Method of Madness

I have a initial set-up budget of $500 bucks, as well as trying to establish a method to keep reoccuring cost low.

Let's talk about cameras.

There are multiple ways to capture your animation, you can go all digital, you can do analog video capture, you can go digital still capture, or the old school actual film.

I, as a newcomer, contimplated each option carefully.

The all digital option was my first choice, it allowed me to use a reasonably priced software package that has all the toys to do animation. The capture cards for this were also moderatly priced, under $250. All other computer upgrades were a wash across the board so it came to the camera. You could go web-cam, but the quality would be so poor, I saw no point in investing time in a product doomed from the onset to be sub-standard. The good cameras, the ones with 3CCD, start at about a grand... Bit pricey for me, on to the next option.

I next looked into digital still capturing, however this option would not allow me to use some of the best features of whatever software I chose to use, so again... next option!

Using film was totally out for me. This is a reoccuring expense that I can not afford. I am on a shoe string budget here, so every dollar counts. Even if I didn't get sticker, which I did, film and processing fees plus editing hardware would blow the budget.

Which leaves analog video capture. What does that mean? That means that an average camcorder can be used. A brand new one, with impressively high resolution, can be picked up for a few hundred bucks. I, however, already had one (actually, the wife did). Regardless, I conjunction, you need something to catch what the camera is pitching, so I found an analog video capture card for around $150 bucks retail (I have a bid on one on eBay for $65, all part of being cleverly cost effecient. Some people call it cheap, I call it cost effecient.) This card is nothing special, plugs into an expansion slot in your CPU, and your camera plugs right into it using RCA jacks.

So there we have it, by using what I already had and making it work, I got out in the camera department for under $200 buck.