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Quoted from d2m

Since this community has a good few thousand users, there must be someone here who gets their rocks off when enthusing about video cameras…

I’m not really ‘in the know’ about what is good at the moment, so I’d greatly appreciate the advice of anyone who would be kind enough to spend a few minutes telling me what’s good and what I should be looking for.

I’m looking into the purchase of a HD Camera for my business, to film client testimonials and also offer a new video production service for clients – filming of their business – for example a hotel or guest house.

Essentially, there will be a mixture of indoor and outdoor filming, so I’m assuming this might warrant the purchase of an additional microphone for clearer sound quality when outdoors? Obviously tripod will also be necessary.

What would be really useful would be recommended cameras in the <£250, £250-500 and £500+ categories, so I can ascertain which would be the best option for us moving forwards.

Thanks in advance! Since it's nearly Christmas, an outstanding reply will get a festive gift! For those who have no idea, please don't shit my topic up with rubbish replies xxx

p.s. inb4 porn comments.

I think you may need to extend your budget slightly. HD cameras with the features you are asking for cost up to £500 minimum.

the most important thing about video production is not necessarily the video quality . Although it is a big part of it . Sound is more important . I would spend less on the camera and more on a good mic . Here are the boom mics we used in college http://www.rodemic.com/microphone.php?product=VideoMic

Quoted from d2m

[…]

Fair shout mate – like I said, I’m not that clued up on anything above a Flip HD :p I was considering using one of those, but the quality probably isn’t that great for business purposes. One thing to remember though – I don’t need ridiculously high quality for this, the videos are for businesses but they’re not going to be put onto things like YouTube. We don’t need BBC HD levels of awesome or anything :D

Mic looks sick!!

In that case I would go for a Sony camera .

They are :

Good quality
Not to expensive
Have the features you were looking for

here is a great cam http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sony-HDR-HC7-Definition-Camcorder-Screen/dp/B000N20YSI/ref=pd_sxp_f_pt

It is tape however . But it is the only handy cam that has external mic support and camera control which you will need

I used to be quite into this before HD started to become the norm, so heres what advice I can give.

When HD came out, everyone decided to go down the route of ditching DV tapes (which I should point are actually recording digital anyway so there’s no quality loss for it being a tape) in favour of built in HDD’s and SD cards. The problem is that they always horribly compress the video to fit some even remotely decent amount of time on to the tape/HDD. A DV tape was 13GB of data once ripped back to a computer and that was just standard SD PAL, nevermind HD.

So pretty much, try to look at some higher end stuff that uses HDV tapes. Thing is, this puts you up to looking at spending at least £1k on a camera, probably a bit more, also not counting tripods (which are pretty expensive for these higher end cameras). Try checking out the Sony HDR series and the Panasonic/Canon equivelants. Its all proper professional quality stuff, and a lot of it is even the higher end shoulder mounted type of cameras. Might seem overkill, but think about how much more impressive it will look to your client if you walk in with a big professional looking shoulder-mounted camera, instead of something that looks like you just bought for going on holiday.

Anyway, as I say, I’ve not really been paying attention much for the last few years but hopefully that will help.

Quoted from d2m

[…]

Man that looks pretty awesome. I was sceptical, given that it’s about 3 years old – but just watching random video shot with it on YouTube/Vimeo, quality looks really good. Also a very decent price.

What should I expect to pay for the mic/tripod?

cheapest i can find for the rode mic is http://www.warehouseexpress.com/buy-Rode-VideoMic-Microphone/p1020155?cm_mmc=GoogleBase-_-Audio-and-Video-Accessories-_-Microphones-_-Rode-VideoMic-Microphone_1020155

and a good tripod will cost a lot of money . So just go for a cheap one . as long as you aren’t filming in a strong wind then you should be fine . I use a jessops one http://www.jessops.com/online.store/categories/Accessories/Tripods%20and%20Supports/Tripods/products/Velbon/DF-40%20Tripod-77483/Show.html

never failed me yet :D

Quoted from BoneS

if using a tripod go for an SLR perhaps

Was thinking about recommending a DSLR but the more entry level cameras with HD won’t have external mic support and if hes gonna spend £700+ might aswell get a proper camcorder unless there is a genuine interest in the photography aspect.

Quoted from skeej

dSLR is the way to go yeah…

Canon 7D has external mic support and tbh I think it looks better than even a Sony PWM-EX3 for instance (a semi-pro videocamera costing ~6000 GBP or something). Together with a decent multifunctional lens it will cost you about 1200gbp maybe? Maybe cheaper even, didn’t check actual prices.

Way pricier than you originally stated, but you’ll have something which is quite future proof and beats all video cameras in its price class.

But isn’t that a bit overkill for what he wants? He stated it doesn’t have to be the best HD out there just good enough for his business, therefore a cheaper dedicated camcorder should be the best route..?

Canon 500D:
http://www.hdtvnieuws.nl/images/Canon-500D.jpg
http://www.hdtvnieuws.nl/images/Canon-500D-achterkant.jpg

or Canon 550D:
http://www.dpreview.com/previews/canoneos550d/

Both can record video and take pictures at extremely high quality
‘professional’ photographers use these type of cameras to take pictures, recently they’ve added a recording feature with amazing quality (the 500series, like I posted) and cause of the design you’ll have more steadiness than a normal ‘handycam’