Now let's take a look at a few general tips which can improve picture quality and make using your camcorder more convenient.

Don't wait until you run out of space on a memory card, tape, or disc to buy more — make sure you have a spare or two on hand to avoid the stress of having to find a store that sells them later. (Sony Mini DVD-Rs shown above)

9) Try out a tripod. Shaky handheld shots are one of the biggest culprits when it comes to bad home movies. Although many camcorders come with various image stabilization technologies, these in-camera features can only do so much to correct handshake. Shooting from a flat surface or, better still, a tripod, is a good way to remedy this problem. And you may be surprised by how affordable and portable small video tripods can be.

10) Keep plenty of memory cards, tapes, or discs on hand. Running out of recording space in the middle of filming is no fun, so you'll want to make sure you have more media available. Be sure to pick up extra discs, tapes or memory cards, even if your camcorder also comes with built-in memory. And if you're traveling, don't count on buying extra media at your destination — many tourist spots sell a limited variety of memory cards, tapes, and discs with heavy mark-up.

If you do start to run out of space, and don't have spare media on hand, you can switch to LP (long-play) mode. This isn't something you'll want to do often, since it saves you space on your media at the expense of image quality. But if your child's football game goes into overtime, for example, you may want to switch to LP mode so you can record more of the final moments.

Want to have your home movies around for years to come? Be sure to copy your footage to a separate backup hard drive.

11) Keep a spare battery around. Backup battery power is just as important as keeping extra tapes or discs on hand. Some spare batteries offer longer recording times than the battery that came in the manufacturer's box, so be sure to check out your options before you buy.

12) Back up your video. Tapes and discs can store your footage for years, but if something happens to them, you're out of luck — there go Junior's first steps or that fabulous vacation in the Rockies. So please remember to back up your video — either to additional discs or to an external hard drive. We recommend against using your computer's hard drive to store everything long-term, because uncompressed digital video takes up a lot of space — approximately 1 gigabyte for every 5 minutes of footage — and because computer hard drives are susceptible to eventual failure. Check out our article on watching, sharing, and editing your home movies for more tips on ways to save your video.