Time lapse suggestions

[Grandad]

I am going to purchase a digital camcorder, I have a budget of not more than £800, can anyone please advise what digital camcorders are available with a time lapse feature, I want to film flowers opening etc.
Thanks for any help. Grandad.

[Brian110507]

I don't think you'll get that option on a camera within your budget, what you can do is use any camcorder then at the edit stage just use one frame from each clip, or alternatively use a stills camera and insert the stills one at a time into an editing package to play as a video.

Let's see if anyone else knows of a camcorder with time lapse capability

[woody67]

My JVC gr dx 100 has a time lapse facility (about £550) and also my Canon G3 digital stills camera can do it.

My previous JVC vhs c could do it too, and I thought that JVC tended to include this feature with many of their camcorders

[Brian110507]

Perhaps I'm not understanding what Grandad means by 'time lapse feature' -- to me it means the ability to take one frame only every 'X' seconds or minutes (where X is variable at the users requirement) and to continue doing that for days on end if required without further attention from the user. I didn't think consummer level camcorders (or still cameras for that matter could do that)

However Grandad you can read the manual for the GR-DX100 here :-
http://www.jvc.co.uk/files/instructi...t1119-001b.pdf
and see for yourself, the nearest thing I could find in the manual was 'Motor Drive Mode' which takes a picture about once a second as long as you hold the button down but the time lapse does not appear to be variable.

And as far as I can see from the Canon G3 specification here :-
http://canon.brochurelibrary.com/pdf...RSHOTG3_UK.pdf
it will only shoot at 1.5 images/sec for max 14 images

[Grandad]

Thanks for your replys. Has anyone any experience with the Sony PC8? I think this has some sort of time lapse feature. Grandad.

[Brian110507]

Yes it looks as though the Sony DCR-PC8 does offer a time lapse feature, if you read the review here :-
http://www.whatcamcorder.net/reviews...onyDCR-PC8.php
you will see that it offers :-
Wait time 30sec/1min/5min/10min
Rec Time 0.5sec/1sec/1.5sec/2sec
so the minimum you can record is 0.5 secs of video - I would of thought that would produce a slightly jerky effect when played back, - time lapse of a sort.

has anyone with a PC8 tried it. ????

[MarkE19]

My TRV900 can do the same as the PC8 (well min record time is 1 second I think). When I first got the cam and read the manual and saw this feature I thought it would be really good, but then I forgot all about it and have never even thought to try it.

If filming something that is moveing fairly fast then I would also think the movement will be very 'jerky', but then as you said Beejaycee, you can then just take one frame out at a time in the editing software. I think this is why I never tried it before when I didn't have an NLE PC.

Mark.

[woody67]

I think I'll have to re-read the JVC manual. I was under the impression that it had this feature. If that is the case, then it looks like I'll be keeping my gr AX-70 VHS-C after all


But the G3 definitely can do time lapse. That link was from a brochure, this is from the manual....

"Shooting Images at Set Intervals (Intervalometer)
You can shoot images at a set interval. This function can be used for fixed-point observation of plants and blooming flowers. The shooting interval time can be set from 1 to 60 minutes and 2 to 100 images can be shot"

[thebrummy_one]

The Sony PC330 has a time lapse facilty. It can record upto 12 hours of filming with between 1 and 120 second intervals. I brought mine from RGB in Ilford for £980, a little out of your budget but it is a nice camera!
Cliff