Quick Review Camcorders : JVC GR-DX77

The celebrity line of camcorders from JVC flaunts the manufacturer’s dominance in overall picture quality, and the JVC GR-D77 is a prime example. The one-pound compact camcorder is designed for demanding consumers who want excellent manual and automatic controls, good picture quality in all lighting, and features to make their camcorder look like a celebrity. The JVC GR-D77 answers with all the bells and whistles for a suggested retail price of $599.95, or about $450 on the street.

The JVC GR-D77 has been a popular buy. Perhaps it’s due to the 2.5-inch color LCD, or maybe it’s the 12x optical zoom lens. More likely, it’s because of the image quality in both light and dark places that shows the versatility of the camcorder. With its 1/6-inch 680K CCD, the JVC GR-D77 performed well in bright light. Colors were accurate, but surprisingly not as vibrant as its younger sibling, the JVC GR-D72. The 77 earns back its bragging rights, though, with its low-light performance. At 60 lux, the overall image brightness and color representation is great — certainly better than most camcorders. There is some noise and grain because of the automatic gain control. At a darker 15 lux, the picture is very similar to the previous low-light test. There is more noise and grain, and the colors take on a brownish hue, but the brightness of the entire image is there.

The automatic function on the JVC GR-D77 certainly does its job. For those users who don’t have the time to adjust the white balance or focus, the D77 takes over and adjusts accurately and reliably. When automatic mode is activated, the entire menu becomes unnecessary. All the user must do is move the zoom toggles, activate the three-bulb LED light on the front if required, and hit the Record button. If consumers want to be more creative, the manual mode provides the access.

In manual mode, users can adjust the shutter speed, white balance, exposure, and focus. Shutter speeds range from 1/60th — 1/4000th of a second. White balance can be adjusted to Auto, Manual, Fine, Cloud, and Halogen. The exposure can be adjusted from -6 to +6. Like many camcorders and cameras on the market, the JVC GR-D77 has several programmed scene settings: Sports, Snow, Spotlight, Twilight, Sepia, Monotone, Classic Film, and Strobe. For still shots, the camcorder can record to either MiniDV tape or the SD card in two resolutions. The Fine quality setting records images at 1024 x 768 and the Standard setting uses a lower 640 x 480 resolution. As an incentive for those tech-savvy users, there is an MPEG4 mode that records in 160 x 120 for easy-to-email videos.

Along with the 12x optical zoom, the JVC GR-D77 also has 40x and 700x digital zoom features. These zoom features are the same as the JVC GR-D93, which retails for a hundred bucks more. The .3-inch color viewfinder pulls out from the camcorder body about a half an inch, and the LCD monitor must be tucked away to use it. The JVC GR-D77 also has ports for USB, AV, DC, FireWire/DV, and even a microphone jack. There is no accessory shoe, so a microphone would have to be handheld or placed somewhere else than the top of the camcorder. The built-in stereo microphone isn’t a bad option either. It records in 12- and 16-bit audio. Still looking for more bells and whistles? The JVC GR-D77 has more than a dozen in-camera editing transitions, such as wipes and fades. It also has a digitally manipulated widescreen stretch mode, as well as a 16:9 option that puts black bars on the top and bottom of your screen.

JVC GR-DX77 Compared to the...