Camcorder help

[sauluk]

Digital camera has packed in.
Want to replace with either a digital camera with excellent video capabilities or a camcorder which produces good stills.
My old camera was a Casio Exilim, extremely slim, brilliant for the pocket, ideally i'd like to have something really slim, something that could fit in my pocket, although i understand that might be asking a bit much from a camcorder. I have no idea with current models etc. so just need a point in the right direction? opinions?

[Leslie999]

I have a Sanyo VPC HD2. It does 1280x720 video and takes good stills. It's very small (less bulky than my old kodak dx4530 camera) and uses SD cards up to 8GB. There are better camcorders but I'm not sure if there are better ones smaller than this for under £300

[sauluk]

Been looking at Sony W80 digital camera, looks pretty good and videos look pretty good. Might pop into a shop or something to check out camcorders. Dont think i'll get one as small as I want. Might have to settle for a Digital cam with good video. Whats the best?

[redsox_mark]

Generally you'll be best with a separate camcorder and camera. But if you need both from one unit, I think you would be better off in terms of quality with a camcorder which takes decent stills. Camcorders can be quite small these days, but not as small as the smallest compact stills cameras (i.e. you can easily fit a camcorder in a jacket pocket, but not a shirt pocket). Sony CX6 is pretty small, shoots 1080i High Def video and decent 6.1 MP stills. Dimensions (DxHxW in cm) are 12.9 x 6.7 x 6.9.

[redsox_mark]

Or, cheaper and more of a "hybrid" model is the Canon PowerShot TX1

See a review here
http://www.camcorderinfo.com/content...-HD2-32863.htm

[rhubarbe]

Well, my HDC-SD7 fits in my pocket. The SDR-S150 (both of these are Panasonic BTW) used to fit easily in my pocket. The stills quality was quite good on both of these. Then there is the VPC-HD2 as previously mentioned which maybe takes better stills than video, though some would disagree.

Let's turn it round if we can. What are you going to be watching the video on?

[sauluk]

Would be viewing on either a HDTV (not 1080i) or my PC.
Just checked out the specs on the new LG Viewty camera phone, shoots 5MP pictures and records video at 120fps. That seems pretty good to me, surely theres a Digital camera out there which can match that, along with having a small size?

[rhubarbe]

Yes that LG thing might suit your needs. VGA video wouldn't suit mine, but there you go.

[redsox_mark]

It also depends on how small is small. HDC-SD7 is very small and maybe you can fit it in a shirt pocket, but it is 5.2 cm thick, compared to his old Casio which is 1.7 cm. I don't know of anything which calls itself a camcorder which gets close to 1.7 cm thick.

[rhubarbe]

Oh, well I was talking about a trouser pocket, not a shirt pocket.

[sauluk]

Yeh i kind of knew i was asking a bit much of a camcorder to hit anywhere near the size of my old Exilim, im going to try and find a slim digital camera with a good frame rate and a decent video resolution, that'll do nicely. It would be trouser pocket, i never put anything in a shirt pocket, and most of my shirts have no pockets anyway! Ive asked over in the camera forum anywho as its more related to that now! Thanks for the help guys!

[glesgaguyav]

The Sanyo HD2 easliy fits in your trouser/jeans pocket although it might ruin your pant line
It also takes good video, just as good as a decent SD camera the HD is also good but not as good as a full HD cam.
Photos are very good up to 10mp and it has a built in flash.