Hi - I'm new to this discussion. I hope you'll tolerate a question from a newbie.

My son has two more years left in high school and I'd like to capture some decent video of his exploits on the football and lacrosse varsity sports teams. Our old VHS-C was fine for birthday partys and Christmas but clearly isn't going to cut it.

This will be mostly at-night under-the-lights fast-action telephoto which I think will be pretty demanding. Apparently now it's standard procedure to make a DVD for use by college recruiters so I will be zoomed in tight on him rather than trying to capture the entire play. Will I be able to get decent video using a GL2?

I've been comparing the specs between the GL2 and the Sony VX2100. I think the 20x optical telephoto of the GL2 will be the better feature even though the Sony has nominally better low light performance.

I'd appreciate any advice on using either of these two for taking video of sporting events or what other (cheaper?!) equipment would work better.

-Arthur

If the field is bright enough to play on, you probably won't have any low light problems with the GL-2. A couple of other thoughts...

Because each field is lit a little differently, be sure to use manual white balance - otherwise it will lokk like your son is on different teams when the color of his uniform changes from night to night!

The 20x zoom on the GL-2 is great, but you will be tempted to handhold at maximum zoom - resulting in shaky images. Pick up a decent tripod or at least a monopod - it will improve things dramatically.

Although you should try to do manual focus, until you get good at adjusting focus with the action, auto focus will probably work better. Be sure that you are high above foreground movement that will send autofocus into a tizzy.

Don't zoom in too tightly on your son - recruiters want to see the context of the play and the role he has in it.

I played both football and rugby - just saw my first lacrosse match a few weeks ago - WOW! Good luck to both your son and the proud dad.