Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube

Subject: Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube
From: Barry Finn
Date: 13 Nov 07 - 01:07 AM

I'm planning on recording an upcoming gig using a camcorder with the intentions of trying to put some of it out on U-Tube (if I can figure it out).
I don't know much about any of this & was hoping that there are some of you with more knowledge about going about this than me.
Obiviously I'm intrested in sound & picture quality but also in recording time & battery life. I'd like to find a recorder that would at least record up to maybe 2 hrs & have a battery life of the same. The normal gig has 2 - 45 minute sets with a 15 minute break, so I'm thinking 2 hrs should cover the norm without having to rush through a changing during the break time. The simpler the better & the format-what ever's easiest. The less expensive the better too.
Any suggestions on what ?
Thanks

Barry

Subject: RE: Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube
From: M.Ted
Date: 13 Nov 07 - 01:44 PM

There are a number of palm sized video cameras that record directly to an SD memory card in compressed format. (meaning you can basically read from the card into your computer, no need for any fancy conversions) Such as these: Sanyo Digital Video Cameras If you do a few online searches, you'll find that prices can vary remarkably for the same devices--I found them from $200-500 the top prices for units that yield unnervingly good HD--there are also cheaper units, made by Aiptek--you can sometimes find them on sale for less than $100--which would give acceptable video, but sound would likely be weak.

Subject: RE: Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube
From: Barry Finn
Date: 16 Nov 07 - 03:17 PM

Thanks M Ted
I found some good prices on Amazon.com. It seems that the miniDV tapes though cheap will be obsolete in the near future because of the tape format. Sony does a CD & hard drive combo format but I think that may be overkill for a simple user like me the SD memory card or stick seems to be a logical format as well as the hard drive which is the costlier of the 2.
Do this need a software program in order to put the clips on a web page or on U-Tube?

Any other info? Anybody?

Barry

Subject: RE: Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube
From: Mr Red
Date: 08 Mar 12 - 11:41 AM

I use an Alesis Videotrak - handy and v good audio - proper mics. The features and the Video are not in the first division. But it is light and small.

S/W is designed to upload to YouTube with the minimum of fuss - I am told.

Subject: RE: Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube
From: treewind
Date: 08 Mar 12 - 01:45 PM

I use a Sanyo VPC-CG10.
You can upload the output of almost any camera to YouTube - they can convert most formats - but the HD mode of my Sanyo produces huge files which would take forever to upload.

I do use editing software Avidemux which is free and multi platform (important as I'm on Linux) for a number of reasons:
- I usually record sound separately and mix back with the video (better sound that way)
- I can cut the tops and tails off the recording
- I can recompress the video data. This gets file size down for a typical 720x1280 video from about 250MB down to 50MB, with a slight loss of sharpness but still good quality.

I've found that Youtube's processing distorts the sound less on HD uploads that it does on lower resolutions. For some reason, others seems to get away with low resolution upload and get better sound than I do, but I've give up trying to work out why...

Anahata (anahatamelodeon on YouTube)

Subject: RE: Tech: What Camcorder for U-Tube
From: Tootler
Date: 08 Mar 12 - 02:12 PM

I use a Panasonic SDR-S26. It's not HD. I bought it just as HD video cameras were becoming common and could not afford one at the time. It does fine for You Tube as far as I am concerned.

I also use editing software, Open Shot<.a> (a Linux only editor) in my case, for the same reasons as Anahata, or at least for the first two reasons as my camera produces much smaller files than a HD camera.

I used to use an editor called Kino, but I've had problems with that since I changed from Ubuntu to Linux Mint - it only plays back at high speed for some reason. I still use Kino for creating animated stills, though as it has a better zoom and pan feature than Open Shot.