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Our media center is looking to buy a few video cameras (both high- and low-quality) for checkout.
We're looking at several Flip cameras for low-res situations like PPT and the web, and a few high-end for DVD production.
Any suggestions on a HD camera? I'm not sure of the budget, but I'd guess about $1,000 or less, since the overall budget is $6,000.
I've always liked Canon for still cameras, due to the quality of the lens. But when it comes to video cameras, I'm fairly clueless.
I know in the past that 3 CCD cameras could be had from Panasonic. Are they more common now? Do any cameras handle low light better than others? Any that compensate for camera movement?
Something I'm not considering?
Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
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Best consumer HD cam on the market right now is the Canon HV30. If you want to save a little more money you can get last year's model the HV20. The main difference is that the HV20 has a 24p mode and the HV30 can shoot 24p and 30p. Also the HV20 is silver and the HV30 is black. They both have the same lens and other specs.
Panasonic makes a 3CCD HD cam but the sensors are so small there is no advantage. The Canon uses CMOS, not CCD, and has gets much better reviews. The HV20 was on almost everyone's HD camcorder of the year last year.
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I have HV20 and it is great. If you want size/convenience over quality, consider one of the camcorders that record on SD cards in AVCHD format.
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I'm looking at these types for an upcoming vaca.
How are any of the ones with built in HDs?
How are the still shots from these devices? Better than my Canon S1 is?
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Music is how we decorate time.”
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So, it sounds like the only potential downside to the HV30 is the tape media. That shouldn't be a problem for us.
Thanks for the info.
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[quote deckeda]I personally don't see tape as much of a downside, and that's coming from a former owner of a camcorder widely known to eat tapes. I still cringe whenever I see the letters "ZR".
I don't know if things have changed, but hard disk camcorders used to be the crappy-ones, with highly-compressed formats instead of the standard, and mostly uncompressed DV format. Ironic, since of course they have the most storage and SHOULD be capable of sustained write speeds necessary for high quality video.
But like I said, maybe the HD cams are different. Anyone care to elaborate?
Still true. The DV/HDV codec compresses video a lot less than the ones used by hard drive, flash memory, and DVD camcorders. Hi-Def just makes it worse given the extra amount of bandwidth HD video requires.
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Having tape is a big advantage, not a disadvantage.
Hard drive and memory card cameras suck.
Yeah, the Canon HV30 or the Sony equivalent HDR-HC9.
Both cameras are very similar, both are very good for cheap cameras.
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I'm sure it's the wrong place to ask this, but I've been very happy with my HV20, and I specifically chose the miniDV format over any of the compressed formats. Plus, the price drops at Christmastime made it comparable to the better SD miniDV camcorders.
My question is this: Is there a painless way to convert edited HDV miniDV footage to AVC HD? Even though I originally didn't want to touch HDV, I am intrigued with the idea of playing these files on my Blu-Ray player. Any searches I do lead me to converting AVC HD to HDV--not the other way around. I know if I bought an AVC HD camcorder I could export to that, but that's not really the answer I'm looking for. Anyone?
