Good Things Come In Small Packages
Written: Jul 27 '00 (Updated Jan 22 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Small Size; Intuitive Controls; Good Audio/Video Quality
Cons: Short Storage Life of Battery
The Bottom Line: There are many purchases one will make in their life that they will regret. For us, this Sharp Viewcam is not one of them.
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| Sunliner's Full Review: Sharp VL-E610U 8mm Analog Camcorder |
Most people buy a camera or camcorder before they go on vacation. We bought ours after we returned from one. We'd never owned a video camera before, but a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Alaska made us wish we'd had one. When we returned, we shopped around town and bought this Sharp Viewcam at Wal-Mart for about $400.
My wife and I both wear glasses, so we rationalized that if we got one of the "hybrid" cameras with both a viewfinder and a flip-out lcd screen, we'd never use the viewfinder anyway...so why not just get a camera with only the lcd screen? Turns out we made an excellent decision. The Sharp Viewcam design is super-versatile and lends itself well to videotaping things from different perspectives and angles. Instead of having to hold the camera up to your head to use it, you can hold it just any way you want, and angle the screen so you can see it.
Too, this is a small camcorder. It's not much larger than a VHS videocassette, just thicker where the lens pokes out. It's easy to carry, and easy to hold up or use. It's easy to conceal from larcenous eyes, as well.
For instance, when my wife graduated from Purdue University, I smuggled our little Viewcam into Elliot Hall with me and shot my own bootleg video of the ceremony, bypassing the $50 charge for the "official" video. A large part of my ability to do this was the way I could hold the camera up to my chest or rest it on my shoulder and point it away through the audience, yet not hold it up to my head and alert all around me that "hey, I'm taping here!" I was totally unobtrusive.
This camcorder has a 16x zoom. Compared to the current crops of 64x "digitally enhanced" zoom cameras, 16x may seem puny. The secret is in the "digitally enhanced" part...I've seen these cameras at their extreme zoom, and the "enhancement" usually cuts the image into blocks that render the subject unrecognizable. Not so with this 16x Sharp...no enhancement. At the maximum zoom the picture is still crisp and, erm, sharp.
Utilizing the camcorder's features -- like low-light settings, manual/auto focus, titles, date/time stamp and so on -- is highly intuitive and very easy to learn. All features are run via on-screen menus run by buttons under the LCD panel. There is never any question as to which button performs which function. Record start/stop, fade in/out and zoom are all controlled with your right thumb.
A nice feature of this camera is the simple video-out jack and cable supplied with it. Simply plug the 1/8" headphone-jack end of the cable into a jack that resides under a rubber cover, and plug the audio/video composite plugs into the matching jacks on your vcr. Presto, instant picture on your tv, and/or transfer to standard VHS videotapes. On a personal note, I bought a video card for my home computer that has composite video in and out jacks. This means that I can plug my Sharp Viewcam directly into the back of my computer and capture video straight from the source...a great way to get pictures on the internet quick without buying a digital camera to sit beside my 35mm Pentax and Sharp Viewcam.
Our camera came with a patch cable to a VCR, lens-cap on a lanyard, a shoulder strap, a battery charger and AC adapter cord, a remote and batteries for the camcorder's clock, the remote and the camcorder itself. After almost two years of use, this camera still functions like new, and looks almost like new. It shoots decent quality video and records sounds well. Although the 8mm format will support stereo sound, this model of Sharp Viewcam only records in monaural.
The only real drawback I've run into is the short shelf-life of the battery. I always seem to be recharging this thing. If I fully charge it and go right out to shoot something it lasts quite a while. I videotaped an entire 4th of July fireworks show one year, in fact. If I charge it and then let it sit, though, there is invariably very little juice left in the battery when I pick the camcorder up to go record something. I could probably solve this by buying the alternate battery for this camera, which holds twice as much charge...and is twice the size
We have used our camera for several occasions, and we are very pleased with its performance. It's travelled up to Michigan and gotten video of our child's great-grandma, in the hopes that he will get to know her a little. It's videotaped evidence of vandalism to our cars for the police. Like another reviewer here, it was taken into the neonatal ICU after our son was born this May. Although my wife couldn't get out of her bed to see our son for the first 24 hours, I would videotape my visits to Gable and bring the footage back so she could see her hours-old boy.
There are many purchases one will make in their life that they will regret. For us, this Sharp Viewcam is not one of them.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
Sunliner
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 - Top 1000 |
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Member: Nick
Location: Sweet Home Alabuckley, Michigan
Reviews written: 103
Trusted by: 53 members
About Me:
Am I still writing things on Epinions? Wow.
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