Hello CD. Can anyone who has experience in shooting FRC media recommended me a good camera around 300$? I will mainly be using the camera for recording videos and taking photos of our team and our robot at competitions. Unfortunately I can’t go higher on the budget, so around 300$ is my absolute limit.
This isn’t a recommendation, rather more of a resource.
Lots of good stuff in here.
Tldr: photos? Easy. Lots of good gear out there for cheap. Video? More research required. Don’t overlook little things like memory cards where bandwidth can be an issue.
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Thank you, I’ll check it out.
$300 is low for high quality camera equipment. Given that this is your absolute budget, my recommendations are:
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Look for used cameras (but nothing groups, FB marketplace, Craigslist, etc.). From my quick search on FB Marketplace, I see someone selling a Canon DSLR bundle with multiple lenses that’s over $800 new for about $350, someone selling a $500 Sony DSLR for less than $200, etc. Photo/video stores also tend to sell these. I prefer local so you can look at the camera, but if you don’t have a local camera shop, Sammy’s, Adorama, and B&H are all great and sell online.
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Use a good quality smartphone. Cameras on premium smartphones (Pixel, Galaxy, iPhone, etc.) are going to be significantly better than a new camera you can buy for under $300. Obviously the phones themselves are likely well over this price, but if you already own one, it’s a $0 investment. If you don’t, a used but recent model phone that can’t make calls can still be used for its camera on the cheap.
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Borrow a camera for events/major videos/publications. If you are affiliated with a school and they have a media class/club of any kind, see if there is equipment you can check out. Some libraries and maker spaces also rent cameras. You’ll often end up getting much higher quality equipment with this route.
My general advice, as someone who used to be is [still] young and stupid: don’t buy cheap things now because you want them. I often fell into this trap: you have $300 and want a camera. Good cameras cost a little more, so you buy a bad camera. Don’t do that. Wait. If you save those $300 for a year or two, you’ll likely have more savings and can buy the better camera. Use the phone until then, and get something you actually want. A $300 camera now, and $200 in a few years from now doesn’t do you much good. $500 a few years from now can buy you a more decent camera.
That advice is not to say that you shouldn’t go the used route. Lots of people get rid of things in very good shape all the time, and you might find a great deal. Just don’t buy a plastic camera at Target for $120. You’ll be disappointed.
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Would 400-500$ be good for a video camera?
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In the “under $300” category, like @jaredhk said, your options are pretty limited.
For instance, you can get a decent Video camcorder like a Sony Handycam in that range and it will take pretty good video at 1080p 60fps (far better than a Cell Phone would), but it would be a far-cry from the quality of something higher end that records at 4k+ (it’s worth noting that even if your final video is only 1080p, professionals will frequently record raw footage in higher resolutions as it allows more post-processing options without losing quality).
That said, I would NOT expect (from personal experience) something like a Handycam to take good quality still photos. For both functions, you probably want to look at higher-end Point-and-shoot cameras like a Nikon Coolpix, though these run closer to the $800 range (unless you find them on-sale), they offer a good balance of quality photography, video recording, and ease of use (if you go too fancy and start looking at like DSLRs you start dealing with things like swappable lenses and manual focus, and most people don’t want to deal with that).
EDIT:
One last thing, though I wouldn’t say it’s the easiest to work with for traditional photography, I wouldn’t totally discount the idea of something like a GoPro camera either. For the price (~$400 new for the current model), the recording quality for photos and video is excellent (plus it will be able to handle things like image stabilization and action scenes much better than a traditional camera), the only downside is that, as an action camera, it will lack a lot of creature comforts of something larger and more ergonomic (plus it’ll have a much smaller screen so it’s harder to see details on), so it might be harder to use as a handheld camera. For video, you might also have to look at an additional audio component (or even the creator edition of the camera) as the built-in mics on the stock cameras are not the best quality (they’re waterproof, what do you expect?).
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Honestly, at your budget, you might be better off not buying a proper camera and sticking with a phone. Im massively impressed with the production quality of the youtube channel Jet Lag The Game that films everything they do on an iphone. While the use cases are slightly different when it comes to video you can likely accomplish a good majority of what you want to do just with the phone in your pocket and some time learning a non-linear editor like Premiere or Resolve.
If you want to explore the “fullsize” camera route, i really like my Sony a6100, which you might be able to find in your budget used. Just be aware youre gonna need lenses as well, which can really shoot up the price (the kit lens can only do so much, assuming you can even find a bundle in-budget.)
If you have any alumni that goes to a university, they could also rent out a camera and lens for little to no cost from their equipment checkout for the team, as Jared already stated. I did that in 2019 and worked really well for event photos.
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Tossing another vote out there for “decent used phone”, plus maybe a stabilization gimbal. Probably the best bang for the buck at that price point, without having to get too creative about which older cameras work well or don’t.
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In fairness, not all phone cameras are created equally. Unless you have a “flagship” phone (iPhones in particular are considered one of the best for photography, but are quite expensive too), most other (cheaper) phones tend to have far worse image sensors, post processing, and stabilization.
I would personally not want to use images/video taken on my phones camera for team media unless absolutely necessary.
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Might be some helpful info in this older thread:
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You’re getting closer with this budget, definitely. I believe Sony and Canon both have decent point and shoots in that range. Though I am a loyal Nikon user myself, I wouldn’t recommend their really cheap stuff, especially not if you’re focusing on video. There’s also a GoPro that’s around $400 and might do what you need, I’d you want to go that route.
“Good,” though, is so hard to gauge. Cameras that cost more will often be “better.” That’s true all the way from a $100 point and shoot to a $700 consumer DSLR to a $5,000 semi professional DSLR to the things they film movies with (whose prices have so many zeros they’ll make you cry). The question is, is the video good enough for your purposes.
If you’re making things for social media, maybe an Impact Award Submission, and the like, you’re probably fine with a $500 camera, yes. I’d venture that some of the really high quality reveal videos use much more expensive cameras and that other really high quality reveal videos are using iPhones (but pretty good iPhones, and with great editing).
A lot of mainstream cameras have review videos on YouTube you can watch which will help you understand the quality of the picture you’re getting.
Is a new $500 camera better than a used $900 camera, now $500? I’m not sure.
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I use an iPhone to record matches and it comes out really nicely in my opinion. I’m no expert but if you use cinematic mode or even the regular video mode with the max hardware zoom (usually either 2.5x or 3x) and use a decently low exposure (depending on arena lighting) you can get a really nice look. The software stabilization works wonders on the match footage and it comes out really cool. This assumes an iPhone but there’s likely someone on your team with an iPhone capable of taking these videos.
Here’s a sample if anyone’s interested, someone with more experience with focus and exposure could do better but it still looks pretty good IMO: rainbow rumble auto some match
edit: I should probably mention I am not the team’s media person, they use better equipment, but I work on the recap videos and am on the field as technician anyways and who doesn’t want robotics videos clogging their phone?
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This describes me too well 
Btw congratulations on Dean’s list!
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Dji Osmo or a pocket 2 may be an option and in your price range. No optical zoom but decent stabilization which is hard to find in a low priced camera.
DJI Osmo Pocket Handheld 3-Axis 4k Gimbal Stabilizer with Integrated Camera Amazon.com
DJI Pocket 2 - Handheld 3-Axis Gimbal Stabilizer with 4K Camera, 1/1.7” CMOS, 64MP Photo, Pocket-Sized, ActiveTrack 3.0, Glamour Effects, YouTube TikTok Video Vlog, for Android and iPhone, Black https://a.co/d/d0Lwxln
We had another thread on this a few months ago IIRC
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This is unrelated to your actual question, but when I read your post title I thought that “300$” was censoring 3005 or something since I’m used to seeing it written as $300. I was very confused 
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Second-hand Canon 60D with a used kit lens off of a marketplace like MPB or KEH
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Yeah I saw that one but I don’t think that person has as low of a budget as me.
Sorry, I put the dollar sign in the wrong place 
This looks like a great option in your price range
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