Need some advice on media files.

Technically all those file formats would give you high quality recordings...but if you're going to be editing afterwards, you should check what kind of file types your video editing software is compatible with. MOV is what I would go with usually, MPEG4 would be my next choice.

 

Well, the short answer is there's no answer.

Somewhat more useful answer is that devil's in the details here, all those formats are basically "containers," they just roughly tell a player how relevant data are stored. The real video compression is done by a piece of software called "codec" (for coder/decoder) and every codec worth the name has a ton of settings of its own. But even the bestest codec in the world can't do anything if your camera's matrix acts noisy, and/or if your lens is dirty. And then, for all but the simplest video projects there's a question of post-process and editing. Not to mention that even the best camera in the world with all the knobs set to perfect values can't compensate for a wrongly-lit or unfortunately framed scene.

So, any of those little details may make the resulting video look anything from "unwatchable" to "Wow! did you use a pro camera?"
Thus, the best way to make a video look as good as you can with the equipment you have is to learn, experiment and practice a little.

1) Find your camera's owner's manual and read it, any camera worth the name has its manual online these days. If you don't understand something, Google it, or ask someone. There's a ton of info online about formats and codecs and whatnot.

2) Try and do some practice shots with a scene that is lit and looks similarly to your project and compare the results.

3) Learn some basic cameramanship and lighting techniques: How to hold a cam properly, how to care for it, framing, positive/negative space, difference between zooming and dollying, and how it affects perspective, conscious use of focusing... two-, three-, and four-point lighting, exposure, dynamic range and sensitivity.

4) Having said that, there's a danger in readinfg about those things on the Net, as along with genuinely useful info there's a ton of stuff that's basically free marketing material for electronics companies that makes you think you need expensive equipment. Don't be discouraged. People on the Internet love to measturbate cameras and accessories to death, and for any given camera there's at least one review that says it's a total crap, or that nothing worthwhile can be done with anything that doesn't cost at least $$$***. That's simply not true. The most amazing shot can be made with a $50 camera from the pawnshop and some basic understanding of light and space. Don't thing along the lines of "but what if I'm going to shot a F1 race at night, while hanging upside-down from a tree? Wouldn't that ten-thousand-dollar pro gadget be neat then?" There's always something challenging about the scene: not enough light, light from a wrong direction, subject's too fast, that annoying idiot in the background... But even a Hollywood-scale budget won't allow you to simply buy your way out of trouble. Instead think of how you can use equipment, skills and circumstances you have already to convey YOUR MESSAGE in a most powerful manner. That's the only thing that matters, and that's the true creativity. Maybe that annoying idiot is a blessing in disguise, and adds a touch of authenticity to your clip, if you shoot it just right.

And good luck. Hope it helps.

P.S. I'm actually more into stills, so, my apologies in advance if I horribly misrepresented some aspect of working with video or forgot something of importance.

P.P.S. And yea, MP4 or MOV are probably the safest bets as far as formats and codecs go. But it depends on the camera.

 

WeirdnessMagnet is right, you can't answer this question and give an order of best to worst.

These codecs have variable compression targets. For example, Xvid can compress the same video down to 99%, 50%, 25%, whatever you tell it to (almost). The same goes for the other codecs you've listed. If there isn't an option in your camera settings to set the compression rate, then it will be hard-set, in which case you'll probably have to just test them all until you find the best output for your camera.

As Stiltzkin Artemicion said make sure that your editing software can handle the codec you choose, as it is annoying to have to convert from one to another beforehand.

 

As stated before they are pretty much all the same. The codecs listed are all lossy, so they would have similar quality. So I would chose a format that is the most convenient to work with and I would stay clear of FLV, because I can't imagine that there is any editing software out there that would be able to handle FLV.

 

There's distinction between format and codec, nothing (theoretically) stops you from plugging a lossless codec into, say, AVI format (although I doubt a consumer-grade camera can do it.) Some format/codec assotiations are more standardized, like MPEG4 and H.264, but strictly speaking, file format and codec are separate things even then.

 

Yeah I know there is a distinction between a codec and a format/container. The formats/containers listed would most likely use their own video codecs by default, except for FLV MOV and WMV. I think it would be cool if more consumer-grade hardware had support for lossless codecs.