DougieBalls

I gentleman I know who runs his own video production company recently gave me one piece of advice he implored me to follow over any other he gave me: When starting out with a brand new camera, pick one particular brand of tape and use it exclusively. This is because the lubricants on the different brands of tape are different and can affect the heads of a camera quicker, thus impacting dramatically the quality of the recording. Anyone have any thoughts on this? Furthermore, anyone have any preference to brand? I've had really, really great luck with TDK in years past, so I see no reason to change now unless someone can give me a good argument.

Ron, in a forum where posts are few and far between, I can always count on you to respond. I just made the jump up to a nice 3-chipper, so the flood of options I have on this camera are in some ways a bit overwhelming. I figure I'll probably only use a few of them for my purposes, but still... I'm thinking about things like the Color Level option. It allows me to decrease or increase color sensitivity...wouldn't I want to jack that up to the highest level for the most color? Why is that even an option? I don't have the ability to set white balance from my housing, so I'm kinda screwed on that one. I'll go ahead and assume the TRV's are good about that. I have wondered about Exposure....the default is 60, but I wonder if when using lights on closer shots it wouldn't be more prudent to set it at 100 or so to keep from getting brighter-colored subjects overexposed and distorted. That was a big problem on my 1-chip.

Looking for anyone who uses the TRV900 or 950. I'm curious as to what particular settings you've used with success in different conditions.

ANyone had any experience with these? Any thoughts?

Folks: I'm looking to move to the next level with my gear, up to a nice 3CCD camera on the prosumer level. I'm willing to drop about $1500-2000 on the camera. Any brand recommendations? This would include advice on housings and lighting as well.