Canon VIXIA HF100 Flash Memory High Definition Camcorder with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom
by Canon
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Canon VIXIA HF100 Flash Memory High Definition Camcorder with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom
Customer Review: Perspective of a Camcorder Novice
Summary: 5 Stars
After reading the reviews on this site and others and seeing the awesome videos on YouTube I decided to buy this camcorder. I give it 5 stars because I believe it lives up to everything that has been said about it. However, if you are a camcorder newbie, such as I am, be aware of the following: You will not be shooting "Star Wars" caliber movies simply because of the camera. All my footage looks like I am in the middle of an earthquake (I do have very shakey hands). I finally went out and bought a $30 tripod from Wal-mart. It definitely helps. The on-screen menu structure is alien to me. There is going to be a high learning curve in understanding all the modes this camera has and what they do. I bought the Transcend 16GB card with the card reader and it was a breeze transfering the files to my computer. However, it then took me nearly 4 hours to get my computer to play the MTS files. Nothing I had would play them and I could not get the free stuff that is suppose to play these to work. I finally downloaded the trial version of Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum 9 and it worked flawlessly. I was able to view them, do some very simple editing and burn them to a DVD (I don't have Blu-Ray and neither do any of my family and friends, so I have to convert these). I definitely will be buying this software to use with my HF100. All-in-all I think I made a good decison in selecting this camcorder. Just remember, if you are a novice you will most likely be putting some time and effort into shooting good videos.Customer Review: Excellent HD camcorder for the price
Summary: 5 Stars
this canon HD camcorder rules! build quality, video and audio quality as well as feature list are all excellent. a camcorder like this would have cost $20,000 10 years ago (if tech. possible).
here a few observations:
i found the second highest resolution setting to be more than adequate (1400x1000 or so) for most projects. the 24fps mode may be of value to some, i found the footage shot in this mode to lose some clarity and presence (which may be the intention)
i have macs in my house. no problems importing footage into imovie, final cut express. i understand that in the windows world the avchd format is not quite supported that well yet, but the product comes with 2 cdrom with software that i assume do the job. just understand that you cannot hook up the camcorder to a computer via the included usb cable and just download video files for immediate playback. the sofware on the computer extracts the footage in the desired resolution from the acdhd files!
low light resolution is not great but not bad either. all consumer camcorders struggle with this and even news reporters with their really expensive gear work with extra lighting.
i personally find the coke can shaped camcorders a bit more awkward to hold and operate than the pistol shaped ones.
love the fact that there are no tapes to insert or rewind, no non standard mini dvds to buy, etc. even the cheap 4gb sd card gives me plenty of recording time.
Customer Review: Couldn't Be Happier
Summary: 5 Stars
The camcorder is great. Very happy with optical stabilization, Flash memory storage, and image quality. I found that being able to quickly switch from video to stills and back was much more useful than I thought it would be. It is nice to have a series of high resolution stills to edit into a slide show with music to accompany the videos on a DVD. I am very impressed with the still images. Optical stabilization gives me sharp zoomed images that I could never get on my other camera, and with the capacity of an 8GB memory card, I can store thousands and thousands at the highest resolution.
Flash memory is the only way to go. It is so easy to transfer data to the computer. The absence of tape drive, mini-DVD, or hard drive motors really improves the sound quality. The low light video is not too good, but the low light still images are fantastic. Also, it is very difficult to tell the difference between the top 3 video recording modes, so I shoot most of my videos in the second-best mode, saving the best mode for tripod supported shots where the benefits might be apparent. That also saves battery life which is a little short, but I don't find it to be a problem. I was originally thinking of buying a second battery, but after using it every day on a two-week vacation, I don't need it.
Customer Review: Plays well with my Mac
Summary: 5 Stars
This was a gamble that paid off. It is the first flash-based camera I have ever had. Some reviews said that it was difficult to use with a Mac. In fact, this camera is easier to use than my previous Canon HV20, takes a great picture, and is easily edited with both iMovie 08 (blah) or Final Cut Express. I can bring it into iMovie 08 or FCE, save, and edit it in iMovie HD , as sometimes I find FCE too complicated.
The only real con I have with it is the fact I cannot re-upload to the flash card, and since I sold my HV20, I have no miniDV camera to upload to. I sometimes do shows to put on local community tv, and it needs to be on miniDV. The sound from wind is a little worse than with the HV20, but I usually tape indoors.
The pros include small size, no tapes to lug around, 12X zoom, superior sound from forward facing mikes, the ability to use sd cards from my photo camera, and an easy button. Often I find the easy button gets better shots than when I do the work of setting focus etc. I absolutely love the integration with Apple's FCE, as I can pull up log and transfer, and choose what clips I want to transfer over to my computer. And watching something on a high-def tv from the hdmi connection on the camera is a joy.
Customer Review: Great piece of technology
Summary: 5 Stars
I was pleasantly surprised by the very usable low light performance (I expected it to be lousy) and excellent autofocusing.
Cons: Can't record lower resolution footages. (However compression is pretty good,). The still mode is not as good quality as a dedicated Canon photo cameras (more purple fringing and tracking), but it is still acceptable.
When connected (by usb), Linux recognizes the camera as a memory device and one can mount it without problem. Mplayer, mencoder (and all other open source players) play with a lot of artefacts, which makes the videos look quite bad, in fact buggy.
However I bought the CoreAVC codec for Windows for $14, and the CoreAVC for Linux project allows it to be used in Linux for mplayer and mencoder.It works great now and the quality is excellent. mencoder can be used now to transcode the videos to lower resolution mpeg that can be viewed by my relatives with slower computers.
AVCHD playback consumes around 20-30% CPU time on my 2GHz Core 2 duo with nvidia 8600 graphics chip, encoding to high quality 720x405 video runs at about 10-20 frames per second.
For Windows users, Sony Vegas studio Platinum edition seems to be worth buying.