Media Grunt: Michael Bazeley

One of our photographers came to work this week with one of these, a Pure Digital Point and Shoot videocamera. It’s $100 at Target. And it could be the way we start getting reporters to shoot video. The advantages, aside from the price:

• It’s reporter-proof (a big red “record” button on the back and not much else)

• The video quality is decent, even in low light

• The audio quality seems passable

• A flip-out USB jack, which means no cords to lose or fumble with

• AA batteries mean no charging or cords

Disadvanatges:

• It’s audio is only passable, and bad audio can ruin otherwise good video
• Its .avi video format doesn’t play nice with Macs out of the box. But a quick export out of Quicktime seems to solve the problem

• It’s feels a little cheap. I’m not sure how much banging around it could take

• You need special software to get the video off the camera

• No image stabilization

The camera is being discussed a bit on the Newspaper Video Yahoo Group. Here’s some video we shot yesterday (admittedly with no real compression, which affects the video quality). And here’s a clip shot by the Racine Times in Wisconsin. Some folks think the quality is fine. Others do not. I guess it depends on your standards and what you’re using it for. I can see reporters whippping out one of these in the field at a crime or accident scene, or for quick video of a subject not already being shot by the photo staff. Bear in mind that this video would likely be scaled down in size to 300 pixels or less and embedded in a story. And while we get reporters used to the idea of shooting, you can bet that new versions of these cameras will get better and better.