Mountain Bike Films
Canon HV30 or Sony SR-12 for filming extreme sports such as mountain biking?
I have Sony Vegas Pro 8.0
If the camera is to be mounted to the bike, then stay away from the hard disc camcorder (in this case, the HDR-SR12) – the vibration and jarring will cause the hard disc drive head to park so it can’t accidentally damage the hard drive platters – and you won’t record anything.
The Canon HV30 also allows for a 24p video capture – progressive frame capture (not available on the SR12) plus a high shutter rate will provide good video for slow-motion playback – or even decent still-frame grabs.
Sony Vegas version 8 was the first version to deal with AVCHD compression (I think), so it would work with either camcorder. The HV30 captures in HDV (or standard definition DV), and Vegas has been able to deal with DV and HDV for a while.
The bigger question is whether your computer hardware can import the HDV – your computer will need a firewire port because you will connect it to the camcorder’s DV port with a firewire cable. HDV importing will not work over USB and USB to firewire hub/adapter/converter/cable things won’t work.
If it was my decision, I would be getting the HV30.
Seasons- New Mountain Bike Film teaser from the Collective
