Trying out the Kodak Zi8 on the WRS...

Train LE-2 at the west end of Lebanon Yard.

This shot was made to test my new Kodak Zi8. The image quality off the camera is fine - a junky .mov file convertor (for editing in MSWMM) totally destroyed the file.

Since the minimum focusing distance of the Zi8 is 3 feet plus a useless (for what I'm shooting) macro mode, I ended up returning it in favor of the Panasonic ZS3.

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• WRS
• White
• River
• Southern
• Railroad
• LE-2
• testing
• HD
• Kodak
• Zi8

[alltweed]

Thx for feedback...

My client "a guitar repair shop" wants to shoot some close up shots of guitar necks and repair issues. So far the Kodak apprears to have a better rep for these shots then the flip...

But of course compromises avail between portability and feature richness. Should be interesting to see how these new vid cams apply downward price pressure on traditional size camcorders...

But dang - that new Sanyo Xiac(sp?) is $500 and up. Features and smallness will cost as it always does.

[TrainManTy]

You should check out the minimum focusing distance on the Flip. 5 inches is perfect for a macro shot, but you're not going to get much into the frame, and the depth of field is so narrow that you can forget shooting down the neck of a guitar and being able to see more than a half-inch in focus...it would look cool but wouldn't show much detail.

At 3 feet away, the guitar might be too small in the frame to see much detail.

Good luck!

[alltweed]

Has a crappy macro mode?

I guess the key wording is "for your needs"...I have seen many macro mode shots with ZI8 and they look great!...Wonder what you were going for..

[TrainManTy]

Well, it's excellent for shooting at a fixed focus of 5 inches...I can put the camera that close to the model but the background will be totally blurry - not at all like when shooting a real train.

In addition, most of my scenes have tracks farther than 5 inches from the aisle where I can put the camera and tripod, so the fixed focus makes that impossible, and 3' is way, way, too far away! My new Canon SX1 can do all of this easily - videographers shouldn't have to work against their camera.

[Chessiecat97]

Cool where'd you get the audio?

[TrainManTy]

I pulled the audio from a prototype video I've taken like the rest of my films. This one came from a clip of CSX Q114 arriving in Worcester, MA, last February.

[fishycomics]

deffently fooled me a fan behind the cam.

[TrainManTy]

Actually, it is a model. So far I haven't figured out how to make the trees move! =D

[fishycomics]

I had rewatched and again amazed, looked like a toy train , watched for tree movement

[TrainManTy]

Adapters like a wide-angle filter? Nope - this is straight out of the box, 720p at 60fps. Are there any adapters that would help with focus closer to the camera but farther than macro mode?