Well I use a Sony DCR-TRV30 NTSC (carl zeiss vario sonnar). I bought it for ￥ 141,000 ah i don't know how to convert into dollars but I think it's pretty cheap.
It's amazing for outdoors and just okay for indoors. 1.5 Megapxls, Night vision and 120x digital zoom is pretty much all you need. SONY DCR-VX2100 IS YOUR TICKET TO BADASS VIDEO CAPTURING

I use Final Cut Pro HD when editing films. That's the only software available on the Mac. I think.