Entry Level/Mid Level Camcorder

Welcome to the forum.

The Panasonic-V700 (click here) is well liked on this forum and gets good reviews elsewhere too.

There is a long discussion of it on this forum: http://www.avsforum.com/t/1403509/the-official-panasonic-hc-v700-owners-thread

Bill
Edited by bsprague - 9/12/12 at 7:12am

Hi b3rt - at your price point, the best European models are the €349 Sony HDR-CX250E or the €315 Panasonic HC-V500. Here is a slashcam side-by-side comparison of the two cameras: http://camcorder-test.slashcam.com/compare-c9427a1d601510f7fe2ffddd234185de.html

Both will produce great high definition home videos - the primary differences between the two are that the Sony has an external microphone jack (which you might find useful for improving sound quality) - while the Panasonic has more manual exposure control.

Hope this is helpful,

Bill
Hybrid Camera Revolution

I clicked on those and Google Chrome translated it to English. Cool!

b3rt, you can get a Canon LEGRIA HF M506 for EUR 390,45:
http://www.amazon.de/Canon-Camcorder-Toch-LCD-SDXC-Kartenslot-Intelligent/dp/B006WZZMAA/ref=sr_1_11?s=photo&ie=UTF8&qid=1347462631&sr=1-11

..or maybe you can find it cheaper somewhere else.

Here is an English description:
http://www.canon.co.uk/For_Home/Product_Finder/Camcorders/High_Definition_HD/LEGRIA_HF_M506/

(The US equivalent is the "HF M500".)

The HF M506 has an HD CMOS Pro sensor for great low light shots. (This is the same sensor they put in their pro camcorders.)
There is no built-in storage so you have to buy a couple of SDHC cards ("class 4 or higher"), which are not expensive these days.

You can search YouTube and Vimeo for HF M500 or HF M506 for tests.
HF M50/HF M52 are US models that are the same camcorder with internal storage and WiFi...a YouTube/Vimeo search for those will also yield a similar image as the HF M506 or 500..

Or search any of the camcorder names plus "review" to get reviews.

If you're interested in Canon and see cheaper camcorders with "R" in the name - these will not be as good as the HF M4... or HF M5... camcorders.
They are worth the extra over the R series, which don't have the pro sensor.
Edited by xfws - 9/12/12 at 8:57am

Perhaps it is a symptom exclusive to that model. Those two videos were from the same user, try to find some other tests on sites other than YouTube or ask in the appropriate thread on this forum.

With the built-in mics, you will get some amount of hissing but not clicking. All the Canon and some of the Pansonic do have a mic jack to use your own microphone for clearer audio.
I'm not as familiar with Sony.

The online manual for the CX250 says, using the standard battery, it will record continously for about 145 minutes and, with the usual on and off use, about 70 minutes.

Consider that most people won't watch a video longer than 3 to 5 minutes. Or, maybe 10 minutes if it is really good. The fun and challenging part of video is to first shoot a hours worth of footage that is good enough to edit into a great 5 minutes.

If you watch almost anything on TV, you will see the standard (that we have been "trained" to watch) is an edited collection of 3 to 5 second clips. So if you shoot 10 second clips for raw material intended to be trimmed and combined, an hours worth of video is 360 clips. That can turn the fun of editing into a lot of work!

My point is that a typical camcorder battery will last around an hour and that truly is enough for "holiday and family" videos. That said, I carry an extra "off brand" spare made by Wasabi for backup.

Bill

The included battery with a camcorder is just meant to be a starter battery/which will typically be under an hour..
You should always get an extra battery/preferably two.

There are extra-life batteries. For example, the BP-819, for Canon models before 2012 will give you 4 hours. The BP-827 even longer. These batteries are bigger and heavier.
There are plenty of no-name generic options on sites like ebay.
Keep in mind that generic batteries will void the manufacturer warranty, versus buying name brand batteries,
Edited by xfws - 9/14/12 at 8:00am

I could not identify the noise source. It may have been the camera, but that seems very unlikely.

Most camcorders are set to operate with AGC, or Automatic Gain Control. The purpose is to find any available sound and amplify it to an audible level. In normal use it will record "normal" sounds at "normal" levels. In a quiet setting, it turns weak sounds into "normal" levels. You end up hearing everything. AGC works well at a basketball game and terrible when shooting flowers waiving in the breeze.

One solution is to turn AGC off in quiet settings. Another solution is to lower the levels in editing. Frequently you will see video where the automatic sound track is replaced by music.

Unexpected sound and noise ruins a lot of holiday clips. The gorgeous river canyon and river sound is drowned out by a passing truck or the very moment the sun dips below the horizon, your wife exclaims "Isn't it spectacular!".

Be sure to buy a camera from a company who will willingly take it back if it has a flaw or does not suit you.

Bill

Good choice. You'll really like the image quality.
Canon recently updated their camcorder batteries, If you eventually get another battery, make sure it is compatible. For example, the batteries I mentioned won't work the 506.

Sony Vegas Platinum is good editing software. As far as beginners, it has a "show me how" tutorial function. You click on something you want to know how to do, for example import media (videos), and it will flash on the spot that you're supposed to click. It won't let you continue until you get it right.

After you get the camcorder, look up the software programs you are interested in, download the trials and play with them before you buy. It's important to do that, because once you open software, you can't return it.

Sony Vegas trials are fully functional for 30 days; there are also programs made by Adobe, Cyberlink and others.

The Canon HF 506 will come with Pixela software. It's a basic editor, maybe it will be enough for now.
Edited by xfws - 9/14/12 at 12:19pm