Camcorders Prices

Canon xl2 digital camcorder and a chance meeting as I was on a lunch break.

Did you know that you can get fed & paid to learn about video production? Picture this:

You’re down the street at the local shops when you hear a lot of screaming from up a side street.

“What the heck was that?” you think to yourself and make your way around the corner to see what all the commotion is about.

To your surprise, you see twenty or thirty people screaming and carrying on as they chase a New York City taxi-cab, only to have it stop after twenty yards and back-up, ready to do it all over again.

You hesitate for a moment and contemplate if it would be better to turn around and walk in the other direction.

It’s then you notice the traffic control personnel, the lights, cameras and huge number of support people. You have stumbled across a location shoot for a television commercial.

“Ahaaa”, you say to yourself “perfect opportunity to learn about ‘the business’”.

So you hang around and study the camera angles, positioning of the lights and how it is all controlled by the director. The placement of screens and reflectors, the use of microphones and the roles of the support crew.

It’s when you speak to the ‘extras’ (the rowdy ‘mob’) that you discover they are being paid $20 an hour and the whole event is fully catered!

Now if you want to learn more about the business of film and video production with the added bonus of being paid to do so, sign up as an extra and learn from the inside. If you are unsure where to start, just type ‘movie extra’ in a search engine like google.

Now this is a true story and as my luck would have it, was taking place right outside my office window for most of the day (the screaming and yelling did get a bit tedious after a while).

It was good to speak to the cast extra’s, but this was a better opportunity to talk to the technical crew on aspects of filming and production. Just had to pick the right moment.

And that I did and picked up some good info to boot!

The production house was not a large firm so they had developed systems and procedures to control costs while providing quality outputs. One of these was using a Canon xl2 digital camcorder as the secondary camera.

The size and weight of the Canon xl2 compared to the betacam unit allowed it to be placed in unusual locations quickly and easily (thus saving time, which equals money) and the image quality showed no discernable difference (you would need to view on a new digital system to notice a difference and even then you’d have to be looking closely.

I even managed to get a word in with the main production cameraman so I could ‘pick his brain’ on the Canon xl2 digital camcorder. He loved the unit but did say he found it’s performance questionable when filming vertical stripes and off green colourings (the types of situations you might find in filming catwalk models). Other than that he said the xl2 was a great asset for a pro or semi-pro operator.

So if you’d like a whole lot of fun while getting paid, sign up as a movie/production extra. And if you want a great camcorder and have the experience to use it get yourself a Canon xl2 digital camcorder.

Mark Sturge is the owner of KMS Productions and webmaster at kmsvideo.com. A site where visitors can find digital camcorder reviews such as the canon xl2 digital camcorder as well as useful hints and tips to better their filming techniques.

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Mini DV camcorders have many advantages over traditional analog video cameras and even Digital and DVD camcorders. Mini DV camcorders are compact, small and afford better editing. They have a better picture resolution compared to Digital Camcorders and even though they cost more, it comes as no surprise that many people prefer them over their more traditional counterparts.

Mini DV camcorders are sold on many websites, electronics stores, through shopping magazines and niche magazines like the ones dedicated specially to white goods. These camcorders are sold by brand, zoom strength, LCD display properties, price, and size, so it becomes easy selecting the one that best suits your needs.

The major brands of Mini DV camcorders are Sony, Panasonic, and Canon. Sony is the market leader in the Mini DV camcorder segment, while Canon, though a late entrant in the market, is fast catching up. Sony camcorders are popular owing to a wide variety and many innovative features, and they come with a reasonable price tag . The Sony Handy cam DCR HC 42, for example, is a Mini DV digital camcorder with still recording as well as MPEG movie recording features. This light, compact camcorder delighted users with it’s easy to use features and high sound and image recording quality on it’s May 2005 launch into the Mini DV camcorder market. Another new feature is the facility for low light and night time recording. And it has a lithium battery which lasts up to eight hours, far more than the batteries of it’s nearest rivals Panasonic and Canon. The camcorder costs around $600.

Panasonic Mini DV camcorders are the next popular after Sony Camcorders. The PV-GS 150 model, for example, comes with 3 CCDs, instead of one, as is the case with the Sony camcorders. You can choose between internal or external microphone for sound recording. Canon’s ZR 300 camcorder series has similar features, but it is available with only one CCD.

The mini DV camcorder market is still evolving, and newer features are being introduced almost every day, with a decreasing price tag. It is important to research the products available in the camcorder market to check suitability regarding your needs, and to see if the recording format is compatible with players in other formats.

Mini DV provides detailed information about mini DVs, mini DV camcorders, mini DV conversion and more. Mini DV is affiliated with DVD R Duplication.

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A couple years ago (ok, more than a few), I became really interested in buying a digital camcorder. Like most people new to the trade, I wanted to purchase the latest digital camcorder that featured the best technology. I always enjoyed looking at the flashy camcorder magazines to check out pictures, and read articles and reviews on the latest camcorders.

However, once I became serious about wanting to buy one, it suddenly occurred to me, as I was reading the magazine reviews, that almost every single one had a positive slant. Virtually every review I read, discussed only the benefits and cool features of the camcorders.

All of these good reviews made me realize that what I was reading was biased information designed as a marketing tool. The content within these articles and reviews was nothing more than eye candy for techies. Essentially, aside from stats (which I could barely make heads or tails of) the magazine reviews actually provided very little information about the quality and practicality of the camcorder.

So, to test my theory on my favorite “flashy magazine”, I plugged in the names of the few digital camcorders that interested me into a search engine. Low and behold I found genuine reviews from consumers who had actually purchased the cameras and expressed their real opinions about the product. What did I discover with my research? I learned that my first digital camcorder choice actually only received a “good” video quality rating from most users. This was a much different result compared to the “excellent” rating it was given by the magazine. Naturally, my attitude toward this digital camcorder changed, and I began investigating other models.

What I learned as I began conducting my digital camcorder review research was that while the stats of the camera matter, they aren’t the most important part of a review. Until you actually purchase the digital camcorder and compare it to another camcorder, or an older model, you won’t know if the digital camcorder is true to its hype. In other words, most of the fancy stats mean squat to the average consumer who knows very little about digital camcorder technology.

Think about it, if you know very little about digital camcorders and a review only provides you with technical details and a product description, how will you know if the camcorder will suit your intended use?

For instance, observe the following example that has been based on an actual digital camcorder review:

The digital camcorder captures fantastic videos and stills. It is compact, lightweight and capable. The Camcorder features a 4x digital zoom, an internal 16MB flash memory with external SD/MMC card slot (supports up to 1 GB) and a 3.2-megapixel CCD image sensor. The digital camcorder has an image resolution of 1280×960, 1600×1200 and 2048×1536, and records MPEG-4 movies. The digital camcorder also has a 1.8″ TFT monitor, NTSC/PAL TV out format, and USB 1.1 PC connection.

Did that mean anything to you? Do you know whether or not you need all of those features, or if you have the right equipment to accommodate the camcorder? If you’re like me, and technical stats make your eyes cross, here’s what you need to do to ensure that the digital camcorder you buy is ideal for your needs.

First and foremost, avoid getting sucked in by all technical flare such as the lab/bench tests, color/lines of resolution etc. Look for quality reviews that will tell you what purpose the camera is ideal for, and the type of person it will likely suit.

Thus, if you are looking for honest camcorder reviews, direct your browser to sites that sell these products such as Amazon.com and find out what people who actually purchased these products had to say about them in the user comments section. Here you will not only receive a consumer “five-star rating”, but also find out what they liked and didn’t like about the camera.

Mark Sturge is the owner of KMS Productions and webmaster at kmsvideo.com. A site where visitors can find digital camcorder reviews such as the canon xl2 digital camcorder as well as useful hints and tips to better their filming techniques.

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