Buying a Camcorder

[MahiMike]

Our old tape camcorder bit the dust and I need to replace it. I'm looking for suggestions that meet the following criteria.

- Must have a good zoom to get my son's LJ-like moves from the sidelines
- Must be able to work with Microsoft Movie Maker (for my daughter the aspiring director)
- Must have plenty of storage (enough to record 1 hour game)
- Must be editable (out of 60 minutes, proably on 10 minutes is worth keeping)

Which is better, hard drives, DVD or small DVD? I don't have a DVD burner and working with a laptop at home.

Thanks for your help.

[SLAG]

Our old tape camcorder bit the dust and I need to replace it. I'm looking for suggestions that meet the following criteria.

- Must have a good zoom to get my son's LJ-like moves from the sidelines
- Must be able to work with Microsoft Movie Maker (for my daughter the aspiring director)
- Must have plenty of storage (enough to record 1 hour game)
- Must be editable (out of 60 minutes, proably on 10 minutes is worth keeping)

Which is better, hard drives, DVD or small DVD? I don't have a DVD burner and working with a laptop at home.

Thanks for your help.


For the best deals Check Ebay - I got a $700 Camcorder for $250- Best deal I ever got on ebay

does your laptop have a firewire (IEEE 1392) Port- if not you would need to get a PCMCIA Firewire Port for your Laptop to do the video editing on the lappy-

I would also reccomend purchacing a DVD burner as they are now so inexpensive-

My reccomendation for Media is MINI DV - its all digital easy to edit and easy to Transfer Via Microsoft Movie Maker to DVD

for the best video quality Choose a camera that has " 3CCD "

Anyway just my 2 Cents

Good luck

[Fire Me Boy!]

FOr media, definitely go MiniDV. Slag is right on the 3 CCDs -- basically, you're dealing with a sensor that turns the light from the lens into information... cheap cameras use one CCD for all light -- meaning it's using a 3/4-inch CCD for red, blue and green light. A 3 CDD camera used three 3/4-inch CCDs, using one for each color of light. Better image quality.

Get a miniDV camera and use the firewire port. Any questions, I'll be happy to help, just PM me or put it here.

[Fire Me Boy!]

What kind of $$$ are you looking to spend?

Also, the zoom feature... the bigger the OPTICAL zoom the better. Digital zoom does nothing besides make the pixels bigger, meaning distortion of the video. Don't be led astray by a camcorder that touts 110x zoom... it sucks if it's 10x optical and 110x digital.

Furthermore, don't buy a camera made by a non-camera company. HP makes damn fine printers. Their cameras suck. Likewise, Canon rocks the camera world. Stay away from their printers.

[MahiMike]

Thanks for the input. I'm looking to spend around $500-$700. I just want to make sure I get latest (as possible) technology. Don't want it to be obsolete for at least a couple years.

[Fire Me Boy!]

Thanks for the input. I'm looking to spend around $500-$700. I just want to make sure I get latest (as possible) technology. Don't want it to be obsolete for at least a couple years.
I've had my Canon XL1 miniDV (admittedly, more camera than you need or are willing to spend for) since 1998. I wouldn't trade it for any prosumer model out there. MiniDV isn't going anywhere any time soon. Unless you can find something with a hard drive rig that doesn't compress the hell out of your video (probably a LOT more than you're willing to spend) go with miniDV. It's cheap and good.

I've said more than once on this board that you get two of the three -- fast, cheap or good. Pick two. If you want fast and good, it ain't gonna be cheap. If you want cheap and good, it'll be slow. The firewire process is slow -- real time. If you shoot an hour of video, it'll take an hour to put it into the computer. But it's cheap and high quality.

For under $700 you can get something that is good enough. If you want to double that (under $1500), you can find a used Canon XL1 with low hours on eBay and have a camera your daughter will be able to use when she starts making movies! The original XL1 (now they've got the XL1S, XL2, XL-H1) is still after a decade the camera of choice for independent filmmakers.

[gblowfish]

All the advice here has been spot on.
Mini DV is the way to go, CCD camera (3 chip) also is the way to go.
Canon makes wonderful camcorders, but the XL or GL series is way over $1000.

I bought a Panasonic camcorder a couple years ago that has a 3-chip CCD processor, and I've been very happy with it.

Digital zooms are worthless. Also, get a good tripod. It makes a world of difference in shooting stable videos.

[dtebbe]

I was looking for the same features you are, and I went with the Canon Elura 100 (Under $400) and it is just awesome. Compact, great video quality, good low-light performance (something you give up with a 3CCD camera) and great battery life. Works great with windows movie maker, and Nero's software as well. I almost spent twice as much on a Panasoic 3CCD unit, but I'm really glad I didn't. I cut my vids on my PC and then dump them to DVD, and the quality is "DVD" quality. You'd never know it was shot with a $350 camcorder.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/productDetail.do?oid=144926

DT

[Fire Me Boy!]

(something you give up with a 3CCD camera)

That's complete and total BS. It has to do with the CCD's sensitivity and lens. And for the record, Canon cameras generally are good low-light performers. If the lens f/stop only goes down to 3.5 on the Panasonic and the Elura goes to f2.8, obviously it'll perform better in low light.

There is also a good chance that the cheaper cameras (like the Elura) artificially "brightens" the image, fooling you into thinking it's a better low-light performer. The only way to really tell how it performs is to look at the "lux" sensitivity of the CCD.

[Fire Me Boy!]

All the advice here has been spot on.
Of course it's been spot on. :harumph:

[kepp]

You probably can't go too wrong with any of Canon's models. I have had a ZR-something...maybe a ZR-600...for a few years and it performs great. I also have a friend with one of the XL models and it, of course, is great.