Camera or camcorder?

S

sabre Man

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I'm looking for something that enables me to shoot small movies for fun and maybe podcasting. Nothing too serious.

Should I go for a camera or a camcorder? Any recommendations?

I have a 5 MP camera that can shoot 640x480 pixels, which is bearable but not great, so it may be a good idea to replace it with a more modern camera.

I also like taking photographs. I would imagine carrying both a camera and a camcorder would be a bit much. What would be the advantages of a camcorder over a camera?

Cameras these days seem to offer all you need, or are there features or situations where camcorders beat cameras?
 

I have a MiniDV camcorder which I haven't upgraded. I got a Panasonic Lumic Z25 camera which has HD quality movie on it. The only problem is that the movie that it creates is .MOV which as far as I can find out, is suited to Quicktime/Apple apps, and doesn't lend itself (if someone knows differently, let me know) to conversion to MP3/4 easily. Looking after a camera and a camcorder would be a bit much imo.

What I'm saying though, is that I went with a good quality camera where I can copy stuff off onto an SD card making it easy for transfer to a pc. It works quite well. If you DO go for a camcorder seperately, you can get the hand held ones for €150 with a HDD, and they'll do the recording job just fine.
 
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I would suggest you get a digital camera cause you can now purchase still cameras, that has boast high definition video recording.
 
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I recently got a Kodak zi8 as was recommended by professionals in both the video blogging and podcasting industry that I have met at several conferences.
I would definitely recommend it. It is easy to use and produces great quality movies. It also takes still photos up to 5mp.

I use it along side my dSLR though so it depends on what you want. If you want to get a new camera then fair enough I am sure you can find one that equals the Kodak I have. I have an older canon camera and the video quality isn't great but check out alternatives out there today. The one great thing about my Kodak is that it holds up to 32gb sd which means I can get over 10 hours of video and some photos. Check that whatever camera you get supports a big memory. Ideally 16gb so you can get the most out of the video function.
 
sabre Man said:
....small movies for fun and maybe podcasting. Nothing too serious.
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Why not just get one of these? You certainly won't have to worry about carrying it around with you.

I have absolutely no use for it, but I just bought one on [broken link removed] for £7.98 delivered, plus a 4GB card [broken link removed] for another £6.39 (using FIFA20 as a promo code).

I know, I could have bought a round of drinks for that...
 

The Kodak zi8 seems like a great camera at a good price but ideally I would like more pixels. How many hours do you get from the battery? Are there any similar cameras with more megapixels?

Can you shoot video with your dSLR camera?
 
camera or camcorder?

You can shoot video with the Nikon d90 dslr..it retails from between e700-1100.

daithi
 
I have a Flip camcorder which I find very nifty and very handy. Would recommend it.
 
The other thing to consider is the more pixels, the more memory is used up as you store it on your pc. It is not unusual for a couple of minutes video to take up 100MB. That all adds up, so consider your storage HDD as well.
 
Just bought a Panasonic TZ7 that does HD. It records HD in Panasonic's pain in the butt format, but also in mpeg which solves a lot of hassle with editing. One thing about the new slr's shooting HD, is that as good as they are (and they are!) it's all very much manual settings/focusing etc, so you really need to know what you're doing and use a tripod.
 
sabre Man said:
The Kodak zi8 seems like a great camera at a good price but ideally I would like more pixels. How many hours do you get from the battery? Are there any similar cameras with more megapixels?

Can you shoot video with your dSLR camera?
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Not with my dslr I can't. Video on dSLR is a pretty new feature.

I have charged my zi8 once and I have used it for 12 hours video so far and it still doesn't need charging. I bought two extra batteries for 8euro on ebay so they are a good backup option.

I was considering the flip when I was getting this but the video quality is far superior on the zi8
 
In my exp. if its specialised in one format its for good reason. All in one is almost always a compromise of some degree and the decision should be based on that the end result requirement it.
 
actually meant to say check also v. carefully the way you intend to trasnfer and format the end result. this can end up being a nightmare in itself. Check for firewire capabilities on your PC etc etc and research good editing software.
 
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