Want to get a canon HD camera to film the kids

G

gowhitesox99

Member
Ok so I have a decent JVC SD camera. It looks nice when burned to dvd and played on the tube TV. But Check out this video clip I made with the kids playing T Ball. The stills from my 10mp camera are crisp and by comparision the video looks like dirt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik7lySxfx9M

Take a look at the clip and you will see what I mean. Just watch like a minute or if you like godsmack watch the middle part of the video.

I used Sony Screenblast to make the vid. I had to make it quick so I didnt have time to clean it up but its ok. It was fine to show the family at a little party we were having.

So I'm thinking of upgrading the camera to a canon HD. Then I was shopping and I like pinnacle ultimate 12 for video editing it looks like that software has some cool tricks to it.

So my question is if I am going to film the kids playing sports and family vacations etc... is 1 canon better than the other? I'm learning towards one that does NOT have a harddrive.

Doing some homework is it true that 30p mode will look better when they are playing sports and what not? I might want to capture someof the stills from the camera if it looks good enough and wiki was saying in 30p mode the stills will look better.

If anyone can help me make up my dang mind i appreciate any feedback.

I was thinking HF100, and buying 2 16gb cards, although for vanity reasons I kind of like the whole black look to HD cams so maybe I'll get a HF10 that has the 16gb internal flash for emergencies to have some internal storage and its not a hard drive.

lastly can I shoot some vids and still, edit it with music like my tball vid then put it back on the camera so i can play for friends who have lcd's but no blu ray players?

So to recap

#1 what mode will I need to shoot sports in to get good stills if I need it
#2 can i make a video on the PC and put it back on the camera to playback via HDMI or component?

any other words of wisdom would be greatly appreciated
 
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If you want to do any editing, the HV30 is the camera for you. The HF100 or HF10 however are truly targeted at soccer moms, soo they probably would be the right camera for you.
 
yommytacoe said:
If you want to do any editing, the HV30 is the camera for you.
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good advice if you are on a slow computer, hdv is much easier to edit with when you don't have modern hardware.

i can do cuts-only editing with native 24Mbps avchd on my core2duo, using sony vegas pro, but it starts slowing down when i add titles or dissolves... avchd is very cpu-dependant.

i'll be o.k. when i can get a quad-core cpu.
 
OSV said:
tape is dead.

you can get the full 24Mpbs avchd with the canon hf11/hg20... i've been playing around with this new youtube hi-def stuff, here is what hf11 footage looks like on youtube:

Pro Street Drag Racing SCSN Kirk Wilmes 6.17 pass
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HDV is definitely still ahead of consumer avchd. If we were talking about the HMC vs the XHA1 this would be a different discussion, but the HF cameras vs the HV cameras, i think the choice is obvious for a filmmaker that being the HV30. For plug and play soccer mom type shooting, the HF10/HF100 is a great choice
 
cough cough.. soccer DAD thank you very much :)

Love all the replies. I wanted to go solid state not tape. I have a tape now and when I want to import video man its such a pain. I would love to record in AVCHD pop the card out and pop it in and just go!

I'm going to get a quad core PC in the next 3 or 4 months. That new I7 kind of octacore pc is now out and quad core prices have already come down. I figure in feb/march 09 quad core will be SOOO 2008 and I hope to get a good one at a nice discount.

Wait a sec I said HF10, I think its the HF11 that has a built in video light. I want whichever one has a built in video light. Or maybe I'll check prices to see which is better economically an HF10 and buying an external light or an HF11...

Would an HF10 with an external light be a brighter light than the HF11 with the built in one?

:dankk2:again for all the help.
 
gowhitesox99 said:
I wanted to go solid state not tape. I have a tape now and when I want to import video man its such a pain. I would love to record in AVCHD pop the card out and pop it in and just go!
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I'm slightly concenred about quality (not so much if you aren't planning on editing) but mostly concerned about people archiving their home videos.

Ask yourself, are you going to have enough space to store all the videos you plan on shooting? (14gb every hour roughly) Also you should also consider an external hard drive that will only be used for backing up your home videos, in the event you main hard drive crashes. Video hard drives tend to crash a lot more often than normal because you are writing and reading so much from them. You don't have to worry about such things with tape, since it is its own archival system. In the end I think you will wind up with hanging on to your home videos longer if they are on tape.
 
egproductions said:
I'm slightly concenred about quality (not so much if you aren't planning on editing) but mostly concerned about people archiving their home videos.

Ask yourself, are you going to have enough space to store all the videos you plan on shooting? (14gb every hour roughly) Also you should also consider an external hard drive that will only be used for backing up your home videos, in the event you main hard drive crashes. Video hard drives tend to crash a lot more often than normal because you are writing and reading so much from them. You don't have to worry about such things with tape, since it is its own archival system. In the end I think you will wind up with hanging on to your home videos longer if they are on tape.
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Good thought.

14gb for 1 hour of video is a lot. How much does 1 blu ray disc hold? I was looking a 1tb external drives they are going for about $150 so that's not bad at all.
 
Have the videos on your your computer and have second backup on an external drive (I would even put it in a safty deposit box incase I get robbed but thats just me and my images of my life).

If you don't want them on your computer then at least get an external drive that has a mirroring raid.

Whatever you do, don't rely on optical media. They go bad much quicker than a hard drive or tape would. Tape you might have a few frames dropped over time but no degration and not chance of loosing everything at once (or less of a chance at least).
 
yommytacoe said:
HDV is definitely still ahead of consumer avchd.
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hdv is essentially obsolete.

24Mbps avchd is the same bitrate as hdv, and it's a far superior codec to the mpeg2 that hdv uses... hdv doesn't even shoot full hd, it uses a crippled 1440 resolution.

the choice to go solid state is the right one.

i think that the hf10 and hf11 are the same camcorder, so the video lights will be the same... but it's not good for much more than close-up fill light when interviewing a single subject, don't expect to light a room with it.

i would suggest holding off on the camera purchase as long as possible, i've seen the hf11 at $829, and it's going to drop further after xmas.
 
the hf11 and 10 seem to be almost the same camera being that an extra 16gig sdhc card is $35 on amazon thus making the camera equal and the hf10 is $699 at best buy OR abt here in chicago. That saves me about $150 oer the HF11.

. yeah I just need a light for a little extra close stuff when filming the kids inside..
 
If anyone has any answers to this, that would be awesome..

#1 what mode will I need to shoot sports in to get good stills if I need it
#2 can i make a video on the PC and put it back on the camera to playback via HDMI or component?
 
gowhitesox99 said:
If anyone has any answers to this, that would be awesome..

#1 what mode will I need to shoot sports in to get good stills if I need it
#2 can i make a video on the PC and put it back on the camera to playback via HDMI or component?
Click to expand...

#1 30p is best for sports/pulling stills from sports footy.
#2 IF you're recording to SD card you can pop your video back onto the SD card and play through hdmi.
 
gowhitesox99 said:
If anyone has any answers to this, that would be awesome..

#1 what mode will I need to shoot sports in to get good stills if I need it
Click to expand...

what tommy said, plus of course shoot in shutter priority mode, with a fast shutter speed... 1/500th of second minimum(??), depending on what you are shooting, and what the lighting is like... don't expect much in the way of quality, tho, these are video cameras period.
 
personally I think the HF100 is the way to go. what I've read is the 16GB internal memory on the HF10 is slow to import to your computer. spend the extra money on a card reader & cards.

egproductions said:
Ask yourself, are you going to have enough space to store all the videos you plan on shooting? (14gb every hour roughly) Also you should also consider an external hard drive that will only be used for backing up your home videos, in the event you main hard drive crashes. Video hard drives tend to crash a lot more often than normal because you are writing and reading so much from them. You don't have to worry about such things with tape, since it is its own archival system. In the end I think you will wind up with hanging on to your home videos longer if they are on tape.
Click to expand...

easy solution: Sony HVR Z7U. shoots tape & card same time, all out of 1 box. (10x the price of a HF100, but that is besides the point)

also, 14gb/hr is DV/HDV 25mbps file sizes. thee HF11 can shoot at a max bit rate of 24mbps, so it would be about 14gb/hr, the HF100/HF10 shoot at a max bit rate of 17mbps so we're talking around 10gb/hr (from my fuzzy, quick math)

if you really are concerned about have a safe copy of your video files, just read up on what everyone w/ P2 is doing. they have 60gb/hr to worry about. at 1/6 the disc space it wouldn't be hard to have a few good back ups. int. hard drive, ext. hard drive blank DVDs, etc.


lastly, while I'm still on my high horse... I think tape only still exists b/c it has a legacy of delivering results at a low low cost. I bought a Sony Z7 b/c of the fact that it shoots on tape AND card. I work for people who still want the raw footage on TAPE. but the only reason why they haven't moved away from tape is the cost of the change over.

when you are the end user, & it is just you, the camera & your computer in the basement, chaging to a new work flow (ie tape vs card) is only as hard as you make it.
 
also shooting for sports:

higher shutter rate will produce better stills (screen caps), but create a more "strobe" effect in the motion. it is a trade off you have to make for yourself.

a good way to see this is to video tape cars driving by (30-50mph). if you can still the image & see crisp hub caps, you are at a good setting for taking screen caps. but usually at that setting, you'll also see the wheels look stop-motion like

bright sunny day 1/1000 will be nice & sharp for still pictures, but might really kill the fluid motion.

but if they are really young kids, they're not moving THAT fast. so keeping the shutter at 1/60 or 1/120 might be your best setting.


as for exporting:

you SHOULD be able to play back on the TV. BUT if your editing software changes the format of the video it might not work. if someone knows first hand what formats these cameras can play, please let us know.

I have had trouble exporting HD video from Final Cut Pro & having it play on through my PS3. which is annoying, b/c I want to watch edited videos on my TV. I have had the easiest time taking ANY card right out of the camera & playing it on the PS3.

I'll try to look this up & post back.
 
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