Hi,
am thinking of buying my 1st camcorder, a HDD at that. can anyone share his views on which camcorder models, less than $1000 ( if any), is good, and can have no problems working with Mac computer?
helps appreciated, thanks!
Presently it is not recommended for users who do video editing to use either hdd or dvd camcorder as the videos are during recording compressed into either AVCHD or Mpeg 2 format which is compressed and not an ideal format for editing. I Will recommends getting minidv as you can via firewire or ilink(sony) to capture source which is raw to do editing and during editing it is not as lasped as doing editing of mpeg 2 or AVCHD. Presently Mac only support mpeg 2 editing if you know the secrets on only final cut pro application. Minidv which is a tape format supports most editing software and you can converted to more formats as compare to mpeg 2. if you are planning to get any hdd camcorder to support mac it is a no for transferring as hdd or dvd camcorder only can be transfer either in usb mode which most camera manufacturers do not try to support in mac format but it will improve in years ahead but if thru av out that is via rca cable it is a yes but you need to buy an external video capture card with firewire connection to your mac and plug the av out to the av in and do the recording thru that way. But quality concern i still think minidv camcorder are a better investments and also the tapes are getting cheaper nowadays if you buy in stacks.
Yup, stay away from HDD camcorders if you intend to do editing your Mac. You'll probably have to jump thru' a few hoops to get the footage to be workable on iMovie or the Final Cuts. For example, you'll probably need to convert the clips into quicktime format using something like Mpegstreamclip or the Quicktime MPEG-2 component. Stick with Mini-dv until the codecs and HDD camcorder technology mature.
