Spot I checked and It seems the lack of detail is when the camera is shooting in 24P.

Thanks

I've been reading over at www.hv20.com and from what I understand, it's when the camera is in CineMode that it softens the picture.

Of course, I may have misunderstood.

Spot, why can't you use the HV20?

Worley

the optical stabilization stays active even when disabled. :-(
Bumpy roads, bumpy air, high speed winds...We tested at 130 mph and it failed horribly, just like the HV10 did.
I'm VERY excited to receive a CX7 shortly. Stabilization can be disengaged, allegedly.

The CX7 is this a new unit from Canon ,and is there any details available on it ?
Let us know how it does ;-)

Alan

I searched for "canon X7" on google, but all I found was this: http://news.sawf.org/Tech/36422.aspx

Sony.

>Bumpy roads, bumpy air, high speed winds...We tested at 130 mph and it failed horribly, just like the HV10 did.<

Aren't those situations where you'd want stabilisation? I'd be keener to turn it off when the camera was tripod mounted.

The CX7 is a new Flash-based AVCHD camcorder from Sony, following a small, narrow profile.
Stuart, as a general rule, for very hard surfaces, the optical stabilizer can't react quickly enough. Electronic is actually preferable in these scenarios.
When we mount an HDV cam to a MotoX bike, aircraft wing, or skydive helmet, stabilization is more often off than on.

Spot, what sort of effect did the OIS have on the footage when you tested the HV20?

Over on HV20.com there is a thread concerned with a 'wobble' when the camera is shaking. The wobble is sort of like a rapid compression and expansion of the image. It seems to be most noticeable when shooting in 24p or 25p with a slow shutter.

Some have suggested that it is due to "rolling shutter", but I wonder if it's a combination of the CMOS readout circuitry and the OIS being too slow to work effectively.

The thread can be seen here: http://www.hv20.com/showthread.php?t=124

Worley

All I know is I sold my DVX100 two weeks after getting an HV20. Best $900 I ever spent on a camera.

Picture is extremely sharp though CineMode (NOT 24p) does seem to soften the image a bit (but it also apparently expands dynamic range.) You can shoot 24p without CineMode and have images as sharp as you want them (the other problem with CineMode is you can't lock your shutter speed without locking your overall exposure so I don't use it.)

The image stabilization works very well on the camera too IMO. However, the IS wasn't intended to compensate for extreme movement, like people walking and shooting shooting handheld. There is some diagonal sheering of the image on large camera movements as well due to the design of the CMOS sensor. However, this doesn't affect subject (as opposed to camera) movement or normal pans/tilts. This diagonal sheering is admittedly noticeable until you learn how to handle the camera so keep that in mind if you buy one. (Of course if the camera is stabilized it's a non-issue.)

The current downside of editing 24p from the camera is that apparently Canon doesn't include the flags necessary to do pulldown removal, so so far none of the big editing packages can do the pulldown removal. (Cineform and a couple of other programs can do flagless pulldown). But again for $900 I don't think you can beat this camera on image quality.

> (Cineform and a couple of other programs can do flagless pulldown).

This pulldown extraction for HV20 is automatic and part of the capture processing within HDLink, it work the same way for Sony V1U capture. The bonus is It makes capture faster and produces smaller files as only 24p data is stored to disk, without the 25% overhead pulldown adds.

David Newman
CTO, CineForm

Spot,

>...as a general rule, for very hard surfaces, the optical stabilizer can't react quickly enough. Electronic is actually preferable in these scenarios.<

Gotcha. I've a few Canon pro L series lenses with optical image stabilisation, and there is a "bounce" with rapid movement so I can see how that could be a problem.

I'm sorely tempted by the HV20 and as I didn't plan on skydiving or riding a trail bike with mine, it might not be that big a deal. Has anyone tried a HV20 with wildlife/landscape material, the sort of thing you'd see on Discovery HD's 'Sunrise Earth'?

Just a quick addition to this thread as I received my PAL HV20 today.

It seems one can disable the image stabilization, but not in the "Auto" shooting mode, you have to select another mode first.