The best Digital8 camcorder (of the last generation)
In 2004 Sony launched the last generation of its 8-mm camcorders. They shared the same body, tape transport, imaging sensor and the lens. Analog and less expensive digital models used traditional physical buttons, while top of the line digital models had got a touch-sensitive screen with virtual buttons.
Five out of seven Digital8 camcorders released in 2004 and 2005 could not play analog recordings, something that has been a selling point of Digital8 format when it launched in 1999. Analog playback provided an easy transition to digital while still allowing to play existing recordings on the same machine. Old tapes could also be reused for digital recordings.
Only two out of seven Digital8 models retained the analog playback capability: the 2004 TRV460 and 2005 TRV480. Of the two, the TRV460 is a better one because it has S-Video jack, which the TRV480 has lost.
So I got the TRV460.
As a camcorder, it is not very remarkable. It has a single ⅙-inch CCD sensor with 460,000 pixels overall, of which 290,000 are used for video. 20X lens starts at relatively tight 42 mm. There is a 37 mm thread for attachments. The viewfinder is monochrome, it extends and tilts up.
There is no focus ring, but manual focusing is possible either via virtual buttons, or using spot focus thanks to the touch-sensitive flip-out LCD screen. This 2.5-inch screen is as thick as a bank vault door. The screen can rotate to face the subject, Sony called it “Mirror Mode”, the word “selfie” had not become commonplace yet.
In line with the Sony’s philosophy of the time, the camcorder does not allow setting aperture, shutter speed and gain directly, instead it offers several Program Auto-Exposure modes in addition to full auto. You can also fine-tune overall exposure level.
The camcorder can shoot in 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios. In fact, all the camcorders from this generation can switch between 4:3 and widescreen, even the Hi8 ones.
A feature that is conspicuously missing is white balance.
The camcorder has a built-in light. It can shoot in infrared mode, which is called Nightshot Plus. In Super Nightshot Plus mode, an infrared light illuminates up to about 1m distance, which can be used for “capturing the face of a sleeping baby”.
The camcorder records DV video with stereo audio. Tape runs twice faster compared to analog mode, so a P120 tape runs 60 minutes in Digital8 mode. This is what Digital8 is about: it is DV video recorded onto 8-mm tape.
It is unlikely you will be using a standard definition camcorder like the TRV460 to shoot videos. I wish Sony ported HDV to 8-mm hardware to prolong its life and to make it the most compatible consumer camcorder format: launched forty years ago offering VHS-like quality, upgraded to Hi8 thirty five years ago, upgraded to DV twenty five years ago, it could have been upgraded to HD twenty years ago, offering one hour of HD recording on an 8-mm tape, but Sony did not bother, so 8-mm video has stopped at standard definition.
As useless as this camcorder is for taking videos, it is indispensable for digitizing old analog videos.
You can play standard 8 and Hi8 tapes on it, it will use built-in time base corrector (TBC) to make sure the picture is steady, and will convert the video to digital and output it as DV via Firewire. It will, of course, output native Digital8 tapes as DV via Firewire. It also accepts analog video via composite and S-Video jacks from your VHS camcorder or Beta VCR, converts them to digital and outputs, you guessed it, as DV via Firewire. This is a Swiss Army knife for anyone who needs to digitize analog video, and for this purpose I cannot recommend it enough.
The TRV460 has a USB port with a promising “USB Streaming” feature, but don’t get your hopes up, this feature is broken multiple times over. First, my Windows 7 machine — and to put it into a perspective, Windows 7 was released in 2009, just five years after these camcorders came out — cannot locate a fitting USB driver for the camcorder. The original drivers supplied with the camcorder support Windows Me, 2000 and XP, and this is it.
To be fair, I run a 64-bit Windows 7, maybe I would be able to install the drivers on a 32-bit variant. But even if I were able to initiate the USB transfer, the connection is good only for 320×240 video at 30 fps, progressive scan. Digital8 video is 720×480 at 30 interlaced frames per second. So, even if USB Streaming worked, it would be useless for transferring digital video from tape to a computer in full quality, which Sony admits in the operating manual.
Luckily, I had no problems with Firewire connection: drivers have been downloaded and installed automatically.
In case your computer does not have a Firewire port, the TRV460 has an SVideo output, which is the second-best choice after Firewire. This allows you to use an external analog-to-digital converter to ingest tapes into a computer. If done right, you won’t see a difference to capturing via Firewire.
The Digital8 format has never been about high quality professional productions. In particular, I don’t know a single Digital8 camcorder that has 3CCD setup. It has been envisioned as a path for Video8/Hi8 users to transition into digital video while preserving compatibility with analog recordings. I wish Sony gave it more love, which it originally intended.
In fact, according to rumors I’ve heard, when DV standard was fleshed out in the early 1990s, Sony offered using 8-mm format for it, but this suggestion was blocked by JVC, so the DV consortium had to design a whole new set of cassettes for DV.
As it often happens, animosity between different companies resulted in producing somewhat superfluous products. ◾
