I’ve spent the past few days “testing” out the Nikon D5000 and the Sony Handicam SR68 and I have finally decided on whether to keep or dump the gear…well, not so much the D5000, but the Handicam was in question.

Actually I have to “up my game” on the D5000 because it has more than enough features for my needs. I was a little disappointed with the 55-200 telephoto (VR), well, to be more accurate, I was expecting more from it than what I got. But this was because I’m not used to the lenses and how they function. So, to say the lens sucked would be wrong, it did what it was supposed to do. I may need to get another, more powerful, lens next year but I have this year to do more learning about it’s limitations. All in all the D5000 surpassed my expectations on ease of use, picture quality, and how fun it is to use.

The Handicam started out to be questionable, that is, until I read the manual and found out the features that it has. The night I picked it up I charged the battery for about an hour and a half to two hours and then started shooting my dimly lit bedroom. This was before I looked at the manual in more detail. I wasn’t happy with the way the video turned out. The more I shot with it, the deeper the disappointment. So, I started thinking about taking it back.

My niece’s indoor soccer game was coming up, and I hadn’t shot any daylight/bright light videos up to this point so I decided to hold off and wait to see how it would go. I had someone take the videos while I shot stills of my niece on the field. When I got home I hit the hay, I had to work that night, and when I got home the next day I shot more daylight footage with the handicam. Between the soccer video and the daylight shooting I truly have to say the videos were great!! The clarity was excellent, the motion in the video wasn’t sloppy and overall, I was excited about using the camera this season.

I sat down and thought about how the Handicam would be used…on the trail and 99% of the time in daylight conditions. I should’ve thought about this first before I went on my “downward spiral of negativity”. It truly wasn’t all that bad when it came to low light conditions with the features it has plus the scene selections. It has a still photo feature but I didn’t try that out. I bought the Nikon for the stills and the Handicam for the video, I don’t need my stills camera to do video and vice versa for the video camera.

I will have video on the main site, and maybe this one, in the future, but for now I gotta get the plans finished out and the reservations made and soon.

I wanted to “up the ante” this year with a new “media outfit”, which means new still digital camera and new digital video camera. I’ve been exploring Nikon D-SLR’s, after talking to a few friends about what to get. The consensus was the Nikon D60 and the D90 as the “next level” above point and shoot cameras. When I went into the Ritz Camera store the woman behind the counter said that the D3000 was replacing the D60 and the D5000 was replacing the D90. After doing some research I found that the D5000 has the same features, and a few more things, as the D90. Hmm, well I had originally decided on the D3000, mostly for price reasons, but as I thought about it I decided to spend a few more dollars for the D5000.

Another reason for a D-SLR was that I wanted to shoot in the RAW file format. It’s pricey when it comes to memory but the pictures are incredible. I also looked at the versatility of adding lenses, whether they’re for increased range or effects. My Sony H7, point and shoot, is about the closest thing I’ve used to a D-SLR but it only has a few lenses available and those don’t include increased range. My Olympus 6000 Stylus is a great “all weather” camera but it too has it’s limitations.

I’ve also been looking at a new digital video camera. This has proven to be a task and a half. There are so many types of these things that it’s been very hard to decide on which one I want. The Sony Handicam (DCR-SR68/L) has an 80Gig Hard Drive (HDD), a great zoom (60x optical/2000x digital), face recognition, image stabilization…you know…everything. It’s fairly new and I can’t find any reviews for it, even on the Sony site. Another thing that concerns me is that there is no High Def mode. I can probably do without it, but it would be nice to have. The Hard Drive is nice so I don’t have to carry memory cards around, which this Handicam has the ability to use, so…I’m just going to keep looking about until I can sort all of this out. Maybe I’ll go to Ritz again and talk to one of their people. It worked before.