N95 and iMovie
Day before yesterday, I returned from a two-week sailing trip that took us from the Turku archipelago to Hanko and then Tallinn, Estonia and back via Porkkala and other locations in the southern coast of Finland.
During the trip, I had a dedicated consumer-level DV video camera for shooting parts of the fun, but there were instances where the camera just was not handy, and I used the N95 video instead.
Back home, I compiled the shoots into a family video type of compilation, and I must say the iMovie works just sweet with the N95 video. Quality-wise, there is little difference between the DV camera shots and the N95 shots apart from the lack of image stabilisation in the latter. In the final "family mix", the content from the two devices mixes together very well, including audio quality.
I had used a stupid widescreen setting in the Canon DV camera which caused letterboxing in iMovie, and N95 did not have this. When interleaving the shots from the DV camera and the N95, I resorted to using the letterbox effect in iMovie for the N95 scenes, and now the content from the two devices is practically indistinguishable.
I did notice, however, that the DV camera does much better in low-light situations, but I am very impressed with the N95 video features overall, and the fact that the format can be directly dropped into iMovie makes the device very usable as the occasional video camera.
Comments
Well, I'm happy the
Well, I'm happy the integration with iMovie works great, but the claim that "Quality-wise, there is little difference between the DV camera shots and the N95" is IMHO ridiculous. Maybe the low end DV cameras really are that bad? :-)
Seriously, there is a HUGE difference not only in optics, but also in the storage format.
From a consumer perspective it is of course a great thing that the N95 still does pretty decent video, and it's really wonderful that there are easy editing tools available.
But it's still really unfair to compare the N95 to a "real" videocamera. That will only lead to disappointment to people who believe such claims and downgrade.
Nevertherless, the video capabilities with the N95 are truly impressive as is the still photo quality, but it still hasn't made me give up my Nikon either. It's just not the same thing.
I would suspect that the
I would suspect that the cheap Canon DV camera I have is to blame. My untrained eye sees main differences in low light, as well as in shaky hands :)
The N95 picture seems a little sharper even, but the sharpness has a certain artificiality about it. Not to a disturbing extent, though.
I agree that real videocameras are probably an entirely different thing. I just don't happen to have one.
Yes, the low end DV cameras
Yes, the low end DV cameras also have very small CCD-sensors and plastic lenses - and I admit I'm picky about them too ;)
You can notice similar issues in sharpness and color between different DV cameras too, I'm especially picky about how they reproduce the colors of solid red objects. Highend 3-chip cameras really blow the low end away.
Anyway, that's not really the issue - it is still very impressive video quality we get from a device the size of a box of cigarrettes which we keep handy all the time.
Re: N95 and iMovie
Yep, I agree, the N95 does like a decent amount of light, but in the right settings it does take very nice video and also still images. I've been very impressed with the different shooting modes for still photos in particular, a nice bit if depth of field effects can be had by using the closeup mode on longer viewed shots. It's a great little camera.
Did iMovie have to convert the N95 footage at all on import?
N95 video
Importing e.g. a 3 minute shot took some 10 seconds, but I am not sure whether or not conversion took place or not.
Quality-wise, I can see in the final result the N95 footage being a bit sharper than the Canon DV stuff, but the sharpness may be a software sharpening effect. Difficult to tell, as a video amateur.