Nathan Estabrooks
February 26th, 2006, 11:39 AM
To begin with… has anybody else noticed a weird knocking sound with their HVX? It doesn’t seem to happen when the camera is powered on, or affect the camera in anyway, but man its disconcerting. With the power off, if I tilt the camera forward something inside the chassis slides forward, when I tilt it backwards something slides backwards. I assume the fact that I couldn’t’ find a post about this indicates it isn’t something others have experienced but I figured I should ask and see just in case.
On with the review…. I’ve only had it for two days and haven’t gotten into the audio options yet but I love it so far. I used to have a Canon XL2 and found the weight, form-factor, short wide angle and the lack of a true LCD to be a pain. So far the HVX has remedied all these issues and more. It’s true that you can buy a wide angle lens for the XL2 in order to get those short, tight shots, but at a price of just under a grand for the lens I figured that’s half way to an HVX! When you include other accessories I’d have to add onto the XL2 to get all the functionality I wanted, hell the HVX was a great deal. Not to mention the ability to film HD.
I really love the way the menus are intuitive and instantly responsive to physical switches on the chassis (ie Scene File, User1, User2, User3). It really cleans up the implementation of the Camera’s many functions.
The chassis and lens are nothing short of perfect for me. It’s just heavy and wide enough to be substantial and remind you that it’s an expensive piece of machinery…..while at the same time it’s compact and versatile. For documentary filmmaking, which is what I’ll be using it for. I have to say I am over the moon. Compared to the XL2 this is a dream….half the weight, perfectly balanced, plus the ability to shoot HD and variable overcranking and undercranking frame rates!
Sure with the HVX I’m giving up a bit of depth of focus when compared to the XL2, but in my case it’s worth it. I did notice though it is a little noisier then the XL2's image. But just a little.
The only real con so far, other then the sliding knocking sound that’s got me worried, is that as other posters have mentioned the LCD is not very crisp. Compared to the Sony HDR-FX1 it seems very blurred. I don’t know it's a huge issue though. For focus and fine adjustments I’d want to rely on the view-finder anyways. To me the LCD is more for maintaining the grammar of a shot. As well I agree with others that I find the placement of the XLR terminals near the front odd.
So since I find these posts very handy when researching stuff I figured I should offer something back to the community. For docs, I think this is the perfect camera. I could have bought a DVX100B and saved 3K, but I figured in a few years I’d want to buy an HD camera anyways, so why not do it now.
Thus far after having a Canon XL2, and playing around with a Sony HDR-FX1 for a couple of days its all about the Pana for me.
Nathan
On with the review…. I’ve only had it for two days and haven’t gotten into the audio options yet but I love it so far. I used to have a Canon XL2 and found the weight, form-factor, short wide angle and the lack of a true LCD to be a pain. So far the HVX has remedied all these issues and more. It’s true that you can buy a wide angle lens for the XL2 in order to get those short, tight shots, but at a price of just under a grand for the lens I figured that’s half way to an HVX! When you include other accessories I’d have to add onto the XL2 to get all the functionality I wanted, hell the HVX was a great deal. Not to mention the ability to film HD.
I really love the way the menus are intuitive and instantly responsive to physical switches on the chassis (ie Scene File, User1, User2, User3). It really cleans up the implementation of the Camera’s many functions.
The chassis and lens are nothing short of perfect for me. It’s just heavy and wide enough to be substantial and remind you that it’s an expensive piece of machinery…..while at the same time it’s compact and versatile. For documentary filmmaking, which is what I’ll be using it for. I have to say I am over the moon. Compared to the XL2 this is a dream….half the weight, perfectly balanced, plus the ability to shoot HD and variable overcranking and undercranking frame rates!
Sure with the HVX I’m giving up a bit of depth of focus when compared to the XL2, but in my case it’s worth it. I did notice though it is a little noisier then the XL2's image. But just a little.
The only real con so far, other then the sliding knocking sound that’s got me worried, is that as other posters have mentioned the LCD is not very crisp. Compared to the Sony HDR-FX1 it seems very blurred. I don’t know it's a huge issue though. For focus and fine adjustments I’d want to rely on the view-finder anyways. To me the LCD is more for maintaining the grammar of a shot. As well I agree with others that I find the placement of the XLR terminals near the front odd.
So since I find these posts very handy when researching stuff I figured I should offer something back to the community. For docs, I think this is the perfect camera. I could have bought a DVX100B and saved 3K, but I figured in a few years I’d want to buy an HD camera anyways, so why not do it now.
Thus far after having a Canon XL2, and playing around with a Sony HDR-FX1 for a couple of days its all about the Pana for me.
Nathan