I was shooting a client’s musical DVD where performers lip-synced to pre-recorded music.  Having a second camera  made a lot of sense for reducing the amount of time shooting.  I could get two different angles of a performance at the same time.

I found a refurbished Canon HV20 for under $500 and purchased it.  My first camera had done a great job and this fit my price range.  However, part way into the shoot, the camera failed.  B&H Photo was very helpful in getting an RMA.  I got a credit because I planned on buying a third camera.

So I would have a second camera on the shoot, I purchased a Canon HF200.  At first, I was leary of going to an AVCHD camera but decided to give it a try when I learned it did 24 mb/sec., the same as the HDV format on my HV20.  It turned out to be a good move.

There were several features lacking on the HF 200 that I decided I could live without since I was using my HV20 as well.  The main one was zebra bars.  That feature really helps with getting good exposures.  It also didn’t have an eye-level viewer.  But the pluses far outweighed the negatives.

The first thing I found was that there was less blurring on fast action.  This has always been an issue with HDV.  It shot full 1920×1080p instead of 1440×1080p I got with tape.  That gave better images with fewer artifacts.

Shooting on a 16 gig class 6 SDHC card gives about 90 minutes worth of recording.  Once a shot is taken, it can be watched on the camera’s display to make sure you got what you wanted.  And of course, it doesn’t take an hour to dump a tape.  It’s a drag and drop operation.

The camera feels tiny in your hand.  I have heard that small cameras are hard to hold steady.  But this one is easily cupped in two hands for rock steady operation.  I can also use the loosened strap to hold it in one hand for a fairly steady picture.

– Rich Pulham

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 8th, 2009 at 1:00 pm and is filed under Video equipment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.