Post by BogoGog24 on Aug 7, 2016 13:58:57 GMT
So lately I have been wanting to film more YouTube videos, like things for my music and just general videos and stuff, but I wanted to get a proper camera/camcorder. My dad has a couple high quality HD digital cameras but they have no monitor on them so it makes it hard to film yourself and I also hate having to ask to borrow it, charge it, etc. I also work in broadcasting professionally and am possibly going to be joining a co-worker in September for a freelancing gig, so I figured if I bought a camera of my own, I could use it for freelancing stuff as well.
So I did some research and decided I wanted the Sony Handycam CX 405 for $230 at Best Buy. It got good but not great reviews and fit within my budget. I did TONS of research on it beforehand, read lots of reviews, even watched YouTube videos where people showed what the picture quality looked like. I went in yesterday and picked it up, opened it, it turned on, and I could see through the viewfinder how the picture looked. It looked like shit. I had heard that camera wasn't very good in low lighting and even in a brightly lit store the picture quality looked washed out and strange, like it was much whiter and lighter than in real life. I put my nails (painted with blue nail polish) in front of the camera to see if it would pick up detail or color well and the picture was not very clear and not true to color.
So then I picked up the next model up which was the Sony Handycam HDR CX 675, which was $500. Basically double what I initially wanted to spend. But when I tested out the picture quality it was so much clearer and more true to life than the cheaper one. No weird lighting problems, very clear picture. It also comes with lots of features the cheaper one doesn't have, such as internal memory, WiFi capabilities, a touchscreen menu (the menu on the cheaper one was very difficult to use because all it had was a tiny ass button that you somehow were supposed to use to scroll through the menu and even with my tiny fingers it still was a nightmare to try to use!), and external microphone and headphone jacks.
Basically I figured if I was going to spend the money, I would rather spend a little more and get something that was really good and something I would be happy with rather than a piece of crap I would have nightmares trying to use. So I decided to opt for the 675, also got a tripod for $20, a nice Sony camera bag for $15, and the best deal of all was a SanDisk micro SD card, 128 GB, on sale for $60, normally would have been $180.
So I took everything home, charged the battery, and then tested it out a bit and I think I made the right decision by picking up the more expensive camera. It does pretty well even in low lighting, which will be a perpetual issue in my house since it's generally very dark even in daylight (it's a really old house). The tripod was quite easy to set up, very lightweight and small as well. I haven't had the chance to use the camera properly yet but I'm hoping by the end of the week I might to get to play around more with it and in the future will probably do a full video review about the camera and all of its features and capabilities.
Have any of you guys ever used this kind of camera before or any other kinds of camcorders? The only other brand Best Buy had was Canon and when I picked them up they seemed about comparable, if not worse, than the Sony ones and were actually more expensive (I always thought of Canon as being a good brand because I remember Avril did a few commercials with them )
So I did some research and decided I wanted the Sony Handycam CX 405 for $230 at Best Buy. It got good but not great reviews and fit within my budget. I did TONS of research on it beforehand, read lots of reviews, even watched YouTube videos where people showed what the picture quality looked like. I went in yesterday and picked it up, opened it, it turned on, and I could see through the viewfinder how the picture looked. It looked like shit. I had heard that camera wasn't very good in low lighting and even in a brightly lit store the picture quality looked washed out and strange, like it was much whiter and lighter than in real life. I put my nails (painted with blue nail polish) in front of the camera to see if it would pick up detail or color well and the picture was not very clear and not true to color.
So then I picked up the next model up which was the Sony Handycam HDR CX 675, which was $500. Basically double what I initially wanted to spend. But when I tested out the picture quality it was so much clearer and more true to life than the cheaper one. No weird lighting problems, very clear picture. It also comes with lots of features the cheaper one doesn't have, such as internal memory, WiFi capabilities, a touchscreen menu (the menu on the cheaper one was very difficult to use because all it had was a tiny ass button that you somehow were supposed to use to scroll through the menu and even with my tiny fingers it still was a nightmare to try to use!), and external microphone and headphone jacks.
Basically I figured if I was going to spend the money, I would rather spend a little more and get something that was really good and something I would be happy with rather than a piece of crap I would have nightmares trying to use. So I decided to opt for the 675, also got a tripod for $20, a nice Sony camera bag for $15, and the best deal of all was a SanDisk micro SD card, 128 GB, on sale for $60, normally would have been $180.
So I took everything home, charged the battery, and then tested it out a bit and I think I made the right decision by picking up the more expensive camera. It does pretty well even in low lighting, which will be a perpetual issue in my house since it's generally very dark even in daylight (it's a really old house). The tripod was quite easy to set up, very lightweight and small as well. I haven't had the chance to use the camera properly yet but I'm hoping by the end of the week I might to get to play around more with it and in the future will probably do a full video review about the camera and all of its features and capabilities.
Have any of you guys ever used this kind of camera before or any other kinds of camcorders? The only other brand Best Buy had was Canon and when I picked them up they seemed about comparable, if not worse, than the Sony ones and were actually more expensive (I always thought of Canon as being a good brand because I remember Avril did a few commercials with them )