What camcorder?

[cp4men]

Can anyone give me some advice on camcorders Im only as small company and looking for one thats not going to be too expensive -semi-pro I guess... any thoughts?

[RobertChandler]

I got the Canon VIXIA HF100 Flash Memory High Definition Camcorder with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom on Amazon. I LOVE it. It's light and portable, but takes very good video. I love the way it pulls in light. It's so small that it would be very easy to travel with two of them if you were doing a two-camera shoot.
I shot a documentary with a much bigger Sony VX-2000 and an even bigger Canon XL2.. Those were big and much harder to travel with. Wish I had a little HD camera back then!
If I bought a new camera, I'd buy the newer version. It's less than $400 on Amazon! I paid $639 for mine three years ago. I love the way video tech gets better and cheaper!

I'd love to hear about what you ultimately decide on.

[cp4men]

I got the Canon VIXIA HF100 Flash Memory High Definition Camcorder with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom on Amazon. I LOVE it. It's light and portable, but takes very good video. I love the way it pulls in light. It's so small that it would be very easy to travel with two of them if you were doing a two-camera shoot.
I shot a documentary with a much bigger Sony VX-2000 and an even bigger Canon XL2.. Those were big and much harder to travel with. Wish I had a little HD camera back then!
If I bought a new camera, I'd buy the newer version. It's less than $400 on Amazon! I paid $639 for mine three years ago. I love the way video tech gets better and cheaper!

I'd love to hear about what you ultimately decide on.

hi Robert many thanks for your input.Its so difficult to choose from and I will certainly have a look at the cams you mentioned. I use final cut express to edit with. Is anyone going for final cut X or is this thread all bit too technical

[RobertChandler]

I use Final Cut Pro now, but looking forward to switching to Final Cut X. Seems like the price is going to be much lower and hopefully it will make exporting easier and clearer.
I'd be using Final Cut Express now, but I shoot two-camera and use the multi-clip feature to edit. Only Pro does that. Otherwise, I would love the ease of Express.
How's that for technical? ;-)

[cp4men]

well done that man and I didnt even go blond ! I was hoping apple may have done an upgrade price for FCE and FCP users but its not to be. I use 3 JVC camcorders all at different positions. Its good for spanking vids as its all over in one take-good for the spankee as well The only problem with the JVS is they are MOD files when I convert them they never seem as good as quality when I put them into final cut so Im hoping that X will support them as they are supported in new version of imovie which I hated-love the old version but only possible to edit one clip in the time line

[nickbaer]

Toast is doing a good job with converting .MOD files to .MOV.

[cp4men]

Toast is doing a good job with converting .MOD files to .MOV.

Really? Never really thought about toast. Mind you it does great job of converting my pal files into NTSC better than JES me thinks!

[cp4men]

by the way how are you nick! where are you in the world

[HunkyLuke]

So has everyone moved to RAM-based cams now? No more tapes?

[cp4men]

So has everyone moved to RAM-based cams now? No more tapes?

Ive got a DV camera that I use for face shots. Its hard to keep up!theres going to be some good secondhand pro based DV cameras coming on the market soon so will have to wait and see if there are any bargains out there rather than going for SD Cards

[nickbaer]

I haven't used tape in 2 years. The first few shoots, I experimented with different camera settings, with different results.

And, Toast has had 2-3 upgrades in those same 2 years, so now it is pretty good.

I use Toast to convert, but haven't yet tried the old method of FCP capturing the video from the camera, as I used to do with tape cameras.

[cp4men]

From what Ive heard final cut x will only accept file formats rather than from DV tapes-its just another way of pushing us to to upgrading constantly

[erosproductions]

So has everyone moved to RAM-based cams now? No more tapes?

I still use tapes, unfortunately. Maybe in the next year or so I will finally get around to upgrading.

[HunkyLuke]

Yeah I still use tapes too. My main concern with going to a memory / disk based camera is that the quality will not be there. I have tapes from a few years ago that I originally processed at a lower quality and am re-processing now to get better quality for my members areas. The good thing with tapes is that you can do this. However, with digital videos you are stuck with the quality you filmed at.

What do you guys using memory / disk cams do about that?

[asiaboy]

We do not use tape anymore, laptops no longer even have firewire ports to transfer it.

I have a Sony HD camcorder that still works very well and produces excellent HD video. But we have no way to transfer tape anymore. So it gathers dust in a drawer now. We switched to a hacked Panasonic GH1, aka GH13. Fabulous video quality even at low light, with the right lens. Much superior to any tape based camera at similar price.

I got a Canon Vixia a year or two ago, but did not think it was very good, it uses a cheap lens, I think. So we will use it only for "quick and dirty" jobs.