Despres Photography

What is a good video camera?

I would like to buy a digital video camera. I'm not that knowledgeable about the technical aspects, but I do have an eye for composition and I am a good editor.

You are probably going to get 101 different recommendations.

Camcorders like many other things quality is a question of cost. decide on a budget, and then have a look around to see what you can get for your money. There are three formats IE what they record to, in order of quality

1 Mini-dv (tape) still the number one for quality, but expensive.
2 flash drive (small cards)
3 Hard dive,
4 I know I said 3 but I will include this one Mini-dvd lowest quality, do not bother even looking at them.

You need to decide if you want to go high definition, or not, what are you going to do with the video, Basically to keep the quality, you either need to play it back on a computer or a Blu ray disk, if you are planning to upload it to youtube or the like then the quality will be reduced through the converting process.

http://camcorders.about.com/od/buyingguide/a/when_buying_a_camcorder.htm

a few features, Zoom every one loves to zoom in, ignore the Digital zoom figuars, always look at the optical zoom, the higher it goes the harder it is to keep the picture still. In camera editing total waste of time always better to do it on the camera, effects, by the time you select the effect for the scene Aunty Jane has fallen into the river. and you have lost the moment.

there is some good advice here

http://pages.ebay.co.uk/buy/guides/camcorders-buying-guide/

And

http://www.reevoo.com/pages/camcorders_buying_guide

once you get an idea of what you are looking for then go and have a look at some, if you are a big person you dont want to get a small camera that you can loose in your hand, not the other way around, also can you press the right buttons with out looking.

once you have decided on say a couple of models, (remember video cameras) get the sales people to let your record some footage and then play it cak on a HD TV see what it looks like, If they start to go on about mega pixles ignore it, it has nothing to do with video. las bit if you think that you will be recording in low light then check out how dark the camera will record in , this is measured in LUX, 0LUX being total darkness, so the lower the number the better anything from 0-1 is fine.

There are a few pointers for you, half the fun of getting a camera is the looking around for the right on. another thought Unless you want the camera for Christmas then leave it until the new year sales. you will pick up better bargains then

RR

Unboxing a New Sony HXR-NX5U Digital HD Professional Video Camera

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