You asked about size. Other things that stipulate a camera's size: acquisition format (tape, basically). Betacam is made by Sony and a camera tape is physically identical in size to the old Betamax tapes you may recall that died after JVC won the domestic market in videotape all those years ago. Panasonic is another contender with its DVC Pro, and they are smaller tapes, as is Sony's own DV Cam. Surprisingly the high end cameras using these latter two formats are not much smaller than a Betacam.
Hmmm, I've been playing with a Sony DCR-VX2000E lately, which is the standard camera the BBC's issuing its video journalists with right now (a video journalist is one person doing all the jobs of a reporter, camera operator, sound operator and producer...) - it's a hell of a lot lighter than beta; perhaps 12lb including a mounted shotgun mike and two-hour battery? It's not rugged though; that's probably the difference. I guess there's news and there's news :-)
Betacam is definitely broadcast-quality though; the smaller formats aren't really.
(Disclaimer - I now work for the BBC and therefore consider myself entirely qualified to bore the list with this kind of thing ;-) )
S
