Best Camcorder for Apple TV Viewing

[AliLeigh]

Can anyone recommend a camcorder for me. I am looking for a camcorder that I can use to take short clips (under 2 minutes) of my kids. I am not doing any editing other than trimming in iMovie, but I want the video output to be high enough quality that I can view it crisply on my large screen tv via Apple TV, not just on my Macbook computer or YouTube. I am overwhelmed with the options.

 

[mstrze]

We use a Flip UltraHD....under $200 720p...I can go from importing clips in iPhoto to having a viewable clip up on my LCD through AppleTV in under 15 minutes.

Image quality is fantastic and it's so easy to use.

 

[AliLeigh]

Re: Best Camcorder for Apple TV Viewing

That is good to hear. Do you edit at all with iMovie first? Even just to trim? If so, how do you import? Also, what aspect ratio do you view on your TV?

 

[mstrze]

The process is:

iPhoto imports the video immediately once I plug the camera into the USB port

I open iMovie and drag the clip I want from the 'iPhoto Videos' folder to the timeline.

Trim as needed...

'Share' with iTunes using AppleTV preset.

After a few minutes of exporting/encoding, it's ready. A 5 minute clip takes maybe 15-20 minutes total from import to encode before I can watch the movie on my TV.



My HDTV is 16x9 and the resulting movies fill the entire screen.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

TV is minimally able to claim HD with a very modest incarnation of 720p. As such just about any camcorder that is HD should be a great option to max out picture quality.

BUT... if you are shooting home movies of the family, do you want to settle for the current TV (barely HD spec)? At some point, hopefully soon, there will be a next-gen TV that will (hopefully) step up to full 1080p quality.

If you've shot your family memories in lower quality, they can only be scaled up to 1080i or 1080p HDTV qualities, which means you lose picture quality. On the other hand, if you shoot them now at 1080p, you can master them in 1080p for a "futureproof" version (even enjoy that version on computer screens), then make a lower resolution version to max out the current capabilities of the TV "as is". I choose this option, as you never get to go back and shoot very precious family video later on, so why not get it as good as you can get it now?

Then, yes, I use iMovie to render a version for TV, but look forward to the day I can replace all those movies with the 1080p versions to max out the quality of what I shot... and what I can see on my HDTV. I'd at least give this some consideration before you lock into a 720p camcorder- especially given that the price differences are relatively minor spread over a few years of use.

 

[AliLeigh]

iMovie Import Resolution

Thanks so much for all the feedback. I am going to try and stick with a 1080p. I actually have one. But it seems I may be seeing grain because I am importing my video at too high a resolution. What do I select upon import to iMovie to scale it back to 720?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Thanks so much for all the feedback. I am going to try and stick with a 1080p. I actually have one. But it seems I may be seeing grain because I am importing my video at too high a resolution. What do I select upon import to iMovie to scale it back to 720?

Nothing. If you are following my suggestion, you import it at full resolution. It's the export that gets it ready for TV. For that, you choose the TV option when you render your edited movie. And if you don't want to permanently store the iMovie version, you also want to render a full 1080 version for the future TV, then store it (probably backed up at least 2 times).

 

[JulietWaugh]

Advice

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