I am in the market to buy a HD camcorder this year. I want better pixs this year of my display. I know I need manual controls to make it work properly. What is everyone using and what do you recommend.
thanks in advance
Don C. http://www.hearthelights.com
melwelch wrote: Do not buy a DVD disc base camcorder.... DVD rot over time and is not a good long term storage.
Could you expand on this a little? I've been under the impression that DVD's were as good a storage media as CD's. How do they rot? Thanks.
____________________ Dear, please stop referring to me as "the mad scientist"... How many times do I have to remind you I'm NOT a scientist! http://www.clearwaterlights.org
I too have been looking to buy a camcorder and have not decided on one particular one yet. I know of the DVD (and CD) issue, but tape also has its disavantages. One of the major ones is how long will tape be around given that the industry is moving to the memory style CCs. I've been looking at the Cannon, Sony and Panasonic lines. I've looked at the video on websites such as youtube and others that have done "tests" using different brands and models. Boy am I confused as to which one to buy. I've been reading the reviews, but I find that they just confuse me more and I don't know which ones to trust (especially with MY money).
What brands have you been looking at and do you have a favorite one?
Thanks for the link Mel. I was completely unaware.
____________________ Dear, please stop referring to me as "the mad scientist"... How many times do I have to remind you I'm NOT a scientist! http://www.clearwaterlights.org
I bought a Canon 1080p camcorder last year during a Black Friday sale. It is flash based (16GB built in, and a SD slot for additional storage). It records in AVCHD format, which saves disk space, prior to expending it to edit.
I have 6TB of external Hard drive space, and only filled about 200GB of it for HD video from this camera, over the year of average recording of family events.
in AVCHD format, 16GB can fit 2 hours of 1080p/24
Hard drives are not expensive anymore, so don't make your choice based on tape/hard drive alone.
Agree that you should stay away from hard drive based units. What happens if/when the hard drive fails?
I have an excellent SD 3 sensor Panasonic that uses tape. Tape is good but is also subject to mechanical failure and can, in some cases, pick up the mechanical noise of the tape drive when recording. I would not trust tape as a backup as they, too, are prone to issues. You have to attach the camcorder to the computer to transfer. Additionally, with the exception of pro-gear, tape is going by the wayside.
Internal memory. Convenient but limited to what the camera came with. Some camera's will have an extra SD slot to add more memory. Again you have to connect the camcorder to computer to transfer.
SD memory. This is my recommendation. Price of memory keeps falling. You can download off a card reader. Take the Canon HF20/200. The 20 uses internal memory, the 200 uses SD cards. Based on current B&H pricing, the HF20 $699. HF200 $549. You can buy more memory and still have money left over.
As for backup... I have the original tape and then backup up to 2 separate hard drives. There is also a copy on my working hard drive. This is both raw footage and completed projects. Just anal that way.
What I don't like about the current camcorders is the size. I find the small size to be more of a hindrance than an asset. It is extremely hard to hold these little cameras still by hand. I also don't like the fact that most of these do not have a view finder. Some do, but it comes at price.
My vote and next purchase is the HF200.
...keep the change.
Last edited on Thu Oct 22nd, 2009 07:04 pm by iresq
bwaldrep wrote: I have 6TB of external Hard drive space, and only filled about 200GB of it for HD video from this camera, over the year of average recording of family events.
Where is your second hard drive for a backup??
____________________
New for 2009 150,000 BTUs of flames
I have 2 2TB hard drives, where one is for HD Video, and my iTunes Library (1.3TB). The 2nd drive is for Time machine (hourly backup of the 1st drive) And then a 3rd drive which is RAID1, 2TB for my archived video's
Plus I have a 2 TB drive off site with all family video's in case of a fire or other disaster.
I also have all family photo's back-up on a web server in one of our data centers.
iresq wrote:
As for backup... I have the original tape and then backup up to 2 separate hard drives. There is also a copy on my working hard drive. This is both raw footage and completed projects. Just anal that way.
iresq you are so correct... I do the same. More people need to pay attention to what is needed to keep your pictures safe.
iresq wrote:
What I don't like about the current camcorders is the size. I find the small size to be more of a hindrance than an asset. It is extremely hard to hold these little cameras still by hand. I also don't like the fact that most of these do not have a view finder. Some do, but it comes at price.
I concur! Man, with almost no weight to them, even a slight hand tremor results in image shake. And I don't want to drag a tripod all over the place. And it would seem like overkill to put a professional stabilizer on such a small camera. Ah, well . . . I'll never be pleased!
Love my camcorder with a 40G internal hard drive! You guys are kidding right? Asking about backups? All clips are transferred to my PC for editing/viewing and backed up on two external drives. Then deleted from the Cam.
NO WAY would I go back or recommend a tape. Since my miniDV tape camcorder stopped working, I now have a box of tapes I can't watch without buying a new Cam since there are no stand alone tape players. All the footage I really wanted was copied to my PC already.. at viewing speed.
The HD cam transfers clips fast without having to watch them during the transfer. Also has a great video index to find a clip still stored. No scanning as with a tape. Also noticed the HDcam battery lasts much longer then the tape cam. This may be better technology but I say at least some of the improvement is the from not having to reel the tape.
