Canon HF S10

[Mike L 0]

Well unfortunately our boat was canceled for tomorrow due to conditions. I hope to get out with the camera this week to shoot some test footage.

[BigPhillyFish 0]

Well as an HF-S10 owner, and after numerous testing between the S10 and the Sony 520V, the Canon was a clear winner for me. Shooting video both topside and underwater, low light capability wasen't the only requirement for a good video camera. Keep in mind the Canon offers manual gain control, so I have seen the S10 beat the 520V in low light if set-up correctly and with a lot less noise then the Sony. In day light the Canon is the superior winner, the OIS of Sony is nice indeed. With the S10, Canon stole a few nice things from Panasonic, JVC and Sony and threw them on a flash based camera with a 24M/bps bitrate. Now I don't own any prosumer cameras but have spoken with and seen footage from people who own both the S10 and the Panny HVX200 and the S10 and the Sony FX1, and both guys stated the S10 was the same if not slightly better then the lower end prosumer models. Granted they are older prosumer models, but you can definitely see what the bit rate increase does for AVCHD.

 

As far as the joystick control, Gates makes an awesome joystick control for the Red One Housing. If Gates makes a joystick control for the Canon HF-S10, watch out! Because this would give you complete control of the camera underwater from manual focus, manual gain, manual everything. If they design the new housing with a joystick control, which I don't see any way around it for white balance, there will be nothing better in the water in the consumer category, IMO. You would have a bullet proof housing, with a consumer camera that has full manual control. It will be sick!

 

But hey, this is just my opinion. But if your intrested in this camera check out my Vimeo channel at http://vimeo.com/channels/35766. There you will find comparison shots of the S10 and 520V, and comparison shots of other camera's, you will also see what the camera is really capable of doing. Keep in mind Vimeo is pretty good with video, but not great. If you really want to see, download some of the footage and throw it up on a tv.

[Steve Douglas 16]

The Canon S10 is getting rave reviews all around and Light and Motion should have a housing for it by sometime in June. I was asked by a reader how to access the metadata off the cards of these type cams which would show what the exposure, gain and white balance settings were for the individual clips but I have no idea as to how to access them. Could anyone here provide an answer to that procedure?

Steve

[Mike L 0]

I've now tried to get out 3 days in the last two weeks to test dive the HF S10 in the Equinox housing, and all 3 days have been canceled due to weather!! Perhaps next weekend...

[BDSC 1]

I got an e-mail today from L&M and they are indeed working on a housing for the Canon and hope to announce something very soon they said.

[BDSC 1]

L&M has updated their website and it now shows the HF S-10 as being one of the cameras for the Bluefin.

[TMan2 0]

BDSC-- You DA MAN!

 

I am gonna have to talk to my rep DAN about keeping me in the loop better, this is good news!

[BDSC 1]

I just checked the Best Buy website today and they have the HF - S10 on sale for $1104.99.

 

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?_d...agetype=listing

Edited May 20, 2009 by BDSC

[urahozer 0]

Sweet thanks, im definately getting very stoked for this camera for sure!

[BDSC 1]

So do we have any uw footage yet from you folks who really know what you are doing? I am especially interested in knowing if anyone has had an opportunity to shoot anything with the L&M housing.

 

Thanks,

BDSC

[Long John Silver 0]

Maybe I'm a little bit but ...

 

Looking at this video (shot with HF S10 so IT ):

 

http://vimeo.com/channels/35766#4630484

 

I'm realizing we are in the middle of a epoch change

[lemon 0]

Just came across this european site that compares the new canon and the new sony, it also shows screen caps captured at various lux levels. This site is picking the Sony as the superior low-light camera. In their review, they seemed a bit disappointed in the Canon's low-light performance. I also posted this over at scubaboard.com where we've been discussing low-light performance.

 

The Canon looks intriguing and seems to probably look better in well-lit conditions (IMHO), however, I think low-light performance is paramount in UW videography. I don't use lights because the consensus seems to be that they only make a difference within a few feet. I like to film large stuff at depth, so low-light is paramount to me.

 

What do you guys think of this comparison. Would be interested in your thoughts.

 

 

This page compares the Sony 520, Canon HFS10, Sony HC9:

http://camcorder-test.slashcam.com/compare...c9de761e69.html

[lemon 0]

Canon HFS10

"The sensor´s high pixel resolution seems to reduce Canon´s usually excellent sharpness.Some missed functionalities like zebra or a manual control ring are back on bord.The menues are smoothly animated, but for examplethe intricate handling of the focus hinders a fluent workflowA little disappointing is that the big 1/2 sensor size doesn´t result in better low-light performance.So for some users Canon´s 2008 models will be more interesting, especially as these are decidedly cheaper."

 

Sony 520

"The Low-light picture quality is very good and sets a new standard for the sub 1000 euro camcorder classBut there is no histogram, no zebra, no shutter-control, no focus assist and no picture adjustmentThis is sad, especially because Sony could probably unlock these functions via firmware"

 

I don't own either of these cameras, but this review is really making me lean in Sony's direction. Can anyone convince me that Canon has the better low-light performance?

[ronscuba 4]

Interesting site. I threw in the Sony FX7 along with the EX1 to the comparison. Not sure how accurate those test pics are.

 

If you can wait, I'd hold off from buying until you see how the Sony and Canon perform UW with MWB.

 

There already is some footage of the Sony 520 in a L&M housing. Just waiting to see some from the Canon.

Edited June 4, 2009 by ronscuba

[lemon 0]

Interesting site. I threw in the Sony FX7 along with the EX1 to the comparison. Not sure how accurate those test pics are.

 

If you can wait, I'd hold off from buying until you see how the Sony and Canon perform UW with MWB.

 

There already is some footage of the Sony 520 in a L&M housing. Just waiting to see some from the Canon.

 

do you know the link to the L&M/520 video - would be interested to see it!

[ronscuba 4]

Click the link below. Brings you to the thread on scubaboard, which has links to vimeo and youtube videos.

 

 

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/underwate...test-video.html

Edited June 5, 2009 by ronscuba

[Long John Silver 0]

This page compares the Sony 520, Canon HFS10, Sony HC9:

http://camcorder-test.slashcam.com/compare...c9de761e69.html

 

On other forums I read that several tests on that sites seems to be very biased.

 

I prefer camcorderinfo for reliability.

[lemon 0]

On other forums I read that several tests on that sites seems to be very biased.

 

I prefer camcorderinfo for reliability.

 

biased? based on what? can you link the threads? i'd be interested to read them. thanks.

[lemon 0]

was browsing camcorderinfo as well looking at the new canon vs the sony. it seems camcorderinfo is giving the low-light edge to the sony as well:

 

http://www.camcorderinfo.com/content/Sony-...Comparison.htm#

 

http://www.camcorderinfo.com/content/Canon...Performance.htm

 

these comparisons are based at the 60i frame rate. it looks like the Canon does quite a bit better at the alternate frame rates that it has as an option, however, they mention that you can get a choppy or sluggish effect at those frame rates. would be curious to see a sample of footage at that frame rate to judge for myself.

 

Of note they mention how much darker the Canon image is in low-light at the baseline 60i rate as compared to the Sony. This is pretty obvious if you look at the low-lux sample screen captures taken from the German website review that I linked to earlier above.

 

One thing that I don't like about the Canon is the noise level that it is showing at low light levels. The test shots at camcorderinfo seem to clearly favor the sony on this and low-light color. I believe they put low-light sensitivity on par.

 

The impression that I get from Camcorderinfo is that neither the Canon nor the Sony is stellar at low-light performance, but that the Sony delivers better low-light performance, particularly in terms of color and noise levels.

 

So BOTH the german website and camcorderinfo say the Sony 520 is a better low-light camera than the new Canon. So for my needs at least, I think the Sony is probably looking like the better dive camera. Remember, however, that from my perspective good low-light performance makes or breaks the types of shots that I like to take - at depth (i.e. not generally in the 0-20 fsw range) and filming subjects outside of the useful range of lights (10 feet? or so).

 

would be interested in hearing some input from others on this! agree? disagree?

[Long John Silver 0]

biased? based on what? can you link the threads? i'd be interested to read them. thanks.

 

Hi Lemon,

I reviewed my link and I made a mistake

the site is Infosyncworld.

 

On http://www.videomakers.net (the biggest italian forum about video technique) many user were complaining about a lot of differencies between tests on infosyncworld and camcorderinfo.

Complaints were about Canon review and expecially about the new Panasonic TM300: Camcorderinfo rates it as probably the best camcorder of 2009 while infosyncworld tears apart it.

 

Sorry about that

[Francisco Xavier 0]

One sad notice on Sony 520 is the absence of C-Lank control.

 

Once I have a Sony housing c-Lank controls and had upgrade from analog cams to the new HD (HC3) cam, just adding a DY slate.

 

Sony decided to discontinue the c-Lank on the new 520. Asked the sony representative and told me the IR control do not operate all the camera setings.

 

The way to go is mechanical controls housings.

 

It is a shame once the low light camera profile is adequate for underwater video and exists a lot of c-lank based housings all around, like mangrove h. for sony video cameras.

 

A downgrade waypoint tech I think. Maybe sony wants to give a chance to my next upgrade to canon S10?

Edited June 5, 2009 by Francisco Xavier

[lemon 0]

Hi Lemon,

I reviewed my link and I made a mistake

the site is Infosyncworld.

 

On http://www.videomakers.net (the biggest italian forum about video technique) many user were complaining about a lot of differencies between tests on infosyncworld and camcorderinfo.

Complaints were about Canon review and expecially about the new Panasonic TM300: Camcorderinfo rates it as probably the best camcorder of 2009 while infosyncworld tears apart it.

 

Sorry about that

 

thanks for the link! yes, it seems the panasonic is getting great reviews. i wonder if anyone will make a housing for it?

[Solo_NZ 0]

Hi everyone,

 

What is the best SDHC card type for using with this camera? I am comparing this vs the Sony XR520 which has HDD built in.

 

Obviously the bigger/faster it is the better! But do you need to go to a class 6 card, or is a class 4 fast enough? (Class 4 is the minimum that Canon recommend). Is it just a matter of speed for downloading into the computer, or can it affect the performance of recording? It seems hard to find class 6 32GB cards.

 

Also, a little off topic but still related... Which editing software can you drag and drop the files from the SDHC card onto the PC and then just start editing with the software? (rather than import at live playing speed?)

 

Thanks for any tips you may have. I'm coming from 8 years of using tape, so need some advice.

Edited June 7, 2009 by Solo_NZ

[Mike L 0]

I picked up an HF S10 the other day (keep selling the one I get for myself). Although I wont be taking it underwater while out here in the Azores, I will get to play with the cam alot, and hopefully get some topside video of Sperm Whales...but more importantly actually get a little time to play with the camera. L&M is shipping their housing starting the week of the 15th!! Very exciting!!

 

I hear the Pano Tm300 is an awesome camera. A friend of mine keeps talking it up, I hear its a heck of a 3 chip camera for the buck. Anyone get their hands on one yet?

[Solo_NZ 0]

I picked up an HF S10 the other day (keep selling the one I get for myself). Although I wont be taking it underwater while out here in the Azores, I will get to play with the cam alot, and hopefully get some topside video of Sperm Whales...but more importantly actually get a little time to play with the camera. L&M is shipping their housing starting the week of the 15th!! Very exciting!!

 

I hear the Pano Tm300 is an awesome camera. A friend of mine keeps talking it up, I hear its a heck of a 3 chip camera for the buck. Anyone get their hands on one yet?

 

 

Hi Mike,

 

I am thinking about the L & M Housing for this. Do you know what the story is with control on the L & M housing? White Balance etc? Also have you heard what the specs are for the WA Lenses?