Video cameras

[Cristatus]

I'm having troubles with my fairly old Sony video camera (battery show's charge, but after a couple of minutes the battery will die, and I've gone through 2 batteries).

Everyone on AT knows about photography, but what's a good video camera for home use?

The problem is, there's so many different formats, it's hard to choose: miniDV, HDD, HDminiDV, DVD, and some even with flimsy memory cards.

I know for sure that I don't want a HDD one, because that would mean constant downloading to a hard drive. I also don't want a memory card based camera because that would mean not a lot of storage.

I guess that leaves me with the two miniDV formats and DVD. Apparently DVDs need closing so that would mean it would become a PITA.

Are there any formats I'm missing?

What do you guys suggest I buy, that's not Sony, and has a good optical zoom (I hate digital zoom)?

 

[Pikachu]

Too easy...

 

[Koing]

HDV

Dad bought one and it's great. Very crisp video.

How much do you want to spend though?

Koing

 

[Pikachu]

Low light shooting ability is on top of my feature priority list. I'm interested in these for that reason:

• Sony DCR-HC90 $589.00
  
  Sony DCR-HC96 $575.00

Uh, they will require battery care and replacements over time. I know this going in.

 

[Cristatus]

Did I mention that touchscreens are a PITA as well?

Anyways, that's minor, as long as the camera is good.

I'm not sure how much I'm willing to spend yet, but definitely not more than 1k. Otherwise, I saw this one, but I'm definitely not ready to shell out that kind of money.

So, yea, let's say that my budget is anything less than 1,000 USD.

 

[Koing]

logic1485 thats the camera my dad has the HC3

Koing

 

[Kanalua]

Sony HDR-FX1...I'm borrowing it from work for the next week. Native 16:9 video (HDV and SD DV). In camera down-converting. THe 1080i images are BEAUTIFUL!

 

[Cristatus]

Originally posted by: Koing
logic1485 thats the camera my dad has the HC3

Koing

That is a nice camera though.

Do you know how many GBP did he pay for it?

 

[Koing]

Originally posted by: logic1485

Originally posted by: Koing
logic1485 thats the camera my dad has the HC3

Koing

That is a nice camera though.

Do you know how many GBP did he pay for it?

£750



VERY crisp video imo.

I love the super slow mo function. Very useful for my weightlifting videos. Basically it records 4x the amount of frames within 2seconds or whatever it is and then plays it is so you get very crisp slow mo.

Koing