Camcorder recomendations

[thescreensavers]

For around 300-600 bucks ( I know large range)

Any Camcorders that you guys can recommend? I have searched around but I wish I could have some camera I could compare some too..ect

It just needs to shoot HD video

 

[RSaylors]

The right answer is a canon fh 100;

this answer is found in the sticky-thread at the top of the forum.

But, i independently spent many hours reading about different cameras and must agree with the assessment.

 

[Kaido]

The previous top model in that pricerange was the Canon HF200. I believe the successor to this model is the Canon HF M300. Amazon has it for $468 shipped:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00322OOCS/

Some specs:
-Full 1080p (24p & 30p)
-Full 24Mbps data rate (max AVCHD bitrate)
-15x optical zoom
-Touch Focus (touch the object you want to auto-focus on, and it keeps following it)

What do you want to use it for exactly? That will help in deciding on a model. For example, you can get a dSLR Video Camera for a little bit more that will give you awesome results, but it has some limitations (poor autofocus, 12 minute recording times, etc.).

Also, with camcorders - most record in AVCHD nowadays. You'll either need a video editing package that can edit AVCHD natively (such as Sony Vegas), or you'll need to convert all of your footage into something your video editing package can talk to, like AVI or MOV. That conversion process can take quite a bit of time and people don't always realize that it's not just shoot-edit, it's shoot-transcode-edit depending on your camera & software setup.