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Author Topic: Newbie Q: Advice on selecting camcorders that record MOV and zoom consistently  (Read 6736 times)

zahari

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Hi everyone and greetings to the group!

I'm hoping that someone might be able to advise this newbie (me) who has virtually nil experience with regards to selecting some suitable camcorders for my needs.

I am looking at buying a nice camcorder and am prepared to spend up to say 2500 USD for a primary one and not sure what I need for "secondary ones"

I want to create simple but high quality training videos / tutorials / how to videos on fixing cars and other technical subjects. There is an element of a "talk show" as well, so I will be inviting technical people over to talk about their products and services. Everything will be filmed indoors in a very simple quiet "mock up" garage environment.

These videos will then be uploaded mostly to Vimeo, some to Youtube and then embeded in my website. So all that I am filming is just going to go onto the web.

So far I have only ever used a decent entry level JVC Everio camcorder and truth be told, I was pretty happy with the video quality. But there were two issues that bugged me. One was that it records in AVCHD and the other that it was very hard to get a smooth consistent slow zoom when zooming in and out.

I also ran into another problem and that is it gets pretty monotonous when you only have 1 camera angle!

So, along the way, I started using Final Cut Pro X and I like the fact that it does multicam (not that I have ever used it!)

So for better or worse, I have decided to stick with Final Cut Pro X / Apple.

So, what I am thinking is, I should get one very good camera. In particular, I can use it to focus on and film my guests that are talking about whatever product it is that they are selling. As they might be demoing products and showing how things are done and how things are used, the need to zoom in smoothly and "track" their hands moving and then zooming back out smoothly is something that I think is important.

My experience with the JVC Everio that I have is its so hard to concentrate on the filming part, and also concentrate on not having the thing zoom in too quickly! Its this abrupt zooming or overzooming to me that can spoil the look / mood / pace of the video.

The last thing, as I mentioned earlier, is that it would be very monotonous to have a talk show that has only one camera angle. So what I need would be to have a way of getting say an extra 2 angles. So, the way Im thinking is, my best camera is trained and manned by someone on the guest, one cheap camera is trained on me and is unattended, and one cheap camera is trained on both of us and is also unattended. Use a clapperboard to sync the 3 devices in final cut and edit so that mainly just feature the guest in the videos and ocassionaly go to the other cameras and the one on me when I ask a question.

So, my questions!

Can anyone of you kind gentleman suggest a primary camcorder that would shoot MOV so that it can be ingested into FCPX, and that has a very smooth consistent zoom? I'm also thinking it would have to have a high quality audio section.

Could you also suggest what I can use as a secondary camera to film the other 2 angles for essentially filler shots and questions from me. It too will have to record in MOV. Would I be even better off using a DSLR here?

Any advice, suggestions thoughts would be greatly appreciated as I have such little knowledge in these matters.

Thanking you all

Regards

Zahari










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bcooter

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I am looking at buying a nice camcorder and am prepared to spend up to say 2500 USD for a primary one and not sure what I need for "secondary ones"


So, my questions!

Can anyone of you kind gentleman suggest a primary camcorder that would shoot MOV so that it can be ingested into FCPX, and that has a very smooth consistent zoom? I'm also thinking it would have to have a high quality audio section.

Could you also suggest what I can use as a secondary camera to film the other 2 angles for essentially filler shots and questions from me. It too will have to record in MOV. Would I be even better off using a DSLR here?

Any advice, suggestions thoughts would be greatly appreciated as I have such little knowledge in these matters.

Thanking you all

Regards

Zahari













There are a lot of $2500 cameras in the small cmos design, canon makes a fairly good one though the small chip cameras require a decent amount of light, usually have fixed zooms (at this price point) and are very video looking given the fact the sensor is small and it pulls a lot of focus.  Not that there is anything wrong with the video look for this type of work.

In fact a lot of people have moved to dslrs and some larger sensor cameras to give a cinematic look which will add to the visuals, but always causes more effort as focus is more critical and some videos really should look like video.

Actually look at a show like TOP GEAR that does documentary style videos with eng video cameras.  They put a lot of money into produciton and post but the program is shot well and doesn't suffer.  In fact I think if they went to big sensor cameras they would lose some of their style.

Some of these $2500 cameras allow for connecting a zoom controller that allows you to dial in the zoom amount and do a slow crawl to a fast slam zoom.

Going Multi cam will add interest, but two cameras is triple the work, as your lighting and sets will have to be designed to cover a wider angle, so instead of a 50 or 60 degree angle you can end up covering 180 degrees, you will add another operator, more lights (usually) and increase your editorial time.

One thing that helps for this type of work is to have one camera with a long lens come in on details, an A camera covering the establishing set and a third camera on a jib arm above the set to add interest and a more detailed view.

But once again, every camera more than doubles the effort and you will also need to run some type of sound into each camera, (if only scratch sound) to do sync, especially if you chose to use the auto sync function in fcp X.

Good luck, look for cameras with a connector for a zoom controller and I hope it works out for you.

IMO

BC

P.S.   Avchd is not the end of the world as long as the mbs data rate is good at least 24 to 50.  Obviously you will have to unwrap and transcode the footage but there a tons of small software suites on the cheap like wondershare, that will make very fast work of this.  Kind of a set your preset, set a folder destination hit the button on go to bed.

For sorting into scenes you can use Expression media (I-view) or adobe bridge.

One other thing and I'm sure you know this but single or multicam Always Slate every camera and don't let an operator turn them on and off and lose the continuity.

If you can find cameras that have genlock it's all the better though most genlock cameras are about a thousand more.

I'd look at the Canons as I've used them in the past and they worked quite well, though the build quality is a little fragile.

http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-camcorders/canon-xa20/4505-6500_7-35655907.html
« Last Edit: October 15, 2013, 05:55:24 am by bcooter »
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Morgan_Moore

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You dont need two cams or timecode to do a video that cuts. You need a script.. and to keep the speaking mouth out of the second shot - which is often a CU (close up) of the hands doing the thing.

You then edit to the script, which should be laid on the timeline first.

Often things are boring - maybe doing up a bolt - and you can reduce the time that takes by cutting from one shot wide of the spanners first rotation and then the tight of it hitting home.

Two cameras can help - for example it can be hard to film chopping onions twice- as they are chopped at the end of the first take and you might not have spare ones.

Positioning your two cameras? A 30degree seperation will stop 'jump cuts' as you move forward in time.

Proper shoot/edit skills will lead to dynamic content that can describe actions quickly and well.. we should all shoot the film 'making a coffee' as we learn video.

Develop proper shoot/edit skills with a single cam and no moves or zooms during the edited shots, none.

As for zooms.. well do you actually need to zoom during your shot?

I have an EX1 $5k the zoom is OK - you only get a really good controllable zoom on a $15k fuji lens you see on a TV camera.

Choice of camera?

Well this is going to be driven by audio so probably you want the cheapest cam with two channels of XLR and throw the rest of you money into nice lavalier mics.

S
« Last Edit: October 15, 2013, 06:05:28 am by Morgan_Moore »
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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

Morgan_Moore

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Incidentally that script - don't make it 'hard' make it freeform, the the perosn use their own words. and do it in short chunks, many times, most people cannot even say who they are cleanly in once take let alone describe something.

A camera review..?

Dont say - 'tell me about the new Nex5n'

Break it up.

Formfactor?
This is a small mirrorless camera,
MP?
It has 16mp, which is enough for most applications

I tend to use a set of bullet points developed with the talent.

Have a listen (maybe with the vision off). Yes I did multicam and I did zoom, but didnt need to!



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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

zahari

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Hi bcooter

I am very grateful to you for your reply. You have given me some things to think about. I will read and research up some of the things and suggestions that you have mentioned.

I would like to ask you for some more details though about the subject of AVCHD that you mentioned!

Are you saying that with some conversion software, AVCHD, can be quickly converted so that it can be ingested and edited directly in FCPX?

I was under the impression that this part represents an inefficient "bottle neck" in the workflow.

I suppose a core belief / assumption of mine has been that we can churn out content onto the web at a much greater rate if we set up a nicely controlled studio environment and eliminated this transcoding process.

And so armed with this belief, I have tried to seek out a camera that natively shoots MOV.

So my question would be, are you sort of saying that it's not really important to have a camera that shoots in MOV? Would you suggest an alternative format?

BTW, I would say upon reading your reply that I am someone that is very happy with lots of depth of field and I guess that makes it "a video look"? I am not too sure exactly what cinematic means, but I suspect that it means largely shallow depth of field and thats of no priority to me at all :)

So yeah.... Im happy with the depth of field / video look :)

Thanks so much again for your replies and views.

I look forward to your advice / views on how important it is vis a vis efficient workflow from card to editing if show in .mov. Or not!

If it's not so important, it makes it easier to find a camera  yes?  ;D







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zahari

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Hi Morgan

Thank you so much for your reply.

You have made me think a lot about how to do the shots and how I haven't given this aspect enough thought!

I will ponder on what you have shared and thanks a lot for your views!

It's a bad internet line at the moment so I will look at your video link tomorrow.

I would like to ask you on what you think would be some good lavs to get!

Appreciate any views on that!

Regards

Zahari



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