It is a fixed-body camera that maintains the Panasonic tradition of the highest image and build quality. It boasts a 3-megapixel, full HD, 1080p resolution and a new feature: Variable Image Quality on a Specified area (VIQS).
4.5/5
Good:
Bad:
Panasonic has a long, rich history of producing cameras of the utmost build quality that produce extremely high-quality images. It has embraced IP. Since the early 2000s there has been a conveyor belt of product entering the market.
Every new product has brought improvements and enhancements, ensuring Panasonic remains at the top echelon of the market, in terms of brute quality. Its latest flagship product is the WV-SP509, in their fixed-body range. The camera keeps the silver aesthetic design, which will keep architects and end users happy — nobody likes a garish camera on display!
The camera has a list of modern features including a 3-megapixel sensor (full HD, 1080p resolution), Power-over-Ethernet, audio in/out, video motion detection, memory card recording (including support for the new SDXC standard), and the cherry at the top of the cake, Variable Image Quality on a Specified area (VIQS), a bandwidth reduction feature. With all of these features, how does the camera fare?
3-megapixel, full HD, 1080p resolution
The image quality of the camera is fantastic. Every image is smooth and detailed, and the colours are vibrant and vivid. Facial features are incredibly visible, as is the grain in wood. All activity within our office environment was captured, even if objects were exchanged between hands!
With the resolution of its image being so high, the camera let us digitally zoom in without losing quality. I found that with a 4x digital zoom I could read words on a pen in my hands without blur!
The camera also has face detection built in (for use with the WJ-NV200 recording and the WJ-NV20F business intelligence software). The resolution of this camera makes it perfect for viewing faces, since the image quality is so good.
IR cut filter
Fixed body cameras are extremely flexible little beasts. They are used both internally and externally (in housings). Rather than have umpteen models to achieve this, Panasonic has included an IR cut filter here. When used externally the WV-SP509 is compatible with IR lighting (both 850nm and 940nm). IR lighting really adds value to external systems. A compatible camera is not only a bonus, it is becoming a necessity. Points for the SP509 here!
Variable Image Quality on a Specified area (VIQS)
Having higher and higher resolutions is great because our pictures are so detailed. However, if we raise the quality then we also increase the need for higher bandwidth networks, since higher image resolutions need higher bandwidths. With this in mind, Panasonic has developed VIQS, a nifty feature that allows us to identify two separate areas within our picture and then adjust the picture quality based on what we want to see.
Imagine we have an area, such as an entrance, museum, or office. Within that area we have one or more hot spots (where more activity happens, or there is more likelihood that something will happen). For our entrance, one spot might be a door. For the museum, two spots might be a walkway and a painting. For the office one might be a walkway near desks.
We can reduce the image resolution of areas outside of these hot spots, such as ceilings and the periphery of our picture, and can maintain the resolution in these hotspots to ensure we capture anything that happens in them. The result is that our bandwidth is reduced, our storage is reduced, and the total cost of the system is reduced! Panasonic claims that if you reduce the non-hot spot areas down to VGA resolution (keeping the hot spot area at 3-megapixel resolution), then the bandwidth and storage is reduced by as much as 25%!
Additional features
The camera also has some great additional features: It supports PoE (class 2), Audio in/out (full duplex audio), 3x terminal alarm inputs and 1x terminal alarm output. Perhaps the best extra features it the support for SDXC. Most cameras support up to 32GB on the SDHC standard. This is very good for emergency or backup recording. However, with more and more focus on edge recording, coupled with ever increasing image resolutions, a 32GB capacity can be filled up rather quickly.
SDXC is a standard that allows for up to 2TB storage per memory card — more than my laptop hard drive! At the time of this review, the SP509 supports 64GB SDXC cards. We can expect, with firmware releases (and more SDXC cards on the market), that this capacity to be expanded all the way up to 2TB — that is like having an NVR built into the camera!
The verdict
With all the jargon talk in the industry, we can often lose sight of what a camera is all about — an image! The most important feature of any camera is how good an image it produces. In the case of the Panasonic WV-SP509, the image is a very, very good one. We know that Panasonic builds very reliable products.
Every feature that Panasonic puts into its products, it does well. Image quality is very good. (It makes use of H.264 high profile.) It provides us with bandwidth control via VIQS, it offers SDXC as a form of future-proofing the product for systems use, and it offers a good number of terminal alarms. It’s a great collection of features. If I were to identify what is missing on the camera, the biggest thing would be video analytics. Within the last two years, the number of analytics available has increased massively. Even more important, their accuracy is much better.
Panasonic includes video motion detection on all its cameras. As a standard, that lags behind the times. It is far too dumb and inaccurate. Panasonic’s main competitors have onboard analytics (either in-house or via third-party integration), which makes its cameras more intelligent and useful than a simple point-and-shoot device.
Analytics will soon become a necessity that systems are built around. Devices that do not contain analytics, such as Panasonic cameras, will not be used. For out-and-out image quality, reliability and features that work, the SP509 is as good as anything I have tested. The quality of its audio is good. Its image quality is excellent, and its menu is simple to use and configure.
It is one of the highest-quality fixed cameras I have managed to get my hands on. If it had Video analytics then it probably would have been awarded 5/5.
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