I can only help you with part two parts of you questions. First when you shoot the Varicam at 24fps/59.94 hz the time code is automatically in the non drop frame mode. Since the audio files and the offline are at 29.97 you should have no problem matching the time code. To get the movie on to HD CAM is a problem you should consult a post house over. It would be a shame to take the footage and squash it into HD CAM. A better solution would to up convert the finished film from a 720p master to 1080p/24 onto D5. From the D5 you can make any format.
The reason why there is so little Panasonic support in you area is simple supply and demand. Sony has saturated the market with HD CAM decks.
Rob Bullard
http://www.varicamrental.com
osprey.hd@verizon.net
