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Question

JVC GZ-HD7U in Low light

Aug 15, 2014 5:31PM PDT

Hello, I have this camera, and only use it indoors, but where I shoot doesn't have much room for lights and is in a low light situation. Is there any way to clean up my video to make it HD. Here's a link, sorry it's a video from my youtube, I am just using it as an example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k35Rv1Ddx1E

Now I'd like to know if there's setting that work good in low light, or if there's smaller lights that don't take up space. Anything would be helpful. Paid a lot of money for this camera and my cellphone takes better video in this room.

Discussion is locked

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Answer
That HD7 was one of the
Aug 16, 2014 4:10AM PDT

"good" high definition camcorders using low compression that stored to an internal hard disc drive.

As far as I know, there's not a lot to choose form in the way of "camera settings", but you edited the video and rendered - which means there's something else going in the process on for which the camcorder should not be faulted. You also want " to clean up [your] video to make it HD"... but the YouTube link allows the option of 720p which is high definition... 480p is standard def. Anything higher (including 720 and 1080) are high def.

Link to the manual:
http://books.jvc.com/Download/1018543304/LYT1734-001B.pdf
Page 68 tells us that the HD7 records in high definition (1080) resolution.

What we don't know is how you get the video from the camcorder to the computer, what video editor is used and the rendering settings the video editor has when rendering the final project for uploading... other than it appears to be limited to 720 horizontal lines. We also don't know how much video compression is being applied.
Lots of compression = smaller files = reduced video quality.
Less compression = larger file size = improved video quality.

If you are using the i.Link (firewire) connection, then we know for sure the video has a chance of being imported at high quality, low compression (HDV) format video (assuming the editor doing the importing is not downsampling). If the video files are copied from the camcorder's hard drive using usb, then transcoded, we need to have an explanation of the transcoder and the settings being used. The video editor looks to be decent enough - the low-end stuff does not allow multiple video tracks.

As for adding light... We can't see the size of the room, but wall mounting some flat panel LEDs (expensive - see LitePanels stuff) or even using some clamp lights (inexpensive) like
http://www.amazon.com/Bayco-SL-302B3-Brooder-Porcelain-Ceramic/dp/B0061MZ4Q6
with, perhaps, a diffuser to soften a bit if they are too close - or use them indirectly - might help. You'll probably want more than 2... Left, right, top or back...

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LED lights
Aug 16, 2014 9:18PM PDT

I agree with Boya84 regarding lighting. Probably when you have a small room, a set of battery powered LED video lights could help. In general use, a set of 160 LED bulbs in a holder is a start. Have a look at LED video light panels in Electronics in Amazon