• DSLR Video

  Mini-camera suuggestions?

  Posted by Paddy Uglow on October 25, 2013 at 11:02 am

  Hi,
  This is the nearest forum I can find to being right for this request:
  I’m very happy with my Panny GH2 as my main camera, and I’ve been using Kodak zi8s as my “b cameras”, dotted around on marquee clips with CCTV mounts.
  But I wish there was something as SMALL, cheapish, as long-battery-life and easy to use as the zi8s, but with better low light performance, better video quality, and maybe a bit of optical zoom too. Anybody know of such a thing? Ideally that’ll shoot at 25fps too: I get flicker from some lights when I shoot at 29.97fps here in the UK.
  I’ve looked at GoPros, but they seem to always have mega-wide lenses. The only similar camera I’ve tried (a Sanyo mini-cam) was complicated to set up and the video looked a lot worse than the zi8s.
  Thanks in advance for your suggestions/thoughts.
  – Paddy

  Paddy, CreativeMedia.org.uk

  Bill Bruner replied 12 years, 6 months ago 3 Members · 6 Replies
• 6 Replies

• 

  Bill Bruner

  October 25, 2013 at 4:32 pm

  Hi Paddy and welcome to the forum. If you don’t need an external mic jack, I recommend the £219 Panasonic TZ40 with its 20x zoom, 1080/50p (which easily conforms to 25p) and 720/100p. You can also control it via wi-fi for remote shooting.

  Much smaller than your GH2: Size Comparison Between Panasonic GH-2 and TZ Cameras

  Here is what this little camera can do: “Herons” by Mark Rosenzweig on Vimeo

  Hope this is helpful!

  Bill
  Hybrid Camera Revolution
• 

  Paddy Uglow

  October 26, 2013 at 10:59 am

  Thanks Bill,
  The other requirement I should have added was the the European version of whatever camera I choose shouldn’t have a time limit on how long it’ll shoot video for. I often want to shoot for up to two hours, and cameras here tend to be limited to 29 minutes shooting because of tax laws 🙁
  I chose the GH2 because the restriction can be hacked off! 🙂
• 

  Bill Bruner

  October 26, 2013 at 3:45 pm

  Ugh – I apologize. I should have realized that when I saw that you were shooting events.

  In that case, the best you can do for the money is probably a used Sony GW55VE for £241.60 from Amazon UK. This camera shoots at 1080/50p, has a 10x zoom, is waterproof, and is a camcorder, with no clip length limit in the EU.

  Here is the image quality the US version of this camera, the GW77, can produce (again from Mark Rosenzweig on Vimeo): Fall in Nanjing, Part 2

  Hope this is closer to what you need!

  Bill
  Hybrid Camera Revolution
• 

  Al Bergstein

  October 26, 2013 at 5:14 pm

  You might also take a look at the Canon EOS-M. I really like mine, and it’s not much larger than the Kodak when you have the 22mm pancake lens on it. Uses the same sensor as the 7D. Takes fabulous footage, and with an adapter you can mount canon lenses on it. Also has a mic in and you can adjust the volume levels. They appear to be close to putting out a new version, and the current version is very inexpensive in the States.

  Al
• 

  Paddy Uglow

  October 26, 2013 at 5:33 pm

  Thanks for suggestions and the link. I’m inclined towards the Sony one – I’ll do some more research and see whether I can persuade my workplace to go for some to upgrade the zi8s.
  The Sanyo one I got (I don’t remember the model immediately) had the power input in the bottom, so it couldn’t use the tripod mount and the power at once!! And the quality was disappointing.
  – Paddy
• 

  Bill Bruner

  October 26, 2013 at 7:18 pm

  Sadly, the EOS M is limited to 22 minutes of continuous video, both in the EU and in the States.

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