In addition to announcing the HV30 upgrade to the Canon HV20, Canon announced 2 new high definition camcorders that record to flash drives. The VIXIA HF10 has an onboard flash drive and support for recording to SD cards. The HF100 includes no internal drive and records to SD cards. One key new feature of both cameras is recording 30 progressive frames per second at 1920×1080, which translates to an image that might look better for Web viewing by eliminating the need to de-interlace movies that won’t be viewed on a television. Based on my own frustrations with AVCHD over the past year, I’m not thrilled with this being the codec of choice for the HF10 and HF100, because it translates to lower bitrates than HDV. Aside from being two different colors and the difference in internal memory, the HF10 and HF100 are basically the same camcorder. Key features of both video cameras are:
3.3 Megapixel Full HD CMOS Sensor
12x HD Video Zoom Lens
DIGIC DV II Image Processor
SuperRange Optical Image Stabilization
Instant AF (Auto Focus)
2.7″ Multi-Angle Vivid Widescreen LCD
Aside from the AVCHD codec, my other big complaint is the size of the camera body. These are tiny cameras (as you can see in the photos). I have small hands and these camcorders felt too small to use comfortably for any long term shooting.
VIXIA HF10
VIXIA HF100
