I need a good/small video camera at a reasonable price.

Video camera high quality for low price?

• I need to find a fairly inexpensive digital video camera. I will use it to compile sports tape, so it must take good quality video. I will also use it for 2 school video projects which, mean i need to be able to upload video to the school computers for editing. What is the best digital video camera i can get for a fairly low price?

• Answer:

  Ok.. given school, you need to be sure you're getting a camcorder that can work with the school computers. Most will, but for example, if the class isn't video-oriented, they may not have Firewire, which is the standard for all tape-based camcoder transfers to computer. Without offering a price limit, this is a hard question to in return offer specifics. You can pay serious green for a very good quality camcorder... you can pay under $100 for a "Flip" style web-camcoder. There are dozens of cheap camcorders like this: cheap non-zoom lens, horrible low-light capability, weird recording formats. I can recommend the Flip only because the software is good.. the video is still poor, but they're easy to use. Aipitek, DXP, and many other Chinese flash-card camcorders have similar quality, but no decent software support. The best deal I've seen lately for a high-def camcoder was a Hitachi Blu-Ray based model (far from the best HD camcorder, but not too bad in bright sunlight) for $299.. but that's over. Usually, you're going to pay $500+ for a high-def camcorder. Regular consumer camcorders, more likely to be in the $200-$400 range... there are dozens of options, and I don't know what you're looking for well enough to suggest anything. Look at http://www.camcorderinfo.com for reviews and suggestions. You can get really good standard-def video these days in most modern still photo cameras. Any 640x480 mode is likely to rival the 720x480 mode you get in all standard-def camcorders. My daughter is in a "Communications Academy" in High School, they do video projects all the time. While I've offered a few video camera to her for these things, most of the video she shoots in on her Pentax pocket digital camera (last Christmas' present). I paid about $100 for that camera. And if this is just for two projects.. borrow something. Even if you think you're going on in video work, rushing to buy something for just one project is usually a formula for disappointment.