Month: June 2009

Digital Video Camcorder Comparisons A How-To Guide For Newbies

When you’re buying a new digital video camcorder, comparison shop! You may be eager, but rather than just walking into a store and taking the first one that catches your eye, know what you’re looking for and what a decent price is for what you want. Making comparisons between various digital video camcorders can be easy with the Internet available just check a review website!

What To Expect When You Comparison Shop For A Digital Video Camcorder

When you go to a website for comparisons of digital video camcorders, you can expect that they will be evaluating many camcorders. Some of the brands that should be at any reputable comparison site would be Sony, Canon, Sharp, Hitachi, Kodak, Panasonic, JVC, Sanyo, Samsung, and a few other less-well-known manufacturers.

Some of the review websites have helpful guides available to steer you toward the camcorder that will best fit your needs and budget. Check for white papers (articles) like How To Choose the Camcorder Best For You or Selecting A Camcorder For Your Needs. Websites want to help you find the best product for what you intend to use the camcorder for, so their guidance can be very useful.

Many review sites have helpful shopping features. Some of them will let you input sort criteria so that you can get results that will truly interest you. Consider sorting by price range, size, weight, LCD size, type of connection, optical zoom, memory / storage type, high definition…digital video camcorders come with many features. Once you’ve sorted by the features most important to you, you can further focus in on digital video camcorders that most appeal to you by doing a comparison of specific digital video camcorder models.

Once you think you’ve chosen a model, or you’re down to two or three you’re choosing between, look for reviews of that specific model. There will be experts reviews of it, which evaluates the camcorder in relation to the features that the experts know are important. They can help you know which models are best for the money.

Also look for reviews by laypeople current owners of the model you’re thinking of giving away your hard-earned cash for. They can’t be taken as absolutely unbiased, obviously, but they can give you hints to things that the experts didn’t think to say anything about. Read several the particularly delighted and horrendously disappointed are those most likely to return to post a review on a website, so keep that in mind, as well.

Best Point And Shoot Digital Camera For Excellent Picture Quality

Like other digital camera models which Sony has brought out in the market, the Cyber Shot W series is the model which is currently top of the line. To choose the best point and shoot digital camera from this series is the Sony?s Cyber Shot DSC-W100.

Its siblings which are the DSC-W70, the DSC-W50 and the DSC-W30 have almost the same features as the new DSC-W100 model. All of them have the same ultra compact 6.7-ounce body and the 38mm-to-114mm 3X zoom lens. Also all of them have a bright 2.5 inch LCD.

But the DSC-W100 can be considered the best point and shoot digital camera because its resolution has been increased to 8 megapixels, and the finish is much smarter and textured on its metal front panel. There is a manual exposure mode which has been added to it. But these upgrades may not be attractive to somebody who wants to pay less, because the difference in price between the older models and the new one is between $50 and $100.

Why It Is The Best

It could be in the category of being the best point and shoot and digital camera simply because it has a sensor which is capable of shooting at ISO 80. When photos are shot at this sensitivity level, they are quite sharp with little noise and few processing artifacts. Photos can be printed reasonably well up to the size of 8 x 10, but they do look a bit foggy and soft.

For movies too it is the best point and shoot digital camera. The fine-quality movies that you can shoot with it really look good when they are played at the actual size. In good light it can shoot really well and performs strongly on movie capture. But naturally it cannot match the best zoom digital camera, when it comes to close shots.

Easy To Use

Like the other Sony models, the DSC-W100 is quite easy to learn and then use. You have to go often to the menu system if you want to change the metering scheme or the ISO speed. The burst mode that it has makes it difficult to change the settings which are frequently used. These small controls tend to complicate matters a bit.

Cons

One wonders why Sony has included a manual exposure mode. If you are a snap shooter, you prefer to use semi-manual modes like program shift, shutter priority and aperture priority. Basically the manual exposure of this camera may not be so easy to use after all, because it provides only two aperture choices for a given focal length.

Most reviews and users of this camera still consider it the best point and shoot digital camera mainly because of its superb picture quality. It is also compact and has good features, like the macro function and the auto focus option. That is why it is just a point and shoot camera, as it does everything for you and the pictures that come out of it are excellent.