![]() You should know, however, that the more you’ve zoomed in, the shakier your footage is likely to be, since every microscopic wobble is magnified by, say, 12 times. (As for the number after the slash, see “Digital zoom,” on the following page.) Such zooming, of course, is useful when you want to film something that’s far away. That number measures the optical zoom, which is the actual amount that the lenses themselves can zoom in. When you read the specs for a DV camcorder-or read the logos painted on its body-you frequently encounter numbers like “12X/300X ZOOM!” The number before the slash tells you how many times the camera can magnify a distant image, much like a telescope. On the other hand, full-blown DV camcorders and tapes are no longer much more expensive than their 8 mm predecessors, and Sony’s Digital8 camcorder family has already begun to wind down. Your Mac can’t tell which kind of tape the Digital8 camcorder is playing. This kind of camcorder, in other words, may be a good solution if you have a library of old 8 mm tapes that you’d like to edit in iMovie. (When recording digital video, however, the camera runs twice as fast-you still get only one hour of recording per tape, just as on MiniDV tapes.) But they can play back either digital video or traditional, analog video. Onto these cassettes, Digital8 camcorders record the identical DV signal found on MiniDV camcorders. Instead, it accepts the less expensive 8 mm or, as Sony recommends, Hi-8 tapes. This fascinating hybrid doesn’t use the MiniDV videotapes used by all other DV camcorders. Here’s another plan for getting your older footage into iMovie: Buy what Sony calls a Digital8 camcorder. Until then, stick with old-fashioned tape that stores a modern digital signal. (Already, JVC sells a camcorder that stores an hour of video on a removable 4-gigabyte hard drive.) Put another way, today’s DV camcorders are a temporary technology, a halfway step toward the ultimate: a camcorder with a little iPod-like hard drive inside. (Until you transfer the footage to iMovie, that is.) You still have to rewind and fast-forward to find a particular spot in the footage. They store their signal in digital form as a bunch of computer codes, but still record it on videotape just like the old camcorders. Today’s DV camcorders are really only half digital. After all, digital cameras don’t require film, and digital TV recorders (such as the tapeless TiVo and ReplayTV “VCRs”) don’t use videotape. If it still needs tapes, how can they call it digital? I was a little surprised to find, when I bought my DV camcorder, that it requires tapes, just like my old nondigital one. The LCD display depletes your battery about 50 percent faster than when the LCD is turned off.įREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONWhat’s Digital About DV You may also want to use the eyepiece when it’s very bright and sunny out (the LCD display tends to wash out in bright light), when you don’t want people around you to see what you’re filming, and when you’re trying to save battery juice. When picture perfection counts, therefore, use your camcorder’s eyepiece viewfinder instead of the LCD panel. The color and exposure revealed by the LCD screen may not exactly match what’s going onto the tape, either. ![]() Now, what you see isn’t exactly what you get.įor one thing, the LCD panel usually has its own brightness control, which, if not adjusted perfectly, may trick you into thinking a scene is lit better (or worse) than it actually is. And thanks to the small, built-in speaker found on every sub-$1,500 camcorder, you can watch and hear your work played back on the LCD screen while still “on location.” ![]() ![]() Better yet, after shooting, you can play back your footage. ![]() The LCD means that when you’re shooting, you can see what the camcorder sees without having to mash your face against the eyepiece. That’s a nice way to play back your footage for a couple of onlookers. Without an LCD screen, you’d have no idea whether or not you were centered in the frame.You can usually flip the LCD so far around, in fact, that you can press it flat against the camcorder, screen side out. Figure 1-3. Your camcorder’s LCD screen can rotate 180 degrees to face front that’s useful when you want to film yourself. ![]()
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