Jump to content

New Canon HD Camera�.Fact or Fiction?


Guest Dan_Lippman

Recommended Posts

Guest Dan_Lippman

New Canon HD Camera?.Fact or Fiction?

 

This is the million dollar question??. Over the last year I have listened to every conversation, read every article, and tapped my most useful resources but nothing is better that from the preverbal ?Horses Mouth? and that mouth is the fine people at Canon.

 

I have always wondered if there will be an XL-3 released and my sources at Canon have confirmed that there will be an announcement this month. What that announcement is I have no idea but, what I can tell you is that during my last conversation with Mike Zorich he stated that company officials ?have the intention to release a high-definition camcorder soon. Mike emphasized Canon?s dedication to HDV, and that the XL-2 will be the last SD camera from Canon??? While he did not have a timeline for when a camera would be ready to announce a different format, like HDV / HD. ?We have a lot of work ahead of us in terms of design and engineering.? Zorich added, ?Canon does not have a history of making product announcements a year out; we usually like to announce a product and then make it available for creative users for about six weeks after we announce the product?

 

Well Canon?s Expo is a week away; my deep digging into one of the most coveted issues this year might pay off?..can anyone guess what the announcement is going to be?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member

Here's the obsession:

 

I just plunked down on an XL2. If I'd known when the XL3 would come out, I would have waited before forking out all that cheese. I think Canon is the best built product but they are always behind the curve on market timing. It miffs me that I spend money on their products over and over just to catch up with the other manufacturers. Even with that said. They're pretty darn good cams!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The last post in this thread sums up canon's philosophy from pretty much their origins.

 

I've shot with the xl2 and obviously it is perhaps the only professional design miniDV cam out there. Sort of taking a non-pro format into pro territory and, well, ending up seeing a bunch of well known feature films being made with them as a result. Unfortunately for Canon, JVC and Panasonic's latest HDV cameras are now professional design and will, without question, be used to make the upcoming features we're all going to hear about/see in the HDV format. Could have been Canon's elite domain, but they blew it. They sure dominated as the camera of choice for the DV feature thing we saw. Though the image quality was not there for theatrical features, we sure saw a few of them!

 

Canon is a conservative follower Japanese mega-corporation by nature with the odd breakout product like the XL1/2 that really does something special. They're always quality products aimed at a specific market, though rarely revolutionary or leading the pack as something new. Nikon's in the same boat. Olympus and Asahi are the historic leaders from that country in photographic equipment, with now JVC and Panasonic leading the way with video with a big nod to Sony. But Sony, as usual, is on a foolish meglomaniac tangent with what they're doing.

 

To be honest, I'm surprised to read about anybody investing in a new regular DV only camera at this stage of the game, but I'm sure you have your reasons.

Edited by santo
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Premium Member
I've shot with the xl2 and obviously it is perhaps the only professional design miniDV cam out there. Sort of taking a non-pro format into pro territory and, well, ending up seeing a bunch of well known feature films being made with them as a result. (...) They sure dominated as the camera of choice for the DV feature thing we saw. Though the image quality was not there for theatrical features, we sure saw a few of them!

"Obviously it is perhaps..."? Hmm...

 

I don't want to pick nit with your HDV crystal-ball-reading but the Panasonic DVX-100 and 100A have been used in nearly as many features as the Canon XL-1/2's. According to IMDB, the count, so far, is:

 

DVX-100: 191

DVX-100A: 30

 

Canon XL-1s: 31

Canon XL-1: 245

Canon XL-2: 11

 

Sony PD-150: 86

Sony PD-170: 4

 

I own an XL-2, so obviously I prefered it at the time to the DVX-100A.

 

EDITED BY ME.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...