Word  camcorder is derived from two words  camera and recorder. A camcorder (camera recorder) is a portable electronic recording device capable of recording live-motion video and audio for later playback. Camcorders have three major components – a lens that gathers and focuses light, an imager that converts light into an electrical signal and a recorder that converts electrical signals into digital video and encodes them for storage.

Handycam is also a camcorder.It as a condensed term for a handy camera.  the electronic manufacturing giant, Sony, created a handy video recording device, named HANDYCAM, in 1985. It was the smallest camcorder at that time which uses the Video8 (8mm) format which eventually developed to Hi-8.

The first camcorders recorded in one of two analog formats, VHS and Betamax formats. Recordings were stored on video tape cassettes and replayed with a video tape cassette recorder (VCR) hooked up to a monitor, typically a TV set. As technology improved, other formats such as S-VHS, 8mm, Hi-8, and digital video (DV) and high definition video (HDV) became available.

Nowadays, camcorders  records in digital format. The images that new camcorders record are stored digitally and it won’t lose quality or resolution when copied or reproduced as it was in analog  datacapturing.

Video tapes or films are no longer used; video information can also be transferred in different digital storage devices like memory cards, CDs, DVDs, and hard drive of computers.

In essence, the Sony brand Handycam is a small handheld camcorder. As time went by, small camcorders were customarily called handycams as the moniker stuck as a label for small camcorders. The smaller it gets, the more handycam it becomes.

Sony still continues to manufacture Handycam brands that ultimately evolved to digital formats. Due to the pioneering and popularity of the Sony brand, even other manufacturing companies that make handheld camcorders are often referred by many people as handycams.

1. Camcorders are shortened term for camera recorders; a device that captures video and audio. Handycam is a trade name of a camcorder by Sony. It is  a shortened term for handy camera.

2. Camcorders is the correct term for camera recorder whereas handycam is the moniker stuck label for them