Sony, Panasonic, JVC, RED, Video Camera Reviews

The Z7 itself is a minimalist camera: the lens and lens hood are more than half the package:

HVR-Z7, with and without its lens

Indeed, the lens hood, like that on the EX1, has a little nubbin on the bottom to keep the front-heavy assembly from nosing over.

The Z7’s primary operating controls are arranged on the left side and on the top, where they’re easily accessible.

Everything you need to fiddle with that isn’t lens-related is right here

The top of the body, underneath the handle, has shot-transition and focus-marking buttons. A slide switch with locking “off” position controls camera and VTR-mode power. Six assignable buttons, three with default assignments, reside along the front and top edges of the left side, while a cluster of pushbuttons along the bottom edge handle shutter speed, gain, and white-balance controls.

Behind the exposure controls, nicely separated by a raised nub, lie the menu, picture profile, and status check buttons, along with the menu-setting thumbwheel (which is also used for shutter speed selection). A stiff (thus unlikely to be moved accidentally) slide switch controls the full-auto/manual mode of the camcorder.

A flip-down door with a magnetic latch covers the audio auto/manual switches and the gain pots, keeping them safe from accidental adjustment but providing ready access when needed.

Peek-a-boo audio controls exposed

The control layout works very well and I soon found I was able to operate and configure the camera naturally, without hunting or fumbling. Having all the controls on the left, as opposed to distributed between the left and the rear as on the Z1 or the EX1, made menu and profile changes a lot faster; I could keep the camera to my eye and not have to shift my position to access the menus.

Transport, playback volume, and display controls reside atop the carrying handle, as they do on the HVR-Z1.

Transport controls are revealed when the LCD is flipped open

There’s also the usual top-mounted start/stop trigger with locking collar, and a secondary zoom rocker. The zoom rocker has the usual “off” and “fixed” settings, but also offers full variable zoom control (albeit without quite the same fineness of control as the larger, lens-mounted rocker) Why don’t all cameras have this?

The supplied ECM-XM1 microphone clips into a quick-release shock mount beside the transport controls, atop a pod containing the dual XLR inputs with rear-mounted line/mic/48v phantom power selector switches. The pod also has an input selector, routing each input to its own channel, or sending input 1 to both channels, letting you record a single input at two different levels.

Analog and FireWire doors open, cassette ejected

All I/O ports are concealed behind flip-open doors. On the left side, an HDMI connector allows connection to an HDMI monitor or HDMI capture card. On the right the camera offers six-pin i.Link (much more robust than the fragile four-pin connector); multipin connectors for component, composite, and Y/C video and analog audio (cables provided offer all of the above except Y/C, for which an optional cable must be purchased), LANC remote control, and a headphone jack.

The battery nestles in a cavity in the rear, deep enough to hold a high-capacity NP-F970. When using AC power, a battery eliminator plate with attached cable snaps into the same place. If you attach the supplied MRC1 CF card recorder (discussed below), it covers the battery compartment and must be removed when changing batteries. Fortunately this isn’t a frequent occurrence; the supplied F570 battery is good for nearly three hours of operation, and the F960 I used easily ran the camera for a full day of on-again, off-again docco work, with power to spare.

Tapes slide horizontally into a vertical transport sticking angularly out the rear of the right side; there’s simply no place else left on this compact camera to put the tape transport! There’s also a Memory Stick Duo slot on the top right panel, just in front of the tape compartment; the Memory Stick can be used for grabbing still pix.

The camera handles very well for a 5+ pound Handycam; it’s nicely balanced, and while it’s not as light in the hand as an HVR-V1 or a PD150/170, the handgrip is well enough contoured and close enough to the camera’s lateral center of gravity that it doesn’t feel unnaturally side-heavy. Operating for twenty minutes at a stretch wasn’t a problem, though I’d probably want some sort of support for longer takes.

The camera comes well equipped with the usual accessories, such as an extra-large eyecup, a shoulder strap, a battery, and a tape. The AC adapter handles two batteries, and has a status display that tells you the charge level and the time left to charge the current battery; you cycle through status displays at the push of a button.

Charging the supplied F570 battery as well as an F960

There are other thoughtful touches, too. The rear of the carry handle has a 1/4x20 tapped hole for mounting accessories, but the Z7 comes with a shoe mount you can screw down in its place. By the same token, the front-mounted accessory shoe is a separate piece. You can leave it off if you don’t need it, or you can remove it when you take the lens hood off, so that you can mount a big matte box and still have access to the filter slots from the top.

When you yank the lens hood, you can yank the accessory shoe too, making room for bulky matte boxes

Overall, the HVR-Z7 is a very pleasant camera to operate. It handholds naturally, its controls are well placed, and its viewfinder displays are the best around. Zooming and focusing are smooth and consistent, and while the viewfinder could show more detail for critical focusing, it’s still the sharpest available in this class of camera (while the EX1’s LCD is more detailed, its EVF is inferior).