Buying A Camcorder

We present here the essential information you need to know to make a good choice before you invest $200 or more into a video camcorder.

With the advent of higher resolution television sets found even in the $250 price range the concept of buying a VHS camcorder is almost a waste of time. VHS has a fraction of the picture quality most sets can exhibit and the cost compared to a higher quality camera is the same or close.

Hi-8 should be the lowest buy-in anyone should seriously make. It deliver above broadcast quality picture as far as resolution is concerned. On the downside the small width tape does flake faster, but most people who shoot on Hi-8 with the intention of playing back their films a lot tend to make computer capture copies and then burn DVD disks.

Hi-8 cameras start as low as $200, making them competitive in price with VHS. They are generally smaller and lighter.

In the Digital Video range we have the Sony Digital-8 and everyone else (including Sony) with Mini DV. These are incompatible but similar formats. As with the old analog Sony may actually have the overall better product, but it probably won’t survive because everyone is going Mini DV. The primary differences to the consumer between the two formats is that the Sony process uses 8mm wide tape while the Mini DV is about 6mm wide, the same as the old Travan back up tapes for computer. Wider tape lasts longer and jams less.

One of the things making Mini DV so popular is that semi-professional cameras (ENG or TV News Quality) use the large DV Cam cartridge, but can play back the Mini DV with a special adapter. This means a commercial video transfer company need only buy a DV Cam and then they can take in both DV and Mini DV business with less overhead.

As with VHS and television Mini DV comes in two flavors, the NTSC for America and PAL for Europe. These are incompatible and not interchangeable. If you want to get a US made Mini DV video or television show on in Europe you must have it converted to PAL Mini DV or burn a DVD disk, which is about the same quality and interchangeable with European systems.

DV cameras of any type have a sharper, more stable image. They are actually better than most older broadcast equipment as far as seeing detail in a picture. They still cause a rainbow color fringe due to the single image sensor.

Home quality cameras start as low as $275 reconditioned or on closeout. New cameras of any make start at about $399 retail and go up into the thousands.

The most important things you should look for is a wide range or ratio for the optical zoom lens. This is what takes the picture. Digital zoom simply enlarges a small area of pixels.

The ability to take high quality digital still pictures might be a plus. Cameras with well over 1.5 Mega Pixels will do this acceptably, thus your movie camera can replace a $150 to $200 still camera. Movie cameras will not replace a $600 still camera, not yet at least.

Inputs and outputs. This is very important to any camera. It should come with at least S-Video in and out. This means you can transfer from the camera and back to the camera from a computer. Some cameras also include composite connector, making them compatible with older TV sets and VHS recorders. Some cameras also include the FireWire connector.

FireWire alone can get you into trouble as there is a very high incompatibility factor between digital cameras, Windows, capture software and capture hardware. This doesn’t just happen randomly. If you look hard you’ll see Panasonic, Sony and Canon users all asking why their systems can see the FireWire features. This is largely a driver problem and may be corrected in the next few years.

Digital camera companies are not making the drivers. They are leaving this up to Microsoft and the software vendors, who are slacking off on the job.

The Canon ZR40, for example, won’t function with the Pinnacle Studio Deluxe 7.0 software under Windows 98 SE. The hardware sees the camera, but the software can’t connect to the controls. This means no FireWire transfers. The ZR40, however, also has S-Video connectors so you can make the transfers that way. Had this camera not included an alternative means of transferring you would be out of luck, thus the benefits of having multiple connectors is an obvious plus in picking a camcorder.

Other optional connections also include line-in, microphone in and headphone out. These are a plus feature for anyone doing serious video work. It allows you to, for example, record bands off their mixing board using a line-in for better wound. It allows you to add an external wireless microphone so you can make TV commercials and very high quality wedding videos. Usually you have to pay over $600 to get these features.

After this comes size, weight, cost of the battery, charger and accessories. You should certainly find out how much a new batter is and if it is NiMH rather than NiCAD. NiMH is a far superior battery. Units usually come with a low cost, slow charger. You may want to upgrade to a second battery with a fast charger.

The three chip cameras make for better professional use in television or DVD work. These cameras offer less features, weigh more, are larger in size and have a smaller zoom range. They are, however, much better in quality. The color is more distinct. There is less red and green fringe on whites or at the edges of the image. But, these more expensive units are still only semi-professional grade. Prices start at about $2,500.

What is the difference between professional and semi-professional? Compression. The semi-professional systems use a JPEG quality image compression that introduces garbage and noise to parts of the pictures. Professional cameras use either a different, lower compression system or no compression at all. Lower compression cameras are priced from around $10,000 while no compression cameras start at $60,000. At 60,000 you also start to see image detail good enough for HDTV. These are generally out of the price range of even a serious filmmaker.

The differences probably will not show up until you broadcast on HDTV and even then only a studio engineer will probably notice the quality difference.

To sum this all up:

Home TV delivers from 350 to 600 resolution lines. HDTV delivers from 700 to 1,000 lines of resolution.

VHS delivers 240-260 lines with lots of wiggle and color fringe for the $200 price tag. You can readily see the different in quality between VHS and everything else if you look at the picture image.

Hi-8 delivers 400 lines with lots of wiggle and color fringe for the $200 price tag.

DVD delivers 480-530 lines with very minimal wiggle.

Digtal-8 and Mini DV delivers 480-530 lines of resolution with minimal wiggle and a little color fringe for $350 and up. These are good enough to produce local TV commercials, band videos, wedding videos, cable access TV shows and even low cost infomercials.

Semi-professional Mini DV delivers 530 lines of resolution, minimal wiggle and minimal color fringe for $2,500 and up. These are good enough to produce television commercials, documentaries, new shows and infomercials. You can almost do a broadcast pilot episode on these.

Professional grade DV cameras user a larger cartridge (Mini DV will work with adapters), get more running time, deliver 530 to 700 lines of resolution with minimal wiggle, minimal compression, better color saturation for a $10,000+ price tag.

Professional broadcast cameras use an entirely different recording tape and process with no compression and deliver from 600 to 1,000 lines of resolution with minimal wiggle, no compression of the image, better color stability for a $60,000+ price tag.