What's The best camcorder for beginning film students?

Well, let's make it a little easier for you! If you want to shoot video and then edit it to take out wasted scenes, add titles and music, etc., you're taking a hit in video quality by shooting native with a DVD camera. This is because the video on DVDs is encoded to MPEG2, a compressed format. It's great as an end of the line format, but not for shooting source footage. Likewise, hard drive based camcorders, while convenient, tend to record in MPEG2 (only JVC gives you an option to record in AVI). This gives you the same problem. Additionally, you will also have to "re-encode" (also called demuxing) the footage into an editable format. It's a hassle for those of us who wish to edit our videos as a hobby.

Oppositely, miniDV cameras are much more robust. Cameras like the Elura 100 are much better in format because once you've captured, edited and then burned to DVD, you aren't recompressing already compressed footage, like using the DVD camera would force you into.

Now, let's talk about what PC you're using. Are you a MAC user? If so, it's a good idea to steer clear of SONY, IMHO, as they tend to be incompatible with MAC due to proprietary issues. They do, however, work just fine with PCs, go figure.

I'm a big fan of Canon. Particularly the Canon Elura. It has widescreen ability, image stabilization, recording in Dolby, and a nifty little feature called analog to digital pass through, which enables you to take those home movies you have on VHS and capture them onto your PC by daisy chaining your VCR through the camera and into the PC via firewire. Then you can edit and burn to DVD as well. Great feature.

Some will argue that due to the design, that the Elura can record noise from it's mechanisms being so close to the microphone. My research suggests that this may or may not be a design flaw as many just don't get the noise issue on their videos while some complain they do. I'm not convinced it's a design wide issue and may be due to faulty individual units that need to be repaired or replaced. Still, it's a good solid camera and there are great prices on the link above.

Another good option is the Panasonic GS500. 3CCD camera with both firewire and USB 2.0 for transfer, image stabilization, and recording on miniDV. Word on the street though, is that the GS500 has been discontinued to make ready for a new model. You can still find it available as vendors sell out their existing stock to make ready. And support will still be available for it.

Both these cameras are good solid options. Sadly, both have also been discontinued - although you can still get them for the moment.

Canon announced some upgrades to its ZR-line of miniDV camcorders. The Canon ZR800, 830, and 850 will replace the ZR500, 600, and 700 as the company's budget video cameras. While these new models offer only minor improvements over their predecessors, they're welcome offerings ...

With a price difference of just $80 between models, the three offer similar features. All are relatively low resolution, with 680,000-pixel sensors on the ZR800 and ZR830 and a 1-megapixel sensor on the ZR850. All three use the same 35X zoom lens, and feature *electronic* image stabilization to reduce shake. Of course, any magnification over about 12X is usually going to be shaky without a tripod, regardless of the anti-shake features. Finally, all three camcorders have a 2.7-inch 16:9 widescreen LCD for framing shots.

The ZR830 and ZR850 include a new QuickStart feature, a modified standby mode that Canon claims draws 50 percent less power. All three camcorders also feature SecureDigital card slots, and the ZR830 and ZR850 support SDHC cards with capacities of 4 GB and higher. While the ZR800 doesn't feature QuickStart, it's the only one among the three to offer an external microphone port. ZR830 and ZR850 users have to make due with the camera's built-in mic.

The Canon ZR800, ZR830, and ZR850 ship later this month, with suggested price tags of $280, $300, and $353, respectively.

So, why haven't I talked about HD? I just don't think it's ready for the mainstream consumer because of market saturation of HD. As such, it's purely the domain of professionals and early adopters who don't mind investing a good deal of cash to be the first ones to use the latest. That's changing mind you. As we head towards 2007 (the year that Uncle Sam has mandated for moving television broadcast into the HD spectrum), prices have dropped dramatically this year on HD televisions (from $8K to just over $1K), but let's not forget that you'd also need an HD capable editing software, HD DVD burner, HD dvd player, etc. And you need to unlearn and relearn how to shoot HD. And how many friends and family are actually investing in HD at the moment? Sharing HD DVDs with them will be a problem. So, for at least the next 6 months to a year, HD is still out of reach. But it won't be for long.

Well, my beef about HD is that market saturation just isn't there yet. And in buying an HD camera, you have to also upgrade to an HDTV, HD DVD player, HD DVD burner and use expensive HD DVD media. And since there's yet another petty and rediculous format war going on between HD DVD and Blue Ray, which one do you get? And that also has an issue with what others have. All this, and the fact that HD is still the purvue of the early adopter has prices very expensive and it all adds up.

No matter what you decide on, make sure that you have at least widescreen format options, an external mic jack, miniDV, and both MAC and PC compatibility.

I hope that helps.