jvc ex250

The Panasonic FZ150 and current version FZ200 have a high speed mode at 240 fps, taking "VGA" quality MP4s.

You can read the manual here: http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPERMANPDF/DMCFZ200_ADV.PDF

The Panasonic LX7 has a "high speed" mode too but at 120fps. See pages 87-89 in the manual: http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPERMANPDF/DMCLX7_ADV.PDF

Perhaps any camera that can take 1080p60 video will do the job. 60 frames a second is a lot of data. I slowed this clip down to 1/8th speed in my editing software. Slowing it down more with 300 frames a second might be over kill. Baseball is not speeding bullets!

https://vimeo.com/58252577

The camera is a two year old Sony HX9V. When it came out it got a lot of credit for squeezing the capability of HD video in to a pocket size form factor. The current version is slightly better and called the HX20V. It continues to get positive reviews. http://www.amazon.com/Sony-Cyber-shot-DSC-HX20V-Digital-3-0-inch/dp/B006K551WQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1359221393&sr=8-1&keywords=hx20v

The software is Adobe Premier Elements 11, which may be the most common video editing software beyond the free stuff. At Christmas is was selling for $45, but usually is about $80. Version 11 has been out about 6 months and now has two slow motion tools. Older versions did not fully support 1080p60 AVCHD video and only had one slow motion tool.

I ran the clip through a second time and slowed it down more. The result is certainly "grainy" and wouldn't cut it at a film festival, but for analyzing body motion, I think shows about all you would want to see. Watch the muscles in her arm after she misses the ball.

https://vimeo.com/58254299

I see no reason to pick a camera just because it has a "high speed video" mode. It makes more sense to me to get a good video camera that shoots 1080p60, the current standard for quality HD video. Then just slow it down in software when you want to analyze body motion.

A camcorder that puts the video you shoot on an SD card and a laptop with a card reader would put you in the instant replay business at any event. You can pull the card from the camera,put it in the computer, load the clips in the software, apply the slow motion tool and watch in a full screen preview monitor. It takes more time to type this than do it. Making coherent videos or movies of the game, burning disks or loading to YouTube can take hours, but can all be done later.

Good luck with the baseball training.
Edited by bsprague - 1/26/13 at 10:13am

My wife has the FZ150 and has not ever pushed the video button.

The FZ200 should work very well doing this in the 1080p60 mode. It may even do better in the 240 fps mode.

Thank you for giving me the excuse to sit in my chair on a rainy morning and try some ideas and play with my software. I learned a couple things about what it could do and how to do it.

Bill