Digital Video Forum

Digital Video Forum Discuss camcorders, HD video, HD DSLRs, video editing, DV software, and video techniques. Your DV forum moderator is Skyman.
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  1. #1
    Junior Member
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    Feb 2006
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    UK
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    Help: Need a camera - complete novice

    I am a total novice with video cameras and digital cameras. However, I am a web designer and so I need to get myself some hardware with which to get some digital photos which I can use on the web.

    I need 2 things. 1. A digital camera that can fulfill this task. There are so many with varying numbers of mega pixels etc.

    2. A digital video camera with which to capture video for use on the web. Not a clue were to begin here.
    Ideally I'd like one machine to do both. Is that possible?

    I am based in the UK, so need something that is available over here.

    Many thanks for any help.

  2. #2
    Moderator Skyman's Avatar
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    Feb 2004
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    Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
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    Re: Help: Need a camera - complete novice

    i would strongly recomend against getting a device that does both these things. you will be sacrificing to much quality. I know resolution is much lower with web images so a good video camera will probably cut it even though it will be much poorer on the still images but given that lower resolutions are better for web speed then you might get away with it. The questions i would be asking are audience and client related. that is what sort of quality will be acceptable to my client/audience and what would give these images / videos the wow factor that will separate my sites from anyone else's. To that end i think a 3ccd mini dv digital video camera is a must. they are relatively cheap (for the small personal type) these days. the panasonic consumer range are worth looking at. the 3ccd cameras will reward you with more consistently clean video with much great colour accuracy and a nicer "feel" to your footage. also i recomend investing in a good microphone (many of the manufacturers after market ones are good but if you have the budget the likes of akg shure and senheiser should also be looked at). since web video is often highly compressed a clean sound track can make all the difference. as for a camera the jury will be out on this one, but i think any digital camera with manual overides for exposure and a quality lens will be just fine. in terms of megapixels most web images are less than half a megapixel so anything over 1 will be fine. my current favourites are the kodak and fuji premium lines unless you have the budget for a digital slr then almost anything will work. it might be worth checking out some of the other forums on here as well such as the internet and web design forumn http://forums.photographyreview.com/internet-web-design/ and many of the reviews.

  3. #3
    Sleep is optional Sebastian's Avatar
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    Jan 2004
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    Chicago Suburbs
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    Re: Help: Need a camera - complete novice

    Getting video onto the web is very simple. All MiniDV cams have firewire ports, some even let you transfer video over USB. You would copy the video to your computer and re-encode it for the web. QuickTime Pro is excellent for that, the Sorensen and H.264 CODECS do an amazing job for internet delivery, and at $30 it's hard to beat cost-wise. Converting does take a while, but that is the nature of the beast.
    -Seb

    My website

    (Please don't edit and repost my images without my permission. Thank you)

    How to tell the most experienced shooter in a group? They have the least amount of toys on them.

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