Video Cameras: A rapidly improving technology
One of the most important changes in the world of technology is the transition from analogue to digital. All consumer electronics devices are affected by that transition. Video cameras are devices in which the transition occurred very rapidly. Nowadays, especially for consumer camcorders, almost all the new video cameras are digital. Being digital has improved the quality of the image, permitted very small and lightweight devices to be produced and most importantly it allowed data to be captured and edited by the owner's personal computers.
The de-facto format for consumer digital camcorders is MiniDV. It uses a very small cassette thus is very small and lightweight. The second most widely accepted format is Digital8. These camcorders use a bigger cassette, like the analogue cams, therefore are quite bulky. The most important common feature of digital camcorders is that they all have a digital port called Firewire or IEEE1394, which allows digital data to be transmitted from the tape to the PC. Furthermore, most of the digital camcorders have the feature of capturing still images to flash media. Some of them have in addition, the capability to record lower-quality video clips to the flash media alongside the video they record onto the tape.
Some companies have recently released camcorders that record on DVDs. Thanks to that capability, it is possible to preview the records directly on standalone DVD players or DVD drives on PCs. Moreover, a new format that records in High Definition has been announced. This format is called HDV and records on MiniDV tapes but at a much higher quality. Some very high quality camcorders are expected in this format.
As time goes on, camcorders with new features are expected to be released. The new camcorder features that will appear in the foreseeable future have the ability to record on Blu-Ray discs and record full frame Mpeg-4 movies onto flash media. Several companies have announced that they will release such cams in about two years.

Eren Tezmen (MAN/III)