[cowtown]

And now for something completely different:

I'm going to give my wife Suzanne a video camera for her birthday. The main use will be to tape our new son, who will be born in 5 weeks.

Now, while he will undoubtedly be the cutest kid the world has ever seen, and completely worthy of his own video camera, it's also dawned on me that I'd could attach whatever camera I get to the harness bar of my 911 and tape DE events. That is, when I'm allowed to run events again ($ + time + perceived risk concerns on my wife's part, but I'm working on her).

So I'm thinking that image stabilization, light weight, and reliability should be factors in addition to image quality.

Any comments on what I should be looking for? I don't want to spend more than around $800, and it needs to be a MiniDV camera.

I like the Sony TRV-38 for its reviews on ease of use (big LCD, zoom function) and image quality.

Any thoughts? All advice appreciated.
Colin