Best Camera for Concert Video
In our first article on the subject, “Capturing Great Concert Videos“, we touched on the basics of how to shoot video at your favorite shows. Since that article was written, high definition (720/1080 HD) point-and-shoot (P&S) cameras have become commonplace and more and more people are recording their favorite artists and sharing them on YouTube. Now that the bar has been raised for the average quality video, if you want your videos to stand out you are going to need to take some steps to differentiate yourself. The first step is to start with the tips in our last article so you can learn about cameras, where you should stand in the venue, and what type of memory card to buy. Let’s move on to selecting the best camera currently available for shooting concert video.
Although our Canon camera has served us well since 2008, it’s time to upgrade to something with more than 3x zoom and 720p video. Finding a new camera is a daunting task amongst all of the various models out there – and if you recall from our first article, finding something with decent audio recording capability at a concert venue is not easy. We literally scoured the Internet for months looking at various camera review sites and forums for the right replacement. We thought we found it in the Panasonic DMC-GF3XK, a micro four-thirds (mini-DSLR) camera with a Lumix 14-42mm interchangeable lens and adjustable audio gain. We purchased one and took it out for some testing. The video quality was beautiful, but we were not impressed with its limited zoom. We quickly learned that the optical zoom capability of a standard lens is determined by dividing the larger number into the smaller number. In the case of this 14-42mm lens you divide 14 into 42 arriving at 3x optical zoom. So we returned it and were back to the drawing board.
After more research we narrowed our search to the Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS10 and the Sony Cybershot DSC-HX9V. Both of these P&S cameras are widely regarded as the best current models available for shooting video. Looking purely at specifications, it would be hard to choose between the two. Both shoot 1080p HD video, offer 16x optical zoom (24-384mm lens equivalant), have image stabalization, and record stereo audio. We’re not concerned with the other feature differences as we’re focused on shooting concert videos. One thing we noticed right away is the superior quality low light characteristics offered by the Sony HX9V. Many reviews note the ZS10 as having noisy blacks in low light conditions. We were finally convinced in the superiority of the Sony after watching the video below demonstrating the “Indoor Video Shooting Comparison” between both models. Of course, audio quality is another matter we have mentioned time and again and this is something we couldn’t test without taking each camera to a concert. Fortunately, we were able to find some examples on YouTube of people using each camera. To be honest, neither model blew us away, but we did notice the Panasonic sounded somewhat muddy and had less gain. Both had noticeable distortion in the low end frequency range, but both were easily tolerable and sounded quite good compared to the garbled distortion captured by most other cameras.
Indoor video comparison Sony HX9V video Panasonic ZS10 video
With superior low light results and better audio quality, the obvious all-around winner and our new camera is the Sony DSC-HX9V. Along with the camera we purchased two extra batteries, a wall charger and a case. Each battery lasts about an hour shooting video so be prepared with spares. We found a deal for two genuine Sony NP-FG1 batteries to use as backups. Our only complaint about the camera is that it only comes with a cord to plug into the base of the camera for charging. The Sony BC-CSG wall charger solves that problem so you can charge a battery and still use the camera. Finally, a genuine Sony LCS-CSQ leather case helps protect your new camera. We kept the same 32GB SD card from our old camera and can record about 2.5 hours of video at 1080p HD with the new camera.
Well there you go, our suggestion on the killer camera setup for recording concert videos. Stay tuned for the next article in this series on how to record better concert audio than what you get from the onboard camera microphone.
