Camcorder Reviews

[Eickmeier]

Videomaker –

Your camcorder reviews are missing one of the most important specs, or capabilities, in a camcorder, which is its low light capability. And please don’t just give us a spec like “lux” or something – I need to know how it will perform for a wedding in a relatively dim church, and I need to know from an experienced user, not the camcorder company’s marketing department. It is just impossible for us to test all of these cameras ourselves, so I humbly beseech you to include this info in your tests. The ultimate service to us would be a few video clips of the raw output from the cameras you test, that we could download and examine ourselves. I have in the past tried to go into a store with my own memory chip and stick it in a camera to test it and take it home and download it. But that is very chancy and not nearly as good as you having a camera under test and doing something much more revealing and showing us the results.

Would that be a reasonable request to add to your routine?

Thanks,

Gary Eickmeier

[Rob]

“And please don’t just give us a spec like “lux” or something”

Lux is an industry standard term. Saying whether or not something performs well in a dim church is subjective. Here are some tips though:

The larger the lens diameter, the more light is going into that lens.

Large image sensors absorb more light.

Get a camera with it’s light sensitivity rated at 1 lux.

[Eickmeier]

Thanks Rob, but I am not a novice, I am a professional videographer. I meant exactly what I said.

Gary Eickmeier

[composite1]

Eick,

In VM’s defense, the terms they generally use are intended for those just breaking into videography as a hobby to those who on the cusp of going prosumer. ‘How well a camera will perform at a wedding’ is a pretty specific question and you as a ‘professional’ should be able to research such info on your own. Mags like ‘Wedding Videographer’ and ‘Event DV’ often deal with those kinds of specifics and you’d be more likely to find such info there. However, here in the forums there are many members, moderators and staff who have either worked with a piece of gear you’re interested in or have access to the info your looking for. VM’s primary gig is easing folks into this thing and they use the baseline terms as to not scare the newbie’s off with daunting technical terms.

[Daryl]

I have a HDR Fx-1 and it does well in low light I also have a Sony 1000 HDR it does well also. Both Prosumer cameras but I hear others do better, but I have to say I am happy

[Eickmeier]

Thanks to all for the notes and suggestions.

As just one example of the need for the subjective assessment of this very important spec – and it is important to amateurs as well as professionals, because amateurs tend to shoot without lights – the Canon HV20 camera that I bought to test the hi def waters shoots brilliant video if there is enough light, but it falls down miserably and crumbles into a noisy mess in low light. But it’s not just a noise issue – there is a static pattern noise that forms a background to the video, as if you were projecting a movie onto the hood of a black ’56 Chevy or something.

I can’t afford a multi-kilobuck pro camera yet, but even if I could, I would need the low light capability before I put out the green – ya know what I mean? I would give anything to be on VM’s staff and have access to all of these interesting new cameras and see for myself how they perform. Let’s have some real useful reviews that do more than convince amateurs to buy things.

And what does anyone think of putting clips from these cameras up on the web site?

Gary Eickmeier

[Eickmeier]

OK – taking it to Email. Thanks.

Gary Eickmeier

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