Panasonic Pro AG-HMC150 3CCD AVCHD 24fps Camcorder

WOW :-)

I received my 150 a little over a week ago. Bought it because I wanted to move up to HD and get out of the tape business. It did not come with an SDHC card. Bought an 8 GB to carry me over until my 16 GB cards arrive via Amazon. I am still on the learning curve on it. Especially liked the large comfortable color view eye piece. I was also amazed by the clarity of the video play back on my 48" LCD screen. Used the three cable output first that came with the camera( Video Lt. Rt. Audio )



Very clear video much clearer than my trusty old Canon GL-2 It does not come with an HDMI cable. Bought one locally and tried it. Plugged one end into the HDMI out port on the camera and the other end into the HDMI port of my TV. I was blown away by how clear it was !! The video was clearer than some of the stations I view in HD.



On playback you are given a thumbnail of the first frame of each scene you shot when you turned the camera on. On playback you can skip around the scenes you want to view or delete if needed. The focus assist is another nice feature. When you use it it momentarily zooms in on the middle of your next shot so that you can fine focus if needed.



It has many other features that I have not tried yet. On editing bought the Pinnacle 12 Ultimate because it is set up to handle the AVHCD format and a PC with the AMD quad Phenom processor with 3 GB of RAM. Waiting for a more powerful graphics card to arrive before trying to edit in this new format. The battery that came with it is small. Would recommend buying the larger battery as soon as you can to balance it out. Right now it feels a little out of balance because of the smaller battery. Also liked the solid magnesium body. No plastic anywhere ! Overall I am impressed with this camera.



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Canon XH-A1S 3CCD HDV High Definition Professional Camcorder with 20x HD Video Zoom Lens III

Fabulous. Wonderful. Great!

I love this camera. If you don't have a lot of experience with prosumer cameras (as in my case) the first look may be a bit intimidating (a friend said "It looks like you're filming tv news"). Especially as I added a Rode shotgun mike (not sure it does anything other than make the sound louder but...still checking it out).



You can't rest the camera on your shoulder but the image stabilizer helps and the grip and buttons are all well designed and easy to reach. I struggled through the manual but fortunately bought Dan Curran's dvd about the xh-a1 which appears to be almost identical. This was a -huge- help. I can't recommend it enough if you are at all unsure of what you're looking at. He goes through the simplest things (putting the shoulder strap on) to some very technical settings that you can do. The dvd saved me -so much- learning time and also prevented some careless mistakes (like letting sunlight through the viewfinder).



This camera feels like a terrific tool that can do whatever you need and the picture quality--even on Auto--is beautiful. Having the two XLR terminals will make a big difference too. The versatility and design really meets such a variety of needs--way too much machine/expense for "home video" (it's not the kind of camera people forget is pointing at them) but great if you want to shoot training films web videos independent films.



Technology has changed so much in the 20 years since I was in film school--and it's still hard for me to believe that such a great camera capable of such a quality product is available for under $4000.



Very impressed. Highly recommended.More detail ...