A1 - Mic input

January 5, 2009

Been thinking about buying an A1 but of all the spec I've read, there's no mention of XLR ins, just 'mic in'. Meaningless. Perhaps the new 'S' variant has them?

Anyone confirm what inputs it has?

Thanks.

NR

www.obscura-films.com

Dan Durbin · January 7, 2009

Nell,

The Canon XH A1 has two XLR inputs. The inputs can also support +48V phantom voltage, if needed. We have two XH A1s and are pleased with them. More details are available on the downloadable instruction manual (pg 11). The following is a link.

http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/controll...wnloadDetailAct

January 7, 2009

Cheers for that.

I've asked elsewhere - but no-one's been forthcoming - so I may as well try here: would the A1 be the best way to spend £2,250? I realise it's a Canon board but, hopefully, people can remain unbiased.

I'm either looking at the A1 with a decent set of legs, extra battery, rifle mic and boom; a XL2; or adding a little more to stretch to a Panny HVX200, Sony A1 or FX7.

I'm cutting with Vegas.

Welcome any other suggestions. Will be using it for shorts and docos where I work.

Ta.

Roger Smith · January 18, 2009

Cheers for that.

I've asked elsewhere - but no-one's been forthcoming - so I may as well try here: would the A1 be the best way to spend £2,250? I realise it's a Canon board but, hopefully, people can remain unbiased.

I'm either looking at the A1 with a decent set of legs, extra battery, rifle mic and boom; a XL2; or adding a little more to stretch to a Panny HVX200, Sony A1 or FX7.

I'm cutting with Vegas.

Welcome any other suggestions. Will be using it for shorts and docos where I work.

Ta.

Canon XH-A1 or not . . that is the question?

I've had multiple Panasonic HVX200's, HVX200A's and Sony Z7U's and this much I can say in comparison to the Canon XH-A1, switching to the XH-A1 has a been a blessing. Simple to operate, absolutely amazing images, and a work flow that is as simple as SD but with image color depth and flexibility that is truly nothing short of amazing . . AND . . you still have tape for 100% archive and backup.

With the HVX's the workflow in DVCProHD100 is atrochious with lots of storage required, no back up on the fly, and not real NLE friendly, let alone why upscale to 100Mbs when in order to render one will have to choose an MPEG2 rendering codec for their computer to keep up which will defeat the whole purpose. Moreover, the P2 cards are expensive and the cameras imager is only a 960x540 with math to get you to 1920x1080 and again mpeg codec for rendering equals no big improvement over HDV . . BUT . . without back up on the fly and a workflow that often required us to have an IT person in the field plus the HDD transfer time which is just about equivilent to digitzing HDV.

Then the Z7U is great with it's external lens which in itself also adds some complications AND you won't get it for under $5K US . . PLUS . . to change the battery that goes pretty quick you have to remove the external CF drive let alone slightly nose heavy but not like the EX series.

The Canon XH-A1 has by far whether it be it's 20x HD lens or it's much larger imager than the other two above or a combination of th two, is just somehow quite a bit better in my opinion and at a much better price, footprint, and ease of use.

The A1 out of the box default Preset is my opinion poor but the nearly 50 downloadable pretested formats are nice solutions, let alone you can make up your own. Personally I use the VividRGB a lot and get really nice color with it and actually two camera that setting with a Canon HV30 with just a few small tweaks on the A1's preset and even found we can use the HV30 as a B roll in SD mode also.

We have been experimenting with low light situations on the XH-A1 and have found that it's low light performance with either extreme minimal or NO grain is superior to the HVX's (even the A model) and the Z7 which must have something to do with it's larger imager. That is, not just a nice picture when in low light but also with nearly pure blacks without washing the rest of the image. Some of the outdoor material we have shot with full ND filter, iris cranked down to almost shutting off, and overcast snow day, looks like film in 30p HD. Moreover, the sound recording is as near to "real" as we have been able to find thus far.

Switching from those two former cameras to the XH-A1 has been a welcome let alone we have been able to switch to the Kata 192 case and even can carry an external light, extra battery, two battery chargers (one for 12v) all the cables and manuals, and a 2X screen from Hoodie and some other device that I can't remember making the whole package quite portable and fun to back along. We also have built a back pack for it, something we would never have been able to do with the HVX unless that backpack would have carried a laptop and external HDD . .something I wouldn't recommend in any weather.

General price consideration....

1 Z7U and support gear = TWO XH-A1's with support gear

1 HVX200 with 2 16GB P2 Cards = TWO XH-A1's with support gear

Hope that helps and if not feel free to hit back for more detail.