I noticed no camcorder thread here.

I just bought myself a Panasonic GS-180 3CCD miniDV camcorder.

Hope members can discuss their experience in using camcorder such as how to take good video, how to do converting for different media(DV,DVD,HDD) and do editting.

All are welcomed.

Thanks Harry for starting the thread. I was hoping for a thread like this.
My experience, basically to shoot a good video, you must be a bit creative. If you can plan your shoot that would be better.
Steady hands is an asset in making videos. Otherwise your eyeballs would be going haywire watching it. Take shots that are clear and short. Make sure subjects fully seen in your lcd or the view finder. Dont shoot with half a persons face, cutting the head at the top, back view of a person. Unless you want it like that then go ahead.
Minimise your zoomings. Slow zoom is good. But dont take the whole day! When you zoom in to or zoom out from a far subject your video will tend to shake more. Go closer if you can. Use a tripod if you have to.
When you need to pan left and right do it once. That means pan from left to right and stop. Do not pan back to left.
Close-ups are better than full length shoots. Avoid low light areas. Just like photography the light must be on the subject. If the light is behind the subject and you are facing it, than the subject would be dark. Use your cameras light and if there is none get one. Too expensive,... ask someone to shine a torchlight!! Just kidding!
Once you have a good shoot, then load it into your pc........ next time!

basically to convert you video to a portable media (VCD/DVD) you need two things. first the video capturing device and secondly the video editting software.

most cameras now have both usb and firewire port. but for video editting purpose, i suggest you use the firewire port. meaning, if you don't already have the port on your pc, you'll have to buy the pci adapter for the firewire. it cost less that rm100, together with the proper cable .

the software is the tricky part since video editting software does not come cheap ( the original one laa..). the pirated one of course cost less than rm20. you can also use the windows movie maker, although it is more tidious. whichever it is, it your choice.

i personally have made few VCDs of my own and for friends. basically for VCD you can still see some blurring (if you watch the VCD video very closely). so go for DVD version if you can.

Minimise on too many zooms, they look un professional. First compose your shot & then hit the record button. Use the camera's optical image stabilizer (OIS). That will help, but you still need to keep a steady hand. Video production starts with good shooting first. Then the job is already 50% done. No amount of fantastic editing can correct poor shooting skills & jerky footage. Editing is a skill in itself. You need to be good to cut the clips to tell a story, to make it conservative, or jazz it up to be creative & artistic. But editing miniDV is very time-consuming. If you love it then it's fine, else it is tedious.

Why editing miniDV is time consuming? What others video format is faster? MiniDV is the best quality beside Beta.

It's time-consuming because :

1) If you shoot 2 hours of miniDV footage, you have to also upload 2 hours of footage to your PC.

2) You have to go through the uneditted video clips & cut those that are not so nice. Then you have to arrange the clips so that the movie tells a coherent story.

3) Do some color correcting or brighten footage that was too dark, etc.

4) You have to add transistions when necessary, & perhaps put in titles

5) Put in some background music where appropriate

6) And finally, render the movie to VCD or DVD. In my experience, it takes around 5 1/2 to 6 hours to render & burn about 1 1/2 hours of edited video to DVD, even on a powerful PC.

So that's why editing is so time-consuming.

Andrew

All the video editing have to go through this process. There is no shortcut. accept for the media transfering process. MiniDV have to follow the video footage hour. MinDVD and Hdd can download right away. Film type have to do chemical process. So the shortest time is MiniDVD and Hdd but lack of quality.
Maybe I wrongly understand your meaning miniDv is time consuming. I thaught others format are not time consuming.

Exactly Ozak, miniDVD does not require any editing. Whatever you shoot will be burned directly to the DVD although the video is compressed to MPEG2, which is not as good quality as DV. There are some cameras that record directly to a harddisk inside the camcorder. You can upload the footage quickly & edit it with your PC.

My piriority is quality of the video. So change to minidvd is out. Still prefer MiniDv. Unless they comeout better quality than the minidv. Actually I ve this editing laziness due to long hour doing it. That why I ve a bunch of dvtape lying around haven't edit it. Some more than 4yrs. My friend also give up me liau after nagging so long time.(Those noob friends just don't understand) Hehehehe....

Totally agree with andybiz_2005.

Speaking thru experience.

I myself is using Sone MiniDV cam. Problem I have when trying to upload from DV to HDD the PC does not recognise my viewcam. After spending hours of trouble shooting, I finally give up. Ended up buying myself a firewire card. Then manage to do the transfer.

Then come transferring time, editing time, & burning time.

Took me 1 hour to transfer from viewcam to pc. another 1.5 hours to do editing (adjusting brightness, contrast etc). 45 mins to convert the format to vcd, finally 10 mins to burn to VCD.

So far, I have yet to try converting to DVD format.

miniDVis time consuming but of coz the quality is promising.

DVD still can do editting either in PC or camcorder itself but the quality of coz lose to DV.

unless of coz the HD pwned all of them.



good guide. any softwares recommendation for each steps?

from DV to raw AVI, i'm using WinDV or the software comes with my camcorder.

Editting i heard Vegas, Ulead and Adobe Premiere is not bad.

Then from AVI to MPG2, i nvr done yet, but will try TMPGENC.

I'm planning to buy a beg for my panasonic nv gs 33 (just ngam-ngam to put it inside so i don't have to hang-it at my neck). Any recommended brand with good bargain?? It will be better if can give me location and address of the shop that sell it. If buy ori from pana the price will be expensive la. Thanks in advance.

who knows how to use DV cable?????

is it firewire ??????

yes, firewire

Phew, Just came back from Terengganu. Was there to do a 4 camera shoot. It's gonna be hell editing them.
Anybody out there good in editing corporate videos? This one is actually a training video but needs to be edited in style. Like CSI in AXN or some of the new editing techniques. Drop me a line if you are interested. By the way I am using Adobe Premiere on Matrox Hardware. Thankx and have a good day.

i'm kinda new into camcorder but i plan to get one soon.

based on replies here, miniDV quality is the best? if so, what are the recommended brands that give good quality, value for money, etc...(budget <rm3k)

err.. how many hours of video can i take with a DV tape? how many hours does one battery last? under normal usage...

lastly, which place is recommended to buy camcorder in terms of before and after sale service, price...?

Every time ask me recommending camcorder, I always sugges Sony. With budget <3K, you can get HC42E (or 46E the new model).
1 60-min you can record 60min of video with SP mode, if LP mode, 90 min.
the battery comes with the camcorder can last you about 45 min after full charge. If you are not shooting for long, for example, speeh, ceremony, just for normal home video, this is good enough.

Panasonic ve a good range of 3ccd camcorder. Get the panasonic. DV tape is only record 1hr. Standard battery is 1hr and extended battery is about 2 1/2hr till 3hr. If you buy camcorder, get another big capacity battery. The standard battery came with the camcorder is not enough. Lowyat and sg. wang is a good place to search a latest model and buy. For service, go back to their manufacturing service centre. Don't hope for the shop.

some clarifications on what you guys have said.



(Disclaimer: I own a production house)

If you just need to "shoot stuff", then I would definitely suggest using HDD-based camera. most of these cameras have lots of output settings such as MPEG2-TS (dvd-like), DV, etc. why HDD-based? because you don't have to bother the wait of transferring footages in realtime. suits the purpose of "just shoot2 stuff" I think. and virtually all hdd-based cameras have inferior lenses, which does (should) not mean anything to you. heck, go and get a Hi8 format camera even, it doesn't really matter to you. just that maybe later a bit susah to buy Hi8 tapes la. note: Hi8 records to Digital8 format, which is about the same quality with DV, but the camera itself is of lower quality so almost always the picture quality is lesser. but ONLY lesser than expensive camcorders lah. If you are here, I suggest to shoot in MPEG2 mode. because almost always, you will wanna burn to DVD right? not to send to tv station. plus, it wont eat your hdd like crazy, hehe.

however, if you WANT to be so-called a semi-pro or pro shooters, AND having quality pictures, then that's a whole different thing already. BUT, remember that the gears that you have doesn't matter. you have shoot in 1080p mode, but if your shots, lighting are crap then no point. its your technique that matters, seriously. the only difference between the group above and below is just the camera, and the camera's features. itu sahaja.

first set a budget. I don't know about "cheap cameras", as I deal with RM20+ to hundreds of thousands of RM cameras but if you can get your hands on a Sony VX1000, 2nd hand even, then GO GET IT! a lot of digicam pros nowadays start their life with VX1000.

however, miniDV is just the tape. to put it simply, miniDV is just a kind of storage. 20k cameras or 3k cameras, they all use miniDV. but what sets RM20,000 cameras apart from the normal RM3k ones are the features and the lenses. case in point: NASA satellite, the one that went to Mars, uses only 1 megapixel camera. but the image that came out beats any camera on earth by 1000x, no kidding! The lens alone costs RM4 juta sahaja

For starters, I would definitely avoid considering anything HD, or HDV. it's nice to have that feature, but don't consider that even for a second. worthless, for your concern lah. what you should look for is the lens quality (#1), how heavy it is (VERY IMPORTANT!), how stable it is to be hold BY YOU. to be honest, even if the camera is RM10000000, if its too big to be handled by you after a few hours, then no point what. because you need to have good, stable shots, and the heavier the camera is, the harder it is to make it stable after a while. but you don't want the cams to be so light also lah. i suggest, when you want to get a cam, go to a kedai, then ask for that camera, then ask if you can hold the cam, and then you discuss with the orang kedai while holding the cam, just to get the feel of the cam for more than 5 mins.

if the camera has a handle, a big, big plus. u'd be surprised how great a shot can look when you hold it with the handle. but I suppose Rm3k cameras don't really have this feature, right? moving on.......

always, always, have at least 2 batteries. the standard one, and the long-lasting ones. a note: sony cams is great on this part. for some reason sony cams have super gila punya batteries. my sony nw-hd5 mp3 player also can last for 45 hours nonstop. so if battery life is important to you, then search sony cams lah.

and it goes without mention that ask only about the optical zoom, not the total zoom, combined zoom, or digital zoom. those are WORTHLESS. like 3x, 5x, 10x lah. not 100x, 1000x.

if it can take picture, then ok la. but not really important. unless you want to use the same cam to take pictures also lah. but then if you are in this group, then you really are in the first "just shoot2" group. get a hdd based one. better value, no need to get those stupid memory sticks or sd cards. and besides, if you really have to take a still pic with a camcorder, just record a few seconds to miniDV tape, then get a frame from your editing software lah.

as for picture quality, point #1 is have a great lens. not Hi8, not miniDV. point #2, choose the best recording format. MPEG2, or MPEG2-TS is the lowest that you wanna go (just don't). its like this la (might be incorrect, I just woke up ) -
MPEG2>DV,Digital8>DVCPRO50>DigiBeta>Uncompressed world

just remember that this is a technical comparison, not picture quality. again, picture quality = $$ lens. and please, oh please, don't ever shoot in LP mode. if you like to have longer time to shoot than just 60 mins, then you are in the hdd group. trust me, you'll be a lot happier being there. Note: sony just released 83min miniDV tape.

next time I will talk about NLEs lah. NON LINEAR EDITING. or post production. or the editing softwares.

a few short tips before I mandi.
1. if you have low budget, then stop dreaming about good quality. no such thing as cheap, good quality, can cook for you, etc.
2. stick with what you have, and be happy. focus more on what you can do - SHOT QUALITY!
3. something to always remember by when going miniDV/digital. the one biggest flaw with these cameras compared to analog cameras like BETA cams are the lighting condition. you want good looking picture? then GET MORE LIGHT!

no point having canon XL1 but shoot in poor lighting condition. if you can, try to shoot where the light actually ENTERS the camera's lens ke, use bounce light ke. but the general rule is if it looks just nice with your eyes, then add more light. camera lens is bad compared to God's lens, trust me
4. "For service, go back to their manufacturing service centre. Don't hope for the shop."
You get what you pay for. If you want to save a few hundred by buying dekat kedai yam seng dan anak, then don't cry like hell when you drop your camera or the lens calar. because sometimes they can sell cheap because they import. and most imported cameras ("grey cams" what we call them) are not covered locally as far as i know.
5. stabiliser/antishaker mode - a big, big plus.

if you really need to save a few hundred by buying there not in official distributors, then better wait a few more months lah, and search and learn shooting techniques during that time.

good luck!

This post has been edited by C-Fu: Sep 10 2006, 11:23 AM

I have a camcorder lying around collecting dust. It is canon mvx3i or optura xi in US. I have 1 extra long life battery with lights.

But the thing is, after we got out video done, where can we share it? How to improve? Where can I find video shooting club???