As it turned out, those fears were unfounded \u2013 on account that I ended up not<\/em><\/strong> doing any sort of video editing for all the videos I\u2019ve taken of Hannah, in San Francisco and Kumamoto. The HDC-SD20 has been a great boon for us to record Hannah\u2019s life journey in the first 10 months: memories that have become very precious for the both of us. Even Ling \u2013 as observed by the several videos she\u2019s posted up here \u2013 has become reasonably skilled in using the camcorder.:)<\/p>\n The SD20 has one big flaw though: it just doesn\u2019t handle low-light situations well. Granted that these things are consumer-grade and not low-light performers to begin with given their uber small sensors. But when I compare the indoor video I\u2019ve taken using the old mini-DV camcorders versus the SD20, the latter\u2019s video imagery is really, really awful even in comparison. I\u2019ve got a workaround at the moment: I ordered a cheapo third party video light source that\u2019ll get attached to the SD20\u2019s tripod stand, but it\u2019s really only a temporary solution. Moreover, with my at least a month-long and maybe longer trip to Boston coming up, I wanted another camcorder at home for Ling to continue taking Hannah\u2019s videos and putting them up for me to see when I\u2019m away.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n The recently announced camera isn\u2019t available in Singapore yet though, but is already online. I\u2019ll likely wait for a bit longer to see if it reaches Singapore shores soon \u2013 it\u2019s already listed on the local Panasonic web site \u2013 but as these things go, prices get marked up substantially. So, I\u2019m already thinking about making an order for it online, likely B&H Photo Video, once more reviews for the camera are available and they all attest to the unit\u2019s quality.<\/p>\n And oh yes \u2013 speaking of Hannah videos. One trick I\u2019ve found to keep her occupied is to let Hannah watch her own videos on the PC. She sort of sits there with eyes fixed and mouth wide-open watching herself on the LCD monitor, and just yesterday morning she showed signs of recognizing herself in the video footage! She showed this by reaching out for the video screen when the video clip zoomed in for a close-up shot of her. Evidence to come \u2013 if I\u2019m lucky enough to catch it the next time it happens.:)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Another post about toys.:) I picked up my first HD Camcorder \u2013 the Panasonic HDC-SD20 \u2013 more than a year ago mostly for Hannah\u2019s coming into our family. I was initially a little reticent about having my home-video processing work<\/p>\n![\"blog-tm700\"](\"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/04\/blogtm700.jpg\" "\\"blog-tm700\\"")
So, enter the potential upgrade. Some of the best consumer-grade camcorders are made by Panasonic, Canon and Sony. I\u2019ve been keeping an eye out for their models, and was pleasantly surprised to read of a new Panasonic model<\/a> that succeeds Camcorderinfo\u2019s best model of the Year in 2009<\/a>, and is likewise already in the running for the same of 2010<\/a>. The unit makes use of a different sensor system, does amazing well in low-light, and shoots in 1080p 60 frames, a frame rate and quality level that was previously only found in professional-grade video cameras that cost a lot more money. And this unit retails for a relatively low USD999.<\/p>\n