O/T HD Camcorders

Probably not off topic at all Mark considering that people like Tracy, Gaby and Alan (Equinox) are adding a whole new dimension to the forum with their videos. It's inspired me to by a HD Sony Hybrid camera last week (Thanks Kevin 747!). It has a 4mp still camera and an inbuilt GPS that automatically tags your videos to a GPS location (great for travelling). I'm also led to believe that it will load to Google earth to give you a point for each video. It also has the advantage of allowing you to covert downwards from HD to Standard Definition which many of the other brand HD cams won't let you do. From what I am led to believe, HD format will only allow you to record a Blu-ray disc rather than a standard DVD. Most HD cameras only have a shoot in HD or Standard option where the Sony allows a conversion of a video file shot in HD back to standard def. I'll probably be shot down here by those more knowledgable in the subject but that's how it's been explained to me. The camera I've bought is the HDRXR200V. Normally about $2K but on special at Myer and on the net for around $1600.

On the strength of what a few people have said to me I will be buying Sony's Vegas movie studio editing program. If you've seen a few of the video's on this site, some have been done with it. Expect me to be a lot more proficient by the end of the year:-)

Cheers Mick.

Mark,
Great news! We became grandparents 10 months ago, and thought about doing the same - but the endless array of camcorders was something I found confusing.

But the quality of the video and sound off our digital camera is very good - its a Panasonic DMC-TZ15. So we didn't bother with a camcorder - just use the digital camera and burn short videos to CD or bluetooth them to the mobile phones, so you can carry them around.

Cheers
Phil

Hi Mark

I purchased a Canon HV20 with a special set of reasons. Firstly I only wanted a tape drive rather than DVD or hard disk drive. After talking to industry people I found that DVD or hard disk storage is converted immediately to mpeg format and only captures about 9 or 10 frames per second. (some may vary a bit). On a tape drive you will capture in the full 28 frames per second which is normal for video. This allows a lot more tolerance for post production editing.

The same as other cameras you can record in High Definition or standard. What I found was high definition tapes are $35 and standard definition tapes are $5 and to the normal viewer you cannot tell the difference. I just video camping shots on std.

Another big selling point for the Canon HV20 is it can convert old VHS tapes to digital format on the fly directly into your computer so you can digitize all those old video trips. Very few video cameras have this ability.

It also comes with a still camera built in that stores to a storage card. I can also grab still images while I am videoing that get stored to the card - only they are not as good quality as the still camera side can achieve.

David

Like Serendipity, I bought a camcorder that uses tapes. Very convenient to swap tapes for different subjects etc. I chose a Sony HDR-HC7. It also takes 16X9 still photos onto a memory card. One very handy feature is that you can connect to a TV via HDMI and select Slide Show from its Menu and all the still photos appear beautifully on your 16X9 tele.

The current model is the HDR-HC9:

http://www.sony.com.au/product/hdr-hc9e

Nowadays I tend to take just the camcorder on trips with us. It's a beauty.

Now to tackle editing......

Hi Mark

Plenty of advice about cameras so far but only one reply about editing software. I endorse the post that suggested the Sony Vegas Movie Studio product. It comes in many iterations but the Platinum version would be adequate for what you are intending to do.

If you can foresee a time where you might go a little more "professional" then the Sony Vegas Professional editor is an excellent choice (albiet that the cost is significantly higher.)

I use Vegas Pro and the thing I like the most is that it (and the Movie Studio versions) is that they are very intuitive. You can do a lot of things without referring to the help files or the manual.

The software icludes plug-ins to download the clips (events) from your camera, directly into the program. This avoids the need for a third-party application to do this. The camera does not have to be a Sony product for this to work. You can control the camera from within the software.

Other products are similar but in my opinion none match the versatility and price of Sony's products.

Cheers

Russ

Hi, unfortunately I know very little about camcorders, cameras and such, but being a tech head, I have had the opportunity to use a wide variety of video editing recording etc software. To my mind, the most user friendly application that has all the functionality needed for rendering and editing sound and video is Nero.

I do a lot of video recording and rendering and found Nero to be simple and easy to use. it has a great "tips" on start-up section and you can select to have tips shown as you go through each process. It also as a great instruction on hover as you place mouse pointer over clickable buttons.

The only downside, and this goes for most good video rendering applications, is that it is quite system resource intensive, you will need a decent PC to run it although on saying that, my parents run it on a little Toshiba laptop with a little patience. The key is RAM. Their laptop is a dual core 1.8GHz intel running 2GB RAM.

tip to buying Nero, buy it from Nero online in downloadable version. You wont get the manual, but you will pay less than from a retail outlet here in Aus.

Hope this helps.

Having put up with tape-based VideoCam for years, I bought a second-hand HardDisk Videocam.

The advantages are -

- no more worries about cue-ing the tape to make sure you don't over-record a previous recording - just start recording, even if you were just watching something recorded two hours ago.

- you don't have to stop to change a tape after 90 minutes

- see a video directory of all recordings you've made.

- instantly jump to any recording.

- quickly download digitally from camera to harddisk for backup or editing.

Preface - if you get bored with the following (or cant follow it) skip to the last 2 paragraphs and have a look at some videos we have shot on a JVC GZ-HD6.

At the moment guys there is no easy answer to the question as to which hard disk video camera. Two things have happened to consumer cameras over recent years - they have made them "dumber" and they have often shifted to proprietary & incompatible codec's.

By dumber I mean:
- they have removed a lot of the switches and replaced them with a joystick, which is a completely useless way of controlling iris and focus and audio levels
- at the peak of DV (the older common tape based format) there were higher end cameras that were very very good in terms of their optics quality, image sensors & processing, functionality and inclusions - eg the Panasonic NV-MX300 or Sony TRV900. I have yet to find an equivalent in the HD range without going to professional cameras ($5k +).
- they have removed the eyepiece viewfinders. Flip out LCD's are great but not much chop in full sunlight.
- many have image stabilisers that can't be turned off. This gives a jerk at the start of a panning shot as the stabiliser confuses the movement.

Re the codecs I mean:
- The compression and file formats used are often only able to be played back using the camera's software. Sometimes the codecs are standard (eg MPEG2 or MPEG4) but they use a dumb proprietary file wrapper that requires installation of software to play (eg - .TOD files from JVC cams). Why they cant all use .MOV or .AVI wrappers is beyond me (perhaps licensing).
-There is no one single cross-compatible format as there was with DV tape, although they are making a bit of a push with AVC-HD (MPEG4 based)
- This can restrict you in terms of what software you can use for editing and display of the recorded files. You really want to be able to play the files straight back in Quicktime, or the very highly recommended VLC Media Player (forget Windows Media Player folks).

So how do you choose one? Look through some manufacturer websites for models that appear to have the features you want, then do a google search on the model number and the word codec and look for forum postings where people may have had problems getting files to play in other software packages. If there isn't an easy answer to their queries then perhaps avoid their world of pain.

Also look for reviews on the models. Again a web search or some light reading such as the Australian Which Camcorder magazine.

What do I use - well, at work (I teach broadcast TV at uni and previously worked for networks) we have a pile of JVC GY-HD251E HDV (tape based) camcorders. These are considered at the bottom of the broadcast spectrum, with a list price of $17,000 odd, but we have had very good results with these and I am currently building an HD OB truck based around this model.

But for consumer stuff or shots where we don't want to risk a $16k camera, we are using a JVC GZ-HD6 hard disk camera. These are at the top of JVC's range of consumer cameras but still suffer some of the shortcomings above. Particularly the joystick and stabiliser issues. However it's MPEG2 based .TOD files can actually be played back easily in Quicktime based editors (almost all) or VLC once you have loaded their codec from the website or supplied disk. And the image results aren't too bad.

Have a look at the Simpson Desert videos and the Stockton Beach on our youtube channel as these were shot on the GZ. Make sure to click on the HD button and then the fullscreen button to see it in youtube's 1280x720 resolution (good broadband connection required). Most of this was shot by family members with no formal camera training (I go on holidays to get away from video). Judge the results yourself. For editing I use Apple's Final Cut Pro, but Vegas & Premiere are also more than capable enough at this level. A cheaper alternative is iMovie but you have to buy a Mac to get it. Most of the edit software supplied with the cameras is awful (IMHO) but then I am used to professional features.

Cheers - Pat

Thanks so much for all the reply's, my knowledge of camcorders has increased significantly and I am now madly researching all the different makes and features.

Regards

Mark