Recommend me a camcorder please?

Buchanan0204

Buchanan0204

Buchanan0204

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Joined
10 Jun 2010
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Scotland
I'm looking for a camcorder. It's main use will be filming badminton, a very fast sport where the shuttle itself can reach over 200mph. So I'm thinking fast shutter speeds, high frames type thing.... wait... shutter speeds? That's cameras right? anyway!

Budget... under a grand. As much or as little below it as needed.

I may do a little editing of the videos, however it will mostly be playing back and analysing. Slow motion would be a good thing, to analyse body movement, position and execution of shots etc.

It will be used on a tripod.

On the other hand. I'd like to use it to film other things when I go days out or travel or whatever.

I have a very limited knowledge of camcorders unfortunately. Is flash memory the way to go?

Cheers!
 
Shutter speeds are the same on a video camera as a still camera, works exactly the same way. So if you want action, such as a shuttlecock to be pin sharp in flight, you will need to use a high shutter speed.

Slow-Motion requires a camera that can record at a higher frame rate, so that when you slow it down, it's got more frames giving you smoother motion when playing it back. Ideally you want something that can shoot at about 60fps, as that looks really good at half-speed.

You can get this with some DSLRs in video mode, sports cameras like the GoPro (which also has a 120fps mode, but at non-HD resolution).

I've not really looked much at consumer or prosumer level video cameras for a while, so I've got no idea what kind of fps are offered on them now. I'm sure the higher end ones probably have a plethora of options.
 
Thanks for the advice there. Had no idea they worked the same as a DSLR! I dabbled in photography with a D5000 for a year or so.

I'm thinking 720-1080p is a must. Don't fancy losing resolution to frames.

If any has any recommendations that would be great and why? Even a make/model to avoid?
 
The problem you have is that this forum is quite photography centric.

People aren't really clued up on consumer video cameras in quite the same way as stills camera, most threads like this don't really get an answer.

My recommendation would be to have a look in the shops, see what you like and don't like and read some reviews.
 
Nexus said:
The problem you have is that this forum is quite photography centric.

People aren't really clued up on consumer video cameras in quite the same way as stills camera, most threads like this don't really get an answer.

My recommendation would be to have a look in the shops, see what you like and don't like and read some reviews.
Click to expand...

No worries, thanks again.
 
I have a Panasonic SD800 which is in the same 3MOS family as the x900. Its an awesome camera, I have used it to record snowboarding at 50 frames a second and the image is so sharp! You wont be able to get super dooper slow mo from it but its ok to go 50% speed at 25fps.
 
Thanks lads! I'll stump up the cash and go for it. I looked at cheaper models and they just don't seem to cut the mustard.

P.S. I presume I can shoot at 60FPS? NTSC. I realise NTSC is USA and PAL is UK. However, what's stopping me shooting at 60FPS?
 
Basically down to the old PAL/NTSC formats and the 50hz power supply of PAL countries and 60hz of NTSC countries. It's just a legacy thing, it's only usually top end professional cameras that can operate at both frequencies.
 
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