Any issues with hard drive camcorders?

[cdcollura]

Good day all,

Another issue with many hard-drive cameras is that the hard-drives within use a mechanism with "air bearings".

These are slip bearings held by air pressure (no balls).

Basically, what this means is that the air density affects the hard-drive.

Normally, at elevations below 7,000 - 8,000 feet MSL, this is not a problem, even for storm chasing in Colorado's Palmer divide.

In mountainous areas, however, this becomes a problem ... Especially above 10,000 feet.

Same for skydiving, the Hard-Drive camera is affected by the lower pressure.

When the air bearings are affected by altitude, the hard-drive spins down (resets) and the camera shuts down.

 

[Tony Cook]

Sony HDR Model Drop Sensor

I have been running an Sony HDR12 this season (only 3 chases so far) and wanted to mention another issue related to what Chris posted above. Actually, this comes up because I finally got to chase again on the 29th and had this problem occur several times during heat of battle.

The HDR line has a built-in "Drop Sensor" that detects a camera "fall" and blocks hard drive access. This resulted in 5-10 seconds of a "Buffer Overload" message from the camera, during which time it saved my current movie file, thankfully. However, those seconds can be pretty critical sometimes. I did not drop the camera either- was actually just moving around in the car quickly with it in my hand.

It is easy to disable the Drop Sensor forutantely. Default is on, so you have to remember to do it.

Shake effect is a little much- still learning to deal with that (a lot of it is poor camerawork, but this camera accentuates it more than previous cams). Question about using image stabilization features in general on consumer cams- do folks do it, or does it compromise image quality too much? Obviously if I can tripod, I want to turn it off. Lots of times during chase though, there are quick switches beteween tripod and handheld action.

At any rate quality is very nice, and this seems to be a solidly built camera. Lots of little things to like- the doors covering the AV ports are all little built in plastic sliders as opposed to the rubber thingies that fall off or get in the way. It is fairly heavy, and just feels like a nice, solid cam in the hand. Taking some time to get used to touch screen menus, but getting there.

Editing issues are already covered, and I am dealing with the same issues others are with lack of software supprort for the format, and CPU load when dealing with the video. Again, not a huge problem. for me. I just want the best images I can get currently, and I will worry about the editing in a few weeks when the season is over for me.

TonyC

 

[Bryce Stone]

If anyone who knows a bit about 3CCD or 3MOS would be interested in offering advice I would appreciate it (because I have no experience with high-def, 3CCD, or hard drive recording! ).

I am looking for a new camera, and I specifically want:

• Recording to a hard drive. Past experiences with recordable media (CDs, cassette tapes, VHS, MiniDV, etc.) and the knowledge that recordable media is fast going dinosaur make this feature very important to me. I'd prefer the HD to be large enough for more than just a few hours at a time.
• The ability to record professional quality film that could be aired on broadcast television when I get a good video.
• High definition video recording.
• A compact camera if possible.

With that in mind, does anyone have recommendations? On my own, the camera I found which best seemed to fit what I wanted was this one -

http://tinyurl.com/bud6jt

would video recorded on it be acceptable for the media to rebroadcast?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

[Paul Knightley]

I've gone for the tape option and bought the Canon HV30 - hopefully I'll get more than just sunny skies to film!