Word: digital8
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...blue light--and a shotgun microphone, like the one boasted by the $2,500 Canon GL-1. But, hey, who said anything about professional quality? This is the Blair Witch era, after all. Grain is chic. Save your pennies with a serviceable Canon Ultura ($1,200) or a Sony Digital8...
...figured I'd present the whole thing as a learning opportunity. "Now what?" asked my wife suspiciously, when the FedEx guy unloaded a special Saturday delivery from Sony Electronics. "A Digital8 HandyCam Camcorder," I said evenly. "Reviewing it for the column." She then asked what "Digital8" is. Yessssss...
That's where Sony's recent introduction of digital Hi8 cameras comes in, I explained to my wife. The cameras are backwards compatible and can play 8-mm or Hi8 tapes. You can even connect your old 8-mm camera to the Digital8, convert your old analog Aunt Sonya movies to digital and inflict them on future generations. The new Sony cameras have CD-like sound recording as well. And the four models are relatively cheap, starting at $799 and running as high as $1,299. The high-end unit, which features a nifty still-image feature and comes bundled...
...only downside I found was that at 2 lbs., the Digital8 is bigger than most digital cameras, which can weigh half as much and are half as large, as in the case of Canon's ZR Mini-DV Camcorder ($900). And while Digital8 has better resolution and color saturation than Hi8, it requires twice as much tape: a 60-min. Hi8 tape will record only 30 min. of digital video...
...wife pointed out that because we don't have any legacy 8-mm tapes, the charms of the Digital8 may be lost on us. But the benefits of digital video cameras are still compelling. You can create a huge variety of special effects and generally enjoy far more control over how images look. Also, digital tapes are much easier to edit on a PC; an analog tape first must be converted to digital, which is cumbersome. Perhaps the best news is this: for the next year, Sony is expected to have the only Digital8s on the market. That may well...
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