As many readers know, I've been salivating over the prospect of purchasing a high-speed camera for about a year now. Initial searches turned up a bunch of professional Ethernet-connected solutions that would run about $6,000 - $8,000 for a used model that did 300 FPS and only in black and white. Eventually I found the Fastec Sportscam, which looked very promising - but cost $8,000 - $10,000 depending on the features you wanted.

Bleh.

Enter the consumer-priced Casio EX-F1 and EX-FH20, digital cameras that feature the ability to "burst shoot" up to 60 FPS and to capture high-speed video up to 1000 FPS! When I first saw the EX-F1 featured on Engadget, I knew that it was only a matter of time before I broke down and spent the $1,000 on one. After waiting a few months for it to come down in price, Casio released the EX-FH20, which did burst shooting up to 40 FPS and still had the high-speed video quality that I wanted - but at half the cost. Biding my time for about three months, I kept searching Google Shopping for the best deal, and yesterday I noticed that it dropped to $440 + tax with pickup available from Best Buy. I placed the order online (along with an 8 GB SDHC card) and picked it up last night, using it to film my friend shooting wadded-up dollar bills into tumbler glasses to test the awesomeness of 420 FPS (I didn't use 1000 FPS as the quality's not great).

The camera's everything I wanted it to be, and I look forward to taping pitchers during Spring Training to share with you all. It is simply amazing to see the level of detail at 420 FPS that you can't get at 30 or 60 FPS from standard video capture.