Tonight on the news, I saw a news conference and amongst the cameras pointing at the person was an XL1s.

So my question is do some news broadcasts use the XL1s or would this most likely be for some other use (ie. not to be broadcasted) ?

If the press conference was here in the colonies I'd sure be inclined to assume that the XL1s was being used for some purpose other than broadcast news. TV stations seem pretty deeply rooted in their holy Betacam bricks and consider miniDV (and equipment that uses it) to be the province of -sniff- amatuers and vacation snap-shooters.

But this might not be quite so staunchly the case in Europe. I also recently caught a glimpse of an XL1 on a tripod at something like a press conference/announcement in Kandahar. I know that some of the news crews over there are using small handheld cams like the Sony PD150 and VX2000 with miniDV.

I also thought I read a year or so ago that the BBC was beginning to do some experimental shooting with XL1's.

I would think that a small cam like the XL1 would be welcome for camera people who, after years of lugging 15-20 lb cam on their right shoulder, have chronic back pain and walk like Quasimoto. But the XL1s really does not have many of the peripheral suporting features that news crews need for ENG work.

I'm pretty sure that the BBC kit out some of there news cameramen with XL1's.