iPhoto or iMovie?

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I have both, and they are both great if you were to ask me! But my problem is I don't have a digital camera, or a digital cam corder. Which should I buy? The camera I can get sooner due to low costs and easy access, one day shipping. The cam corder can record live motion, but costs quite a bit and could take up to 2 weeks for shipping.

What do you guys suggest I get?

Just for fun: I asked my friend this question and he told me I should buy more HD space. :) 10 GB on my iBook is good enough for me. :)
 
We've got both a digital camera for still-shots and a digital video camera. We honestly use the dig camera the most. Both are fairly high-end but our Nikon Coolpics (?) 990 rulez! I've never gotten into iMovie that much although my husband has done several projects with it. So I'd say: go with the dig camera first.
 
i've never worked with a dv cam but just working with video from my web cam, my guess is that your friend was subtly telling you to have a place to put those videos before you get a dvcam. the 10gb drive will serve you better for pics then for vids. even with that, you will be amazed how quickly those pics add up. you might be best off to make sure you get a model that does both. almost all but the cheapest models do this. granted a dig canera will only give you a small clip of motion and the dv cam will not give as sharp of pics.
i will say that carrying a camera around is much easier than a video cam. the video's are more fun, but you end up watching ALL the action. with a camera you snap a few memories and then you participate. so i'd say it has more to do with what you expect to use them for than any particular advantage one has over the other.:)
 
Depends...if you plan on showing your family, friends and relatives something cool, take the cam corder(I like iMovie better). If you want to publish it on the net, you'd better go for the camera.
 
Originally posted by Dak RIT
Many digital video camcorders will take still pictures as well as video.
Click to expand...

My husband and I own both a high-end consumer model digital video camera and a high-quality Nikon CoolPics 990. In our experience, the quality of still photos from the dig video camera does not compare to the Nikon Coolpics. Plus, if you find that you like taking stills a lot, you might discover that it's simply not as convenient to use the dig video camera for that purpose. (at least that's our experience). But if you need to just buy one, I can see how a dig video camera would kill two birds with one stone.
 
I have a Windows-Only Digital Camera (bought it before I knew I was going to own a Mac! Doh!) and I use my co-workers DVCam (he practically donated it to me cuz I'm the one with a Mac and use it for everything)...

I use the DVCam for EVERYTHING - I don't even use the "Still Capture" on the DV Cam. I use iMovie to download the video to my Mac (boy, talk about needing more HDD space), and I capture still frames from it.

I download the pictures from my Windows Digital Camera to a shared folder that I can access from my Mac, to a Zip or CD.

Then I use iPhoto's import feature for both mediums above.

Of course, if you want higher quality pics or don't want to go through all those steps, get a higher quality Digital Still Camera - just make sure it's compatible with Mac.

Make sure it has a lot of FLASH Memory (anything over 8mbs is ok, the higher the better). Or even better yet - high capacity removable medium (like 64mb Memory Sticks/Flash cards? <grin>).

HTH
 
Also you might want to look into an External hard drive for storage, I use up hard drive space like you wouldn't belive! 10Gbs makes me cring! :)

Does the iBook have Fire Wire (stupid question? what do I know? heh), if so you can get a FireWire external enclosure for about $100, then stick a hard drive into it (Fry's has a 60GB Maxtor/IBM hard drive for 85$ that should do the trick).
 
I have both a digital camera and a dv camcorder .. and I love both, but I honestly use the camera more. Especially now with iPhoto, you can get prints .. that is just awesome. I have been using OPhoto for getting prints from my digital camera, OPhoto is a Kodak company, so the prints we get from iPhoto should be the same. Anyhoo, they look amazing. You can't tell the difference between prints for a digital camera or from a regular disposable or whatever. It's really great. You really can't go wrong in whichever you get, I just happen to use the digital camera more often .. probably 3x as much. Good luck!
 
Well, I've been looking at prices lately (currently the only important thing) over at store.apple.com and I found out I could get a cheap still camera for $400, while I can get a high quality DV cam corder for $600.

I still havn't decided but what do you guys think of the Canon ZR20 MiniDV Camcorder? You can view info at stats about it at apple's shop website or www.cannon.com. Would it be worth the money?

I'm so young I can't get a job till summer, and money is hard to get around here! So...more comments please! I want to know how much money I need to earn, and how fast it will take to earn it, so comments are very much welcome!

The main purpose of me wanting one of these is to record me and my pal's skateboarding to send out to scouters, and to also take pictures or record family holidays to send to my dad over the internet (who currently is away on Government assignments).


Tormente: And yes, my G3 iBook does have a Fire Wire port. Where can I get a drive for $85??!! That's crazy! Do you have a link?
 
Hey I'm a September Layoff casualty - so I know about the money problem - belive me, I'm right there with you! :p

It sounds like you would be doing a lot of both - Digital Pictures and Video, and I take it you can only get one or the other. So it's kind of a toss-up there.

Personally - I'd go for the DV Cam.

Like testuser said, DV Cams are not the best still picture takers, and Digital Cameras are not very good at recording video.

But I think Digital Cameras are worse at recording Video (less ram, slower chips, etc.) than DV Cams are at taking pictures (I strongly recommend capturing frames rather than using the "Photo" feature on them - but test both see what you like).

And if you're filming a lot of action video like skateboarding - you want something that will keep up with you. That's where I think the DVCam wins (but then again - I have a $150 Digital Camera - I have no experience with $400 ones)

10 Gig hard drive might prove to be too small - but take it easy at first and delete whatever clips you don't want to keep to save on drive space. You might even want to output the finished product back on the DV tape (I was pretty blown away by that feature myself <smile>) so you won't quickly fill up your hard drive (until you can buy an external kit or something at least).

I don't know where you live, but out here in Burbank California - there's a store called Fry's Electronics that has that drive I spoke of. Wish I had the money to get it (or two, or three?). :)

Hope that helps, and good luck! :)
 
Hey thanks a lot Tormente! Your post made me see things I hadn't thought about before! Thanks again man!!!
 
I agree totally with Tormente. I bought a canon MV400i and the real added bonus was being able to select exactly the frame that I wanted which was much better for action shots. The movies are great and iMovie is a great application for what I need. I took my camera up the mountain with my last time I went boarding and got over 100 great quality photos from about 20 minutes footage without even trying.

:D
 
When I was younger I used to get free clothing, wetsuits, surfboards, sunglasses, etc. from my sponsors.

Maybe you can convince your parents to make an "investment"? Then again, it depends on how good you are, your contest results, etc.

As for hardware, I'd vote for the DV camera. I was thinking still camera until I heard what you had in mind.

One final thought, you should pump the model number of the camera you plan on buying into www.mysimon.com . I suspect it will find the lowest price for you.

Vanguard
 
Hello,

I purchased a video camera to take videos of my baby. I ended up exchanging the original camera in for the following reasons.

I underestimated the number of stills I wanted to take. My current DV camera has 1.55mega pixels which is photo quality at 5" by 7". The original Cannon ZR25 had terrible stills. Having motion and still in one camera is very convenient. Some still cameras can record low quality MPEGS on their memory sticks/cards.

Plastic versus glass lenses. Sony cameras have glass lenses that make a BIG difference in color accuracy.

Optical versus digital stabilizer. Cannon is the only brand that has an optical stabilizer. I gave that one up when I went with the Sony.

Imaging chipset. Every professional I have spoken with has stated that Sony has the best imaging and firewire support.

USB connectivity is great for downloading the stills. All DV cameras I know of have firewire, despite Intel's efforts :)

Other frills,
Both powered and intellegent mount. The cannon requires a special battery to power the light you mount on the camera. I can put a portable printer on the mount of my Sony!
Built in flash is nice.
Night vision is neat.
Not all camera's allow you to attach auxilary lenses, i.e wide angle, UV filter.

Other notes.
MacOSX sucks with iMovie. Whenever I do any video I boot back into 9. Importing from either DV camera onto my external 60GB drive stops after about 15 seconds and may corrupt the drive! No such problems in 9.

Hope this helps.
 
Hey thanks a lot guys! Your idea's/opinions have helped me greatly! And I've also made it past the $100 mark! :)
 
I'd go with the digital still camera. I may be in the minority on this issue, but I find that pictures you take with a DV camera just dont make the cut. Basically what you get usually is 800x600, which is very noticable on the computer screen and even more noticable if you want to print them. I have a digital still camera.

Also you really can't do any video editing without more disc space.
 
Hey man, I know what you're thinkin...money! We all need it! I'm only 15 (16 in may) and I work at a crappy fast food placE( chick fil a). I get minimum wage and my stepdad left me and my mom high and dry. I pay for digital cable, cellfone, credit cards, and now $55 a month for 2 years cuz of this ibook. They cut my hours at work and now im barely gettin by..but hey! Dont let it get you down! I've wanted a mac for 3 years and never had it! Now i do! If you want something bad enough, you can get it!
 
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