Sony HDR-HC9 6MP MiniDV High Definition Handycam Camcorder 10x Optical Zoom

The best reason to buy this camcorder is if you don’t want to fuss too much with it but want to get the best picture you can. This camera takes great video, and really lives up to the name of “Handycam. ” It’s easy to use, and even if you set it on automatic (or “Easy”) you are going to get good picture.

I picked this up as a backup camera on a small documentary shoot, and it worked very well for me. My only complaint was that the battery that comes with this only lasts a couple of hours. I had a shoot where I needed to be fairly unobtrusive, and so I used this camera which is much smaller and more inconspicuous than the bulkier professional camera I had. Unfortunately, the situation went on for about 3 hours, and I was disappointed that I couldn’t capture it all, since I ran out of juice. Next time I’ll know to have an extra, or a longer lasting, battery on hand.

One thing to note is that I decided to bring this along (on loan from my school) at the last minute, and it turned out to be very easy to figure out how to do things. I plugged in an external mike, I set it to shoot HDV, I adjusted the white balance — and none of these features took me more than a few moments to figure out. I am not a professional videographer — I’m very much an amateur — and it was refreshing to have this camera be a no-brainer. (That was not the case with the other camera I brought along. )

With the HDV video I shot, the images were startlingly clear and the colors were very rich, very obviously better than the performance of my older Canon miniDV camera and pretty comparable to the look of the images I got from the much more expensive JVC GYHD110U that I’d brought with me. What is very nice is that it all shoots on miniDV tape — even though I know that there are hard drive camcorders available, I still like the security that comes from being able to have a tape backup even after I’ve uploaded my footage to a harddrive. As harddrive costs go down and it becomes cost effective to keep multiple copies of all video footage in memory, that may change. For now I like to be able to hold the tape in my hand.

I’d definitely recommend this camera to someone who is willing to pay a little more for quality, but doesn’t want to sacrifice the ease of more low end consumer miniDV cameras. (If you do pick this one up, be sure to get an external microphone – since the quality of the built-in sound definitely does not match the quality of the picture. )
Rating: 4 / 5