In a world of cheap Flip videocams, why would you buy a pro camcorder that costs thousands of dollars? It’s for the cutting edge features, picture quality and control that do not come with consumer level models.
The professional camcorder market is not as intimidating as it was several years ago. Nowadays you can find a pro camcorder with cutting-edge features at a not so astronomical price. The video quality of these camcorders is continually improving while prices continues to drop. Now is a really good time to be thinking about upgrading to a pro-camcorder.
Video cameras can be segmented into a many categories. There are many consumer camcorders that can be modified to meet the needs of a professional user. One example is the Canon HV20/HV30. With a 35mm adaptor it can acquire beautiful images.
Most, but not all, HD pro camcorders can also shoot in SD modes. For the sake of future-proofing your next purchase, make sure your camcorder shoots in high definition. You will also need manual control of the lens, especially manual focus. A professional camcorder will not only allow you to selectively focus, but it will also have a manual focus ring on the lens. This is ideal for maximum tactile control. You do not want manual focus to be controlled by a dial, toggle or button.
Manual exposure, iris and shutter speed control are also important requirements. An iris ring on the lens is a nice touch. Most camcorders have a dial or button to control shutter speeds. Typically you should keep shutter speed fairly constant during filming.
The pro camcorder’s audio capabilities are also an important component. At the very least, the camcorder should accept a stereo mic input.
It’s also ideal to buy a camcorder with 3 imagers (that is, 3 CCDs or 3 CMOS). However, in some cases, a single, larger imager is better than three tiny imagers. As a general rule of thumbs, always aim for three big imagers if you can afford it.
As for acquisition format and media type, here’s where new technologies are making an impact. Ideally, you should choose a pro camcorder that will record to a video format and a medium that’s easy to use and easy to archive. Here are the different types of media solution and their advantages and disadvantages:
1. Tape-based – easy and inexpensive to archive.
2. HDV – needs to be captured by your editing application. This could add some additional time to the process. If time is of the essence, this might not be the best solution.
3. Solid-state memory – records many types of video formats to an advanced memory card. Some of these formats are very easy to edit and you can import them just as quickly as you can transfer them to your editing workstation.