So I'm reading all these posts about using the Phillips SPC900NC web cam and it suddenly dawned on me I have a canon digital video recorder.

What are my possibilities ?

 You mean a little camcorder? With a memory card? Focus on Jupiter or the Moon, hold the camera up to the eyepiece, and see what you get. Hold it steady of course. If it takes stills try that too. It's not very easy, but it's not all that hard either. Go for it.

Yes, you can do this. The main problem is keeping the camera in the right position.

You can make a "movie" and then use programs (free) like Virtual Dub and Registax to clip out the best segments and register and stack the frames to produce improved still images.

Chipdatajeff how long a video would you suggest?

I would make several short videos, then pick the best one (the most consistent one, likely).

You don't want to go longer than about 3 minutes or Jupiter's rotation will start to blur details.

I limit my AVI files to 2 minutes when I'm imaging at 4,800mm focal length, but that's not hand-holding the video.

Another option is -- especially if you're having good luck holding the camera in the right place -- is to go much longer and then use Virtual Dub to chop the resulting video into segments.

If Virtual Dub or a similar program won't accept the video format from your camera, look into a Snappy frame grabber. This is a hardware device that hooks between your computer and the camera and allows you to capture digital video to a hard drive. You'd then save the file in a format that Virtual Dub can handle.

UPDATE: I can't locate my copy at the moment (I'm out in West Texas at CSAC this week) but there's a good (if a bit dated) treatment of using video cameras for astronomy, called Video Astronomy. A number of "occultation chasers" use video equipment in their work, too. There is information about this at the web site of the International Occultation Timing Association.

with my adaptor, my canon miniDV threads directly onto my 32mm EP-- (or any EP with that barrel size actrually)-- hand held gives you too many limitations, you need to get it mounted

i have considered this as well, i have the Orion steadypix camera mount, and most new camcorders have a 1/4-20 thread in the base, would just be a matter of using afocal with a camcorder......which essentially is the same thing we do when we use a regular camera in video mode

my thoughts on it .....i think the resolution would excelent, compared to the 640 x 480 you get with a still camera in video mode, or the same resolution from the spc900nc that i am about to either sell or throw in the garbage.....im not happy with it at all....