PH video guru's £150 camcorder suggestion please :)

[TinyCappo]

Mrs Tiny is expecting sprog No.1 in about 5 weeks and she has asked me to get a video camera camcorder thing to record baby and other such things.

I know nothing about them at all so I turn to the PH collective.

I have a budget of about £150. Suggestions please

[MogulBoy]

Hate to put a chap off purchasing a gadget but if you have an iPhone (or equivalent?), you might be surprised how good the video output can be. The current version of iOS has a great built-in stabilisation feature that has impressed me. Its fun to look back on random short clips of family life that you might never have collected if you had to dig out your (charged!) "video camera". If you can find the time, it is always worth finding a solution to editing to get the best clips but this can be done years later. The key is to keep accumulating priceless footage! (and back it up).

[TinyCappo]

My thoughts on the matter exactly.

The Galaxy note (Yes I have clown hands so dont look ridiculous using it) has a video mode, it offers three modes (normal 1,080p, MMS-friendly and self-recording, which uses the 640x480-pixel front camera), exposure control and three special effect settings (monochrome, sepia and negative). As for the finished results? Well, it's 1,080p at 30 frames per second, but don't expect results that will rival a Blu-ray disc: it has a tiny sensor which means you see alot of noise.

Id love to get a mini DSLR thing that I can actually use for photos as well as do the odd video of baby rather than get a video camera which does exactly the same function as my phone and will only be used very occasionally.

[MogulBoy]

I have played around a bit with DSLR video and it can give great results but I rarely have the time to extract the best from it and end up a bit frustrated. Low light and shallow depth of field can be fun but current gen DSLR autofocus isnt really an ideal companion. In really bright snow/beach conditions, a nice variable ND filter would be a good idea to control shutter speeds so that you can avoid capturing at 1/4000th F22 as even though each frame may be usable on a standalone basis, the overall result will be jerk-city unless you have acceptable shutter speeds.

I would quite like to experiment with a GoPro or the new Sony HDR-AS15 Action Camcorder. Something that had built in timelapse functionality would also be useful...

[TinyCappo]

narrowed it down to this last night

http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Search/searchTerms/5...

Edited by TinyCappo on Thursday 14th March 09:18