Best Low Light Camera

Previously, I ran out and bought the Canon ZR 65MC camcorder to capture my 1 year old daughter's first Christmas. The result with that camera was awful indoor and lowlight films that were grainy and unwatchable. My mission this time around was to find a camera that performed well in that condition. I wanted to stay with the miniDV format because I already had some tapes and didn 't want to bother with conversion, and the price for the Hard drive cameras was a bit too expensive for an unproven technology.

I looked at top rated Canon Camcorders but based on the ZR 65's dismal dim light performance I decided this was not the camera for me. The HC 90 by Sony had gotten great reviews for low light conditions and I wanted to see if that was true. It is. I am very pleased to say.

First what I love about this camera. It is small, light and fit snuggly in the palm of my hand for one handed shooting. The touch screen is easy to use and navigate through the menus, though the menus could be more intuitive. The widescreen provides good viewing for what you are shooting, I never use the viewfinder. Quick settings like "backlight" button change balance for back lit subjects with press button ease, and "Easy" is just that hit this button and camera is fully automatic. You can also change the viewing/shooting screen from 16:9 aspect ration to 4:3 with push of button. I really like the 16:9 feature because most sets permit viewing wide angle pictures in letter box format. Nightshot also works with flip of switch. This is in addition to low light setting. Though color is sacrificed and replaced with greenish hue the picture is still impressive and not very grainy. For example, I shot my infant daughter in her crib in the pitch dark, and could zoom in on her sleeping face. Though picture was a bit green, definition of her face was excellent. Playback is easy. Screen rotates all the way around and touchscreen serves for playback controls as well. Battery information on display seems accurate in terms of how much time remains. On standard battery I have gotten approximately 1 hour of shooting time. Outdoors, the camera takes very high quality video.

I also love that you can burn these tapes directly to DVD with your computer. The software was loaded and easy to use. Cords are provided to help in accomplishing this task with firewire cable for highspeed data transfer with no signal loss. This enables you to load to your computer for editing and then burning for DVD for playback on your TV set. Editing software that comes with is rudimentary but sufficient for my purposes. Sony recommends plugging camera in while transferring. This is a good recommendation because depending on length of tape this can take a while.

I have owned the camera for one month and am very pleased so far. I purchased this camera from Ritz and got excellent price $629.99 with tri-pod, lens cleaning kit and camera bag thrown in.