The Gadgets Page

Here is an old advertisement for the world’s first camcorder, the Sony Betamovie.

It reads:

Betamovie BMC-100P – Exciting Betamovie

Here comes Betamovie, the revolutionary one-piece video camera with built-in recording capability. With no awkward, bulky size or cumbersome weight, the compact, take-me-anywhere Betamovie goes wherever you go Just pop in any Beta-format videotape and you’re instantly ready to shoot for up to 3 hours and 35 minutes (with a Sony L-830 cassette tape).

Sony’s state-of-the-art Betamovie. The terrific way to get more out of home video movie making.

Compared to the technology of its day, this camcorder WAS compact, but right now, I have a video camera on my cell phone that can record video at a higher rate for longer. This ad was made in the 1980’s. If someone had come up to me in the early Eighties and said that I could carry around a better video camera in my POCKET than our high school TV station had, I would have been so excited for the future.