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Written by: George Ou 5/5/2008 4:59 PM
720p with the Kodak V1253 from Eugenia Loli-Queru on Vimeo. The video sample above is why I love technology and progress. You couldn't get this kind of video quality for $1000 in a full size camcorder 10 years ago and now you can get this for less than $200 in a form factor that fits in your pocket. The above is a video sample converted to a much lower bit-rate for Internet distribution on www.vimeo.com so the actual source is even higher quality! The video is taken by Eugenia Loli-Queru using the Kodak V1253 who also posted this detailed review of the camera. DPReview has some more detailed specifics on this camera. The killer feature for me is the 1280x720 30 FPS video capture at 13 Mbps H.264 compression which is stored in the SDHC (Secure Digital High Capacity) cards. Just pop in a 16 GB SDHC card at $70 and you can record 2.73 hours of 720p video or more than 5000 high quality 3MB 12 megapixel JPEG images. The camera also has a relatively large 1/1.75" CCD so that it can capture more light and less noise. The Samsung NV24HD is a very similar camera but it's $150 more money and it's only 10 megapixels with a 1/2.5" CCD. That additional $150 on the Samsung NV24HD gets you a 2.5" AMOLED display with stunning color and contrast ratios but the Kodak's massive 3.1" LCD touch screen display is no slouch. I can easily seem myself putting this in to my ski jacket and following my daughter down the ski slope. Oh sure I have a big Sony HDV 1080i camcorder that does much better quality and I'll take that on the trip too, but it's not going to fit in my pocket so it's not going to the top of the ski slope. I have a nice Canon Rebel XT SLR digital camera too but it's even bigger than the Sony camcorder. As soon as I get my new job finalized, I'm leaning towards this camera over the Samsung. I need to do a hands-on comparison before I can decide.
720p with the Kodak V1253 from Eugenia Loli-Queru on Vimeo.
The video sample above is why I love technology and progress. You couldn't get this kind of video quality for $1000 in a full size camcorder 10 years ago and now you can get this for less than $200 in a form factor that fits in your pocket. The above is a video sample converted to a much lower bit-rate for Internet distribution on www.vimeo.com so the actual source is even higher quality!
The video is taken by Eugenia Loli-Queru using the Kodak V1253 who also posted this detailed review of the camera. DPReview has some more detailed specifics on this camera. The killer feature for me is the 1280x720 30 FPS video capture at 13 Mbps H.264 compression which is stored in the SDHC (Secure Digital High Capacity) cards. Just pop in a 16 GB SDHC card at $70 and you can record 2.73 hours of 720p video or more than 5000 high quality 3MB 12 megapixel JPEG images.
The camera also has a relatively large 1/1.75" CCD so that it can capture more light and less noise. The Samsung NV24HD is a very similar camera but it's $150 more money and it's only 10 megapixels with a 1/2.5" CCD. That additional $150 on the Samsung NV24HD gets you a 2.5" AMOLED display with stunning color and contrast ratios but the Kodak's massive 3.1" LCD touch screen display is no slouch.
I can easily seem myself putting this in to my ski jacket and following my daughter down the ski slope. Oh sure I have a big Sony HDV 1080i camcorder that does much better quality and I'll take that on the trip too, but it's not going to fit in my pocket so it's not going to the top of the ski slope. I have a nice Canon Rebel XT SLR digital camera too but it's even bigger than the Sony camcorder. As soon as I get my new job finalized, I'm leaning towards this camera over the Samsung. I need to do a hands-on comparison before I can decide.
4 comments so far...
Re: Kodak's sub-$200 720P HD video and 12 megapixel still camera Wow, that video looks good! I feel really dumb now, I just got a Flip Ultra for Chelsea for Mother's Day. It's also about $90 cheaper and doesn't need any additional storage to be added to be useful...J.Ja
Re: Kodak's sub-$200 720P HD video and 12 megapixel still camera
Wow, that video looks good! I feel really dumb now, I just got a Flip Ultra for Chelsea for Mother's Day. It's also about $90 cheaper and doesn't need any additional storage to be added to be useful...J.Ja
That video isn't close to the max quality either That video isn't close to the max quality either since the video off Vimeo is highly compressed. However, one noticeable problem with the camera is its tendency to over expose.
That video isn't close to the max quality either
That video isn't close to the max quality either since the video off Vimeo is highly compressed. However, one noticeable problem with the camera is its tendency to over expose.
Let me know on the hands on comparison I personally would like to get a new camera and have been debating on this. My girlfriend is very happy with hers, but I still don't know. I would like to get the camera functions though. There are times when a video would be nice and I have plenty of storage for that.
Let me know on the hands on comparison
I personally would like to get a new camera and have been debating on this. My girlfriend is very happy with hers, but I still don't know. I would like to get the camera functions though. There are times when a video would be nice and I have plenty of storage for that.
Re: Kodak's sub-$200 720P HD video and 12 megapixel still camera George says "The above is a video sample converted to a much lower bit-rate for Internet distribution". It's very silly of George to offer such a sample as an indicator of a camera's output quality, especially when he doesn't say how much lower the bit-rate has been lowered by.George says "The camera has a relatively large 1/1.75" CCD so that it can capture more light and less noise." But as mentioned by Eugenia, the video has a SEVERE problem with overexposure (and overcontrast) and there's no exposure control on the camera.Eugenia also mentions "this video was edited using proxy files because Kodak's mpeg4 .mov source files are incredibly slow". I think what she means by "proxy files" here is that the video was converted to another file format, edited, and then reconverted back. If that interpretation is correct, one should be dubious about the demo, because format conversions affect video quality to some degree, sometimes bigly.George on more than one occasion back in his previous life at ZDNET advised and warned people that vendors with marketing boasts about having "720p", "HD", and similar buzzwords, often aren't actually delivering high quality video and instead their engineering is rigged to allow them to make hollow boasts. This is another example of it, I suggest.
George says "The above is a video sample converted to a much lower bit-rate for Internet distribution". It's very silly of George to offer such a sample as an indicator of a camera's output quality, especially when he doesn't say how much lower the bit-rate has been lowered by.George says "The camera has a relatively large 1/1.75" CCD so that it can capture more light and less noise." But as mentioned by Eugenia, the video has a SEVERE problem with overexposure (and overcontrast) and there's no exposure control on the camera.Eugenia also mentions "this video was edited using proxy files because Kodak's mpeg4 .mov source files are incredibly slow". I think what she means by "proxy files" here is that the video was converted to another file format, edited, and then reconverted back. If that interpretation is correct, one should be dubious about the demo, because format conversions affect video quality to some degree, sometimes bigly.George on more than one occasion back in his previous life at ZDNET advised and warned people that vendors with marketing boasts about having "720p", "HD", and similar buzzwords, often aren't actually delivering high quality video and instead their engineering is rigged to allow them to make hollow boasts. This is another example of it, I suggest.
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