Hey Guys,

I'm getting a little worried that I won't be able to sell my Canon XL2 as of late. Everyone only seems to want HD & HDV only. I've tried to convince a few buyers that this is still a great camera and it has brought us a lot of amazing results. How do you sweeten the deal? I've had this camera for about 4 years now and its in excellent condition and I've had it professionally cleaned twice (once every 2 years).

Should I try college students?

What I would do is, uprez your xl2 footage to 720p then upload it to vimeo.com. If you get clean images which the XL2 is more then capable of, the HD results in most cases will outperform most of the consumer HD products. Of course that is my opinion. Try it if you haven't already. Remember great HD is more than resolution. The XL2 is an amazing camera. I recently sold mine and I miss it big time.

I agree with you. I have used Instant HD in the past to upres my XL2 footage and its looks great! I'm actually going to be moving on to DVCProHD, which is the reason I am selling the camera (also getting off the tape workflow).

I always tell the buyers the the XL2 footage is always way better looking than any HDV camera out there but they don't seem to believe me.

I agree with you. I have used Instant HD in the past to upres my XL2 footage and its looks great! I'm actually going to be moving on to DVCProHD, which is the reason I am selling the camera (also getting off the tape workflow).

I always tell the buyers the the XL2 footage is always way better looking than any HDV camera out there but they don't seem to believe me.

I think you haven t got the suggestion right... He meant the consumer HDV cams... I seriously doubt the XL2 could get a better image than all the HDV camera around.

I switched from a GL2 to a HC1 and even though the GL2 was great, I still find the image from the HC1 is better. And it is no FX1, FX7, Xh-A1, Xl-H1, Z7, Z5, etc.

Vimeo compresses 720p pretty hard (roughly 1600kbps VP6 - fairly quick encode, if I recall correctly). The result is image quality that's somewhat close to really good SD (roughly on par with a well made DVD movie from a Hollywood studio).

I always tell the buyers the the XL2 footage is always way better looking than any HDV camera out there but they don't seem to believe me.

As someone who has owned the XL2 and now the XL H1S, this is pretty hard to say. The SD images from both are comparable, but the HDV from Canon's newest cams really are a good deal better. Plus the new cams have much more control over the image parameters.

Your best bet is to sell it for a fairly decent price lower than the XH A1.

Good luck in the sale. I'm sure you'll find someone ...

I did a quick check on Ebay for completed sales - looks like used ones with some 'extras' like batteries or cases and such, are going for 2k-2,300 - not too bad.

I did a quick check on Ebay for completed sales - looks like used ones with some 'extras' like batteries or cases and such, are going for 2k-2,300 - not too bad.

Yeah, that's about my target price.

You can buy brand new XL2 for that price on Ebay (2K-2.3K).

Most of the used XL2 cameras (with ALL the normal boxed extras) on Ebay sell for around £1200-£1,700 with an average price of around £1400. Prices over £1800 tend to always have a lot of extras such as tripods, adapters, and loads of other extras. I've seen Canon XL2 with both 20X & 3X lenses together as a package go for under £2000 a number of times on Ebay this past year.

After shooting an entire feature with this camera, uprezing everything to 1080p, outputting to HDCAM SR, I can tell you we passed QC from a major post house and it is sold to a distributor.

The XL2 is an amazing camera that tends to "get out the way" of the story teller. I couldn't say the same for the 5D MKII.
I'm not selling mine.

-C

Well, I guess I can always keep the camera as a backup. If I can't get that much for it, then I don't think its worth selling it then.

It'll be awhile before I sell my XL2. I use it all the time on 3 camera shoots and I love it for projects that will be delivered in standard definition. I shoot 16:9 30p with it and the picture works well with the other 2 cameras. It also upconverts to 720p quite well, depending on the subject matter. In June I'll be using it for a night club music video (close ups) along with the other cameras and I suspect the XL2 footage will be good enough for upconversion to 720p. My other 2 cameras are the Sony EX1 and EX3.

- Don