A quick and dirty handheld test of a Canon G40 camcorder
These cameras may be unfashionable in this age of the Go-Pro (with its massive image distortion, I doubt many people watch those videos more than once) but the quality cannot be beaten for handheld shooting, especially in flight, from the cockpit. You get
This one does 1080P (full HD) at 50 frames/sec and 28 mbits/sec which is about the best quality one can work with and be able to host somewhere afterwards
Previously I had the G10 (on Ebay now) for a few years, which was great but did only 25 frames/sec which is quite limiting a lot of the time. This was done with it
and for very slow panning it was OK.
A digital SLR can probably beat the quality, especially given that you can change the lenses on an SLR :-)
Not the zoom though. Also they tend to have poor options for sound input. Also I could never get the manual shutter to work properly on my Pentax models (for prop removal).
But yes a lot of commercial footage is done with DSLRs nowadays.
No wonder the big manufacturers are getting out of camcorders…
alioth wrote:
A digital SLR can probably beat the quality, especially given that you can change the lenses on an SLR :-)
Or cameras like my Micro Four Thirds system camera (“mirrorless interchangeable”). I don’t care the least about zoom lenses and use “fast” prime lenses instead (usually carry one wide-angle and one telephoto lens with me). The successor of my present camera can even capture 4k video – and with full manual control over all settings. Dedicated 4k camcorders are more expensive and often less versatile.
The problem I have with videos is the large amount of time (and storage) required to do the editing. And looking around, a lot of people (99%…) seem to have the same problem and publish their videos completely unedited. However, an edited video taken with a 1985 VHS-C camcorder is a lot better than an unedited one from a 10,000 Euro professional camera… to the point that I don’t usually watch amateur videos posted on the net. And go-pro stuff not at all because to the lack of editing (who wants to watch 12 minutes of boring footage just because it contains 15 seconds showing an interesting landing?) there comes the appalling image quality with all those horrible processing artifacts.
I had an awfully close look at the mirrorless scene about 6 months ago. Just looking at pure technology (costs disregarded so e.g. this was included) and having done some test shots I decided to stay with the Pentax K3. It is far more ergonomic than any of the mirrorless ones, except maybe this, but then I am not using it for movies. The zoom lens options were also poor, unless you can do what you want with primes. Finally I cannot understand why the viewfinders all have such crap resolution.
I agree about editing, but also if you have a movie camera with decent controls, a lot of footage can be kept as it is, without spending days editing it afterwards. Editing takes a lot of skill, with maybe more than 50% spent on finding music and lining the music up with the video for best effect.
But I guess most people will pay for convergence, which is why phones have taken over for most general public use and the other stuff is becoming marginalised. And camcorders are more or less dead.
Peter wrote:
The zoom lens options were also poor
I don’t understand this – with an SLR you can change the lenses and there’s a massive selection of zoom lenses out there (if you’re prepared to pay the £££££). Most camcorders also use “digital zoom” (in other words, they just crop the sensor with the consequent resolution loss) for the last half of the zoom range.
Peter wrote:
…I decided to stay with the Pentax K3
I would also prefer this over a mirrorless one. I went for the micro four thirds camera because at work there simply isn’t enough space for another bag which contains a DSLR and accessories. I have one and took it along some times but it really is not practical. The lenses are so big that one keeps hitting them against the windsreen…
Peter wrote:
…a lot of footage can be kept as it is, without spending days editing it afterwards.
I haven’t seen a video yet which could not be improved by cutting away 30-50% of the material. Music overlaid to the video is one of the reasons I generally do not like to watch amateur stuff for. Why does there always need to be music? Everybody has his own taste regarding music and for me, many otherwise good videos are ruined if I don’t like the soundtrack.
Peter wrote:
Finally I cannot understand why the viewfinders all have such crap resolution.
There is light at the end of tunnel. This is the camera which will soon replace my current travel camera (I have not much choice if I want to keep my lenses) and they finally added a real good electronic viewfinder: https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonic-lumix-dmc-gx8-review/3#evf
I have one and took it along some times but it really is not practical. The lenses are so big that one keeps hitting them against the windsreen…
This was finally why I stopped looking at the mirrorless scene. I do about 99% of my stills shots with the 16-85 and when I found something roughly similar, I ended up with a setup comprising of a “compact” camera body, with a DSLR-sized (well, almost) lens hanging off it. The weight saving was minimal – of the order of 20%. It made no practical difference for carrying. Mirrorless cameras really work best with primes; then you can get a really compact solution which can be really high performance (especially with the £2.7k Sony). And some have good movie perf too.
Like everybody else I went through the phase of carrying a dozen lenses and 25 rolls of film 
but it no longer interests me, and would not interest me for videos either. Too much hassle. Too much “kit” to haul around.
BTW the G40 was bought mostly for shooting from the plane (and then it will stay in the plane for the entire trip) and very occassional use elsewhere.
I haven’t seen a video yet which could not be improved by cutting away 30-50% of the material.
I haven’t seen a video yet which could not be improved by cutting away 90% of the material But that’s because most amateur videos we see are done with cameras in the wrong place most of the time. Especially in aviation.
Most camcorders also use “digital zoom” (in other words, they just crop the sensor with the consequent resolution loss) for the last half of the zoom range.
Digital zoom is crap. I always disable it. That G40 video I posted used totally optical zoom. The amazing thing is how the camera stabilises it even at max zoom. It takes 2-3 seconds before it does it best though.
Peter wrote:
I had an awfully close look at the mirrorless scene about 6 months ago. Just looking at pure technology (costs disregarded so e.g. this was included)
Not really aviation-related, but a pal of mine is a cameraman and uses this Sony professionally.
He shot most of the ground-based film here:
Extraordinary image quality.
Peter wrote:
I ended up with a setup comprising of a “compact” camera body, with a DSLR-sized (well, almost) lens hanging off it. The weight saving was minimal – of the order of 20%
My wife (who also uses a micro four thirds camera – I didn’t want to introduce yet another type of lenses when she needed a new camera) has a “pancake” zoom lens (14-42mm which translates into something like 20-70 for a full-frame sensor) with image stabiliser. An amazing piece of optical engineering, the image distortions it creates are digitally corrected by the camera electronics. I borrowed this lens to take the aerial photographs of my employer’s production facilities which are used in their brochures and on the website. The camera with that lens attached is smaller than the body of the DSLR alone.
