It's hard to accurately control zooming with a lever or a button, so it often results in overzooming and the zoom direction has to be reversed to correct it. Precise control of the zoom in/out speed and stopping point is much more difficult than most people think.
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The manual ring allows precise fingertip control over the zoom speed and stopping point. It lets you capture the exact images you want.
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*This is an actual, edited image recorded by a Panasonic HD camcorder (HDC-SD100)