I love my Sony, a joy to use (Sony Handycam DCR-TRV18)

Member Name: solamarie

Product:	Sony Handycam DCR-TRV18
Date:	27/10/05 (534 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: simple for the novice but loads of features for the more experienced user.

Disadvantages: None that I have found

My third camcorder had to be a digital one didn't it? I hinted, smiled, generally sucked up to..... my husband. And I got one for my birthday!!! Lucky me!!

I knew it was coming, had already passed my old one on to someone else. Opened the box with excitement. A word of warning for the first time buyer, you have to charge it before you can use it and they don't always come with a film in the box, so if anyone is thinking of buying a camcorder for someones birthday for the first time then remember you need film.
We knew this though so in another gift wrapped box were films ready and waiting for me to fill up. After just a couple of minutes charging the battery you can film while it is still plugged in and charging, now the blurb tells you to charge fully before doing any filming, so I plugged it in and read the booklet that came with it. I don't think I have picked it up since and can't at this time find where I keep it. If I were to ask my daughter, she would probably know as she is much more organised than me, but alas she isn't here at the moment either, so without either book of instructions or daughter to hand I will write a review of my experiences and knowledge rather than one full of technical bits and pieces.
On first looking it over, it didn't seem to be much different than my non digital one. The controls are similar enough to get started filming and make a reasonable job of it. There is an LCD screen so you can watch what you are filming without holding it to your eye all the time.

It's main features are
Mini DV - well it is the smallest camcorder that I have owned.
Colour - Do they still do black and white ones?
Horizontal Resolution - 520 lines, and if anyone can tell me why this is good feel free to do so as I haven't a clue here.
Optical Sensor Type - CCD - I will have to look that one up too
Total Pixels - 800,000 - The playback is perfect as far as I can see but I expect you can get more pixels for more money elsewhere.
Optical Sensor Size - 1/4"
Min illumination - 0 lux -
Adio input support included.
Digital zoom - 120 x
Recording speed - sp & lp, now I know that one, short play and long play, I use short play because there seems to be a little less quality on long play.

Now, shooting modes, there are loads, normal movie mode, which is what I use most. digital photo mode, great for quick photos, I don't use this much preferring to take snaps off the film while downloading to the computer.
Frame movie mode. A movie frame by frame.

The different lighting effects are great fun. They are
Spotlight, Sunset and moon, landscape, portrait mode, beach and ski, and nightshot.
There are loads of special effects that can make a film look more professional.
Wipe, still, Sepia, Mosaic, (put that one on by mistake and you get a right mess) Stretch, Trail, Slim, Pastel, Monotone, Old Mc Motion, Luminance Key, negative Art, and strobe.

I love the faders, fading people in and out of shot links up lots of different scenes and looks quite professional. Tip here, with children and animals by the time they are faded in you might just find they are somewhere else altogether or round a corner.
There are:
Overlap fader - white fader - random - ounce fader - monotone fader - wind - mosaic fader.

This camcorder has, electronic image stabiliser, this is good, I found with my other camcorders on the maximun zoom the image was wobbling about so much it wasn't worth filming.
Automatic programme exposure modes, automatic white balance presets, for indoor and outdoor.
16bit digital sound
Digital video format is MPEG EX
Still image Format is JPEG
Infrared rmeot control.
Video capture is 30fps - 40sec - 320x240 - with 4mb card.
Included is 1 flash memory stick. Standard JPRG 640 x 480 58 with 4mb card, mine came with an 8mb card so I guess it is double that
Fine JPEG 640x480 39 with a 4mb card.

It has a 3.3mm - 33mm focal length lense which you can focus by turning the knob at the front, makes for clear sharp film.
This is equivilent to a 35mm camera 42 - 420mm

The optical zoom is 10 x which is pretty good, the digital one being fantastic.

It has a Carl Zeiss lense and features low dispersion glass.

There are loads of edit functions A/V insert and audio dubbing, low lux/night mode. This is good for filming nightlife in the garden or out on the street.
Some of the additional features I haven't used but include backlight compensation, progressive scan CCD system and DPOF support.

It has an LCD monitor viewfinder, colour with 113,578 pixels and shows exactly what you are filming.
There is a built in microphone which is stereo.

There are loads of connections. I use the USB one and the one to charge it up mainly.

An expansion slot for the memory stick.

The software that comes with this camcorder is Pixela which I enjoy using, you can watch the video as you are downloading it (USB streaming I believe it is called, and take snaps along the way. I always end up with masses of snapshots to print.
There are limited editing features for the photos but loads and loads for the film itself. I have been playing with different settings and making film clips join together in lots of different ways, they all look pretty good but experimenting and over experimenting made some of my films look like a kid put them together and used every available editing tool on them. Still a great learning curve, better films in the future.
I have found that Sony camcorder batteries last longer than other makes that I have used which is why I chose a sony this time. There is nothing more frustrating than filming on holiday and running out of battery life half way through the day, the Sony lasts about 12 hours if you don't use the zoom much or the LCD display, if you play about with the settings like I do and zoom in and out just for fun then they don't last anywhere near as long, but still longer than some other popular makes.

I have recorded many hours of film in the last 22 months and played on the pc with those hours. It does use up large amounts of memory and hard drive space, but film always does.

I recorded my grandchildrens first days, and put those films on cd so they are always with us. I only wish I had had one of these when I had my children young because I would have spent hours each and every day recording their development, which in fact my daughter has done.

I think my husband paid £549 for this wonderful piece of technology. That was 18 months ago.
Best price at the moment I found was on Amazon £499

I expect if you look around the internet you could find it a bit cheaper still, electricals seem to get better and cheaper all the time. I ought to know that as I have loads and loads of gadgets. My husband has said that he has found a gadget that I don't have but he won't tell me what it is in case I decide I can't live without one.

I have looked on the Currys site and also the LXdirect site and these seem to no longer stock this model, I expect it has been taken over by the next generation of mini DV camcorders but for my money this one is worth the five hundred pounds that you might pay for it.

I am new to reviewing electricals so hope I have included some useful information for someone out there.
Oh by the way, I did find a site with all the technical pieces on it which helped a lot as just explaining what this or that knob was for looked really silly.

UPDATE

Another year has gone by and another baby's first hours are now on film. I still use my camcorder but not as much as I did in the early days. It is great for filming on holidays to take snapshots of the film when you get home although the quality of these snapshots aren't anywhere as good as my digital camera, still worth having, it means you can play the film slowly on the pc and click the snapshot with the best smiles, the best light so you never get duff pictures.

Sue

Summary: turn it on and start filming straight away

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