Luis de la Cerda
April 11th, 2006, 08:24 PM
We got delivery of our XL-H1 a few days ago and I wanted to add my impressions in case anyone is still on the fence.
The camera is better than I had expected in many ways. I had expected the lens to perform worse than it actually does. The focus is repeatable if you are experienced at doing it and although the zoom is slow and laggy, it can pull off some really nice zoom creeps. I also find that the barrel zoom control is usable manually if you're not aiming for really fast zoom action, but rather controlled zoomin with a manual non rocker feel to it. The F modes are excellent, as good as any P mode, but this has been pointed out before. The controls are good, and it feels more like a professional camera than any other prosumer camera I have ever used before. The menus are really great and it allows you to tweak your colors very accurately. For example, when tweaking the SDX900, a lot of the parameters are so fine, that it makes it hard to judge when you have reached the color you want. That is, you need to turn the little wheel on the SDX forever to change parameters to a point where change becomes visible onscreen. Not so on the XL, parameters are tuned just right, not so coarse that you end up wishing there was a middle point between two values to reach a sweet spot, but not so fine that your brain starts to interfere with your perception of what is happening. The noise reduction control is also great and I like the way canon even gave us the option of using extreme NR methods that introduce artifacting, if only to have the option. Color also seems very accurate. The lens is huge and heavy, making the samera feel heavy because of the poor balance it causes. It's not SDX900 heavy, but heavy. The multiple outputs are also a godsend, and the ability to output SD and HD at the same time is great. The viewfinder is not as bad as everyone makes it to be, and I feel fairly confident that I can focus accurately with it. It must be noted though, that I find focusing with the viewfinder tons easier if you lift the magnifier and look at it with the naked eye, because the magnifier makes the single pixels become very apparent, which in turn makes it harder to judge the image as a whole instead of an array of pixels. Last, I also like the fact that Canon decided to go with black for this camera, because I do a lot of car work and a white camera is a lot more prone to reveal itself reflected on surfaces like car paint.
I will be putting it through its paces in the following weeks, mounting it on a crane, rigs, steadicam, etc... and if I find anything worth writing about I will post it here. In the meantime, I'd like to say I couldn't be happier with it. It exceeds my expectations in almost every aspect and it's a great tool that will be very useful for many projects to come and will pay for itself in a couple of months at the most.
By the way, did I mention the image quality is great? It really is THAT good. And I'm used to working with much more expensive equipment.
The camera is better than I had expected in many ways. I had expected the lens to perform worse than it actually does. The focus is repeatable if you are experienced at doing it and although the zoom is slow and laggy, it can pull off some really nice zoom creeps. I also find that the barrel zoom control is usable manually if you're not aiming for really fast zoom action, but rather controlled zoomin with a manual non rocker feel to it. The F modes are excellent, as good as any P mode, but this has been pointed out before. The controls are good, and it feels more like a professional camera than any other prosumer camera I have ever used before. The menus are really great and it allows you to tweak your colors very accurately. For example, when tweaking the SDX900, a lot of the parameters are so fine, that it makes it hard to judge when you have reached the color you want. That is, you need to turn the little wheel on the SDX forever to change parameters to a point where change becomes visible onscreen. Not so on the XL, parameters are tuned just right, not so coarse that you end up wishing there was a middle point between two values to reach a sweet spot, but not so fine that your brain starts to interfere with your perception of what is happening. The noise reduction control is also great and I like the way canon even gave us the option of using extreme NR methods that introduce artifacting, if only to have the option. Color also seems very accurate. The lens is huge and heavy, making the samera feel heavy because of the poor balance it causes. It's not SDX900 heavy, but heavy. The multiple outputs are also a godsend, and the ability to output SD and HD at the same time is great. The viewfinder is not as bad as everyone makes it to be, and I feel fairly confident that I can focus accurately with it. It must be noted though, that I find focusing with the viewfinder tons easier if you lift the magnifier and look at it with the naked eye, because the magnifier makes the single pixels become very apparent, which in turn makes it harder to judge the image as a whole instead of an array of pixels. Last, I also like the fact that Canon decided to go with black for this camera, because I do a lot of car work and a white camera is a lot more prone to reveal itself reflected on surfaces like car paint.
I will be putting it through its paces in the following weeks, mounting it on a crane, rigs, steadicam, etc... and if I find anything worth writing about I will post it here. In the meantime, I'd like to say I couldn't be happier with it. It exceeds my expectations in almost every aspect and it's a great tool that will be very useful for many projects to come and will pay for itself in a couple of months at the most.
By the way, did I mention the image quality is great? It really is THAT good. And I'm used to working with much more expensive equipment.