Took the plunge...thanks to this forum
 

I finally received approval from Domestic High Command (DHC) to abandon my old Sony Crapcorder and get an XH-A1, which is now sitting on my desk with related accessories. Thanks to posts from the excellent community here, I had no qualms whatsoever splashing out for the package.

Wouldn't you know it that a new camera 'required' a new editing rig, which I'll be building within a week. DHC is not yet convinced that an HDV camera also warrants a 60" HDTV. ;)

Looking forward to contributing more than just gratitude here...

Steve

Congratulations! I believe you made an outstanding choice. There is nothing that comes close for both quality for price and versatility.

RTFM. Before doing anything else.

I agree. That will be my reading for the next several days. I also have in hand the VASST training DVD to speed me along.

Steve

Bill's right as far as he goes. Don't just read the manual, take it with you. Put it in your camera bag and leave it there. Better yet, download the PDF into your PDA. You will be shooting somewhere and want to know how to do something you've never done before. Trust me. Been there.

One other thing... experiment, experiment, experiment! Do this when you don't care what you're shooting so you'll know how to do it when you do care.

You won't be disappointed...

Bugger the manual..'boring!!!' just go and play it!!!

(Not really) But nothing beats actually using it

Good point. What I did the day I got mine was set it up on a tripod, download the manual to my laptop (easy to search that way, and you don't need an extra hand to keep it open), and went through the whole thing briefly. Did some minimal setups, taking down the sharpness, increasing the saturation a bit, pressing the blacks, etc. Then did some shooting. Then, I went through the manual in more detail later. Occasionally there's still something I might forget, so I keep it in the camera bag.

The trouble with the manual is that it assumes you know what the technical terms mean. When you come across something you don't understand, do a search for it on this forum - almost everything seems to have been explained by someone somewhere here.

Thanks for the great tips, folks. I think I'd need Superman vision to read a PDF on my BBerry, so I'll keep the manual handy.

Frankly, I lurked here so frequently before my purchase that I found assimilating the manual pretty easy, e.g., what does XX setting do, accidentally knocking 'lock' to 'standby' and not freaking out, etc.. Shooting -- another story. ;)

Cheers,
Steve

Also fresh out of the XHA1 owners womb. I have yet to decide if I need to keep my XL2. We've been through so much together and I'm not sure that I'm ready for the HDV world.