Thread: Low Light Video Camera

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looking to get a video camera for night use

don't care about normal light conditions, just low light performance

any recommendations?

thanks!

amk

What about one with night vision? Just go to ebay and search for sony nightshot and you will get a good number of finds.

thx pdcollins609

i'll look into the nightshot

wouldn't the recording look like it was "day" instead of night because of the nightvision?

amk

I do a lot of nighvision video. If you go with a camcorder you are going to have the red, ir, light showing. Also the range is very limited due to the range of the little red light. When you swap over to ir it will more then likely be seen in the b/w spectrum. You are also limited to about an hours worth of video if you go with the mini dvd. I'm not sure on the ones with built in hard drives. I got a great security camera from spyville.com This is the one I picked up years ago. http://store.spyville.com/bwinca56lein.html Then I can hook it up to a vcr player and have it run for 6-8 hours without havint to worry about it or having the red light.

You want to find the smallest lux possible. That is the amount of light that is needed to see clearly. Otherwise you will need more and more light with a higher lux. Pinhole cams are great but, need almost a fully lit room to get clarity and color. Wireless is harder to work with if there is a lot of metal/concrete interrupting the signal. The further away the camera from the reciever the more staticy it will be and harder to focus in the picture. I prefer wired for a strong signal.

Another thing you really need to consider is vidoeing someone without their permission can be a mistermeaner. Especially if they are expecting privacy. If you record voices without their permission it automatically goes to a FELONY! Post something in your haunt saying that you are being watched at all times or something along the lines of videoed on property for security purposes. I never record voice myself just to be on the safe side. You can always add funny soundtrack later on.

Good luck and I hope this helps.

thx for the gr8 info growler!

unfortunately, i'm looking to "preserve the night", that is i want it to look like night, if that makes sense?

there are a lot of good night videos here & elsewhere & i'd like to be able do something similar

amk

Definitely find one with the lowest lux rating but not every company uses the same standard to measure lux. Try and buy something local that you can take back without recourse like stocking fees. I just bought what I thought should have been a great video camera. It was a sony with a 80 gig hardrive. It held a ton of video and the image looked great on the camera. The camera was also touch screen that was neat. Problem was when I connected it to the tv the picture was not that good so I returned it. Remember nightshots are typically green in color and supernight shot makes things look like they are running in slow motion.The last time I did a search I think panasonic had some cameras that were rated good in low light conditions. I currently have a sony that I bought 10 years ago. It was top of the line then but night videos are grainy, that is the reason I am looking for something newer.