I'm a newb to home video. I've read about a number of HD video cameras. I've read about some of the different storage mediums, HD, flash, DVD, mini-DV, etc. To someone budget conscious like me, it doesn't seem like a good time yet to jump in. I'd like the tech to mature a little better. Kind of to the point that digital SLR's are getting into now, as opposed to where they were 5 years ago.

I'd like to be able to record in 1080p so I can playback dot-by-dot on my HDTV. When are videocameras going to offer the kind of quality to a home end-user that we can really pull off semi-pro looking videos to display on our HDTV's? Perhaps not Planet Earth, but close to it. Could this ever happen? What's the closest we can come to that in the next 5 years? In something handheld & easily portable. And what will be the best, more efficient storage medium? And means to transfer it to the computer for editing? or on the fly editing even? And what programs are considered best for end users for PC video editing?

Basically how and when will I be able to do Planet Earth with a handheld for under $1500?

Sony HDR-SR11

I'd say flash memory is the wave of the future. However, purely on quality right now, HDV (recording HD to miniDV tapes) is probably the best because it has by far the highest bitrate (25mb/s vs. 16 mb/s max on the HDR-SR11), with the Canon HV20/HV30 representing the pinnacle of HDV technology. In the future, once all the kinks have been worked out of AVCHD compression and with 64GB flash memory cards selling for $20 at the drug store, today's trusty 13GB HDV tapes will seem extremely outdated.

For software, I looked at Adobe Premier Pro (retails for about $1,500) and Sony Vegas Pro (retails for about $500-$600 - but can be had for half that if you buy an old version and then upgrade). Both are pro-level (i.e., there are professional movies and tv shows editing using the software) and can do far more than I can imagine I'd ever want to do with video. Given the big price difference, and the fact that Sony Vegas is optimized to use all 4 cores of a quad-core computer (while Adobe isn't), it was an easy decision for me to go with Vegas.

Cool, thanks. So when do you think the AVCHD (is this referring to cams using flash tech?) will be fully fleshed out & large enough flash cards will be available to fulfill any need?

Has the mini-DV tech pretty much reached full maturity? It can't go too much further than it's at?

Keep in mind that you can't strictly compare data rates between AVCHD and HDV. Since AVCHD uses a more efficient compression scheme, you can get the same picture quality at a lower datarate.

Ken - Theoretically that's right. Unfortunately, tighter compression can also cause artifacts. I don't claim to have studied every camcorder on the market myself, but none of the sources I trust have yet found an AVCHD camcorder with a picture quality matching the best HDV camcorders. The AVCHD compression, while theoretically an advantage, is still probably 1-3 years away from living up to its promise.

Faces - AVCHD is a form of digital compression. The digital files can be stored on flash memory, hard drives, DVD's or blu-ray. The small DVD's used in camcorders only hold 20 minutes of HD video. For longer shoots, no one wants to be constantly swapping DVD's, so the DVD storage format has never really taken off. Blu-ray can hold more, but its still relatively limited how much HD video you can fit on a small disc, and they're so darn expensive. Internal hard drives right now can hold the most data - the one Sony model coming out soon will be 120GB. However, hard drives built into a camcorder add some bulk, are relatively fragile (drop the camcorder, and you can wipe out your hard drive), and produce some noise which has to somehow be mitigated or it ends up in your video). Flash memory will soon be able to hold far more data than either DVD (1.4GB) or Blu-ray (7.5GB), is not nearly as fragile as a hard drive, and takes up much less space than any other format (I'm constantly shocked at the size of the 4GB microSD card I'm using in my Blackberry). Its a safe bet than in a few years, most HD consumer camcorders will be recording AVCHD-compressed video to flash memory.

The problem with HDV (recording HD to miniDV tapes) is that its capped at the 13GB tapes (an hour of footage is nice, but 5-10 hours would be nicer); it uses 1440x1080 capture with stretched pixels (but still has the edge in picture quality, just proving that you can't rely on the numbers printed on the box); the tape mechanism takes up a lot of space and is noisy; and, most importantly, its a pain to capture your videos from the miniDV tape to your computer, since you can only capture in real-time (i.e., it takes an hour to capture an hour's worth of video vs. the AVCHD files that you can just drag and drop). So, while HDV still has the picture quality advantage, as soon as AVCHD catches up (probably a year or two), most people will abandon HDV. People see this coming, so the manufacturers aren't likely to want to keep pouring R&D dollars into the HDV format, which is why I suggest it's now at its pinnacle. It's "maxed out" not so much technologically, but because of the marketplace.

AVCHD does not need to be fixed. It produces better quality than HDV at the same bitrate, but current camcorders using AVCHD use much lower bitrates to save on space consumption and power.

While I do expect AVCHD implementations with higher bitrates (higher resolution, higher frame rates and less compression) as memory (HDD and SD) capacities increase, I also think that the biggest increases in PQ will have little to do with bitrates but instead with improvements in sensors (esp. in low light), stabilization and optics.

Great, this is exactly what I wanted to know. So I will keep my eye on future AVCHD cam's with increased storage capacity on flash drives, improved bit rates, sensors, etc. I'm hoping that by the fall of 2009 they have really gotten these down pat, as that's when I anticipate wanting to buy one (for a trip to Africa).

While I do expect AVCHD implementations with higher bitrates (higher resolution, higher frame rates and less compression) as memory (HDD and SD) capacities increase, I also think that the biggest increases in PQ will have little to do with bitrates but instead with improvements in sensors (esp. in low light), stabilization and optics.

When do you expect the developmental curve in these areas to start to plateau? i.e. when do you expect cameras to achieve levels in these areas that further development will not show such dramatic improvements to PQ.

When do you expect the developmental curve in these areas to start to plateau? i.e. when do you expect cameras to achieve levels in these areas that further development will not show such dramatic improvements to PQ.
This technology doesn't plateau. It will continue to improve significantly. At why point you jump in is a very personal decision. If you're waiting for the "perfect" camera, you may be waiting a long time. Me, I jumped in about 4 months ago with an HG10.

Basically how and when will I be able to do Planet Earth with a handheld for under $1500?

LOL! Never, because your $1500 camcorder isn't using a $50K lens. Doesn't matter how good the technology gets, it still starts with the glass.

Ken - Theoretically that's right. Unfortunately, tighter compression can also cause artifacts. I don't claim to have studied every camcorder on the market myself, but none of the sources I trust have yet found an AVCHD camcorder with a picture quality matching the best HDV camcorders.


Well an interesting article surfaces on this subject. Unfortunately I don't have a link, but a friend of mine read me the article over the phone. The article comes from a magazine called "Government Video"...or something like that.

The author compares the HG10 to the HV20 in a battery of side by side tests. Interestingly he comes up with the conclusion that the overall picture quality of the HG10 is a tad better than the HV20! What's interesting about this, is that in similar tests I did with the friend who found this article, his conclusion was the same. In a few scenes shot side by side with an HG10 and my HV20, he pointed out slightly less noise on the HG10. He was correct, in those scenes the HG10 picture was actually slightly cleaner. These results were on a 60" Pioneer Elite Kuro.

However, what I also found was that as you got closer to the screen, the HG10's picture was the first to 'break down'. It became less smooth at closer distances than the HV20. But at normal viewing distances it was very tough to tell the two apart.

It could well be that the upcoming generation of the better AVCHD cams from Canon and Sony may close the gap entirely between the formats. Who knows, they may even surpass HDV.