The hands on seminar today went very well I thought. Actually, I learned several things I hadn't known before (which isn't hard to imagine).

The presentation was given by New York-based cinematographer... crap, I've already forgotten the young man's name. He actually worked with Canon in the development of the XL2. Interestingly enough, the XL2 is designed and engineered by one person, instead of a team. Canon is of the opinion that this approach is better. This way the engineer knows the camera--hardware and software--frontwards, backwards, inside and out, up and down. (Heaven help us if this guy kicks the bucket!)

Anyway, the cinematographer/videographer was given the task, by Canon, to take the basic production model--body, 20x lens, and color view finder, and shoot several "professional" situations. One of the most impressive to me was a night shot (low light) of three pretty girls in a car at night driving through Times Square. It was beautiful. Shot with available light, no color/contrast enhancements in post. Everything done in-camera, then edited and burned to DVD. Superb!

Another was shot inside a theatre of some Spanish musicians and a dancer. Again, all color & contrast was controlled in the camera, not in post. I honestly believe that if it were shown without previous knowledge, the audience would never image it was shot on video. The image was gorgeous!

I did ask if there were copies of the DVD available. Unfortunately, at this time there are not.

One thing that surprised me was he went through the entire camera, from front to rear, showed each button and feature with a detailed explanation of each item and showed what they did. He did the same thing with the Menu. Frankly, I found that to be very informative presentation.

One more thing that impressed was that he never made one single disparaging remark about other brands. Actually, quite the contrary. He metioned other brands and said they were excellent cameras and how they differed from the Canon. However, none of them had the versatility and flexibility of the XL2. That's what originally sold me.

I walked away with the confirmation that I had invested in a very "professional" grade camera that is capable of delivering stunning images.

The bottom line is if you're not getting great images, it's certainly not the fault of the camera.

Thanks again, Chris, for letting us know about this, because I would have missed it were not for you!

Jay

His name is David Castillo. Sure wish I could have been there. Thanks Jay!

I think I saw the same clips at the NY IFC conference. I too was given the same answer as far as the availability of that video. It did look great!! of course all the clips were composed with good lighting.

How do I find out if this road show is ever coming to Boston?

I really enjoyed the presentation on Saturday, especially getting to meet Jay and Alex. I'm glad that I had a week to work with the camera, and go through most of the menu items beforehand.
Since I'm sort of a beginner when it comes to using all the manual functions, I had a question about one of the comments made by the presenter.
Did he say that in" hand held" he always used auto focus?
I also got a chance to check out the monochrome view finder, which seems much clearer and mor detailed. I didn't really have a chance to play with the manual lens ,though.
It was a really informative presentation, and i would highly reccomend it to anybody who either owns the xl2 or is considering buying one.
Bruce yarock

Bruce, I think he said in a "run-and-gun" situation auto-focus would be the way to go.

Jay

Thank you so much Chris for letting us know about this, it was so good. I got my xl2 right after the presentation. I did talk to David and asked him if we can have the settings for the different scenes that they have on the dvd and he said yes, but I have to talk to you Chris and they will give it to you so you can post it on the web. so would you please ask about that for me thanks.

Thanks Ed,

Hopefully they'll let me run a web video encoded version of that DVD on the Watchdog. Then along with them I could state the settings used for those clips. Otherwise everybody who has never seen this DVD wouldn't know what we were talking about. Appreciate it,

Put me down as another emphatic "YES PLEASE!!!"

Me too please!

Is this a Canon sponsored tour? Is there any information on the cities they are visiting?

Yes, it is sponsored by Canon, but if Chris hadn't posted the info regarding Miami gig here, I would not have known about it.

Jay

what's up Chris? I just want to know if you had talked to David yet about the settings they used on the demo dvd. I am still waiting for those settings.

The unofficial word I'm getting from "a source inside Canon" is that most likely they won't let me host a web video version of that DVD because of quality control issues. But then I haven't really asked them yet. There is a version of this DVD online somewhere else, and it looks awful. I guarantee my web video encoding will look a lot better. I'll have to go through that encoding process first (maybe just one or two clips) to show Canon USA how good it'll be, and perhaps they'll relent and let me host it. Might take a petition from you guys, might not, we'll see.

Hey Chris,

I noticed on line that there were a few books/videos dealing with the XL1(s) and how to get the most out of the camera. Do you think there will be anything like that in the near future for the XL2. I have to believe that it would be a good seller for all of us who chose this as our first "big" camera.

Best,

Matt

Chris, I was mostly concern with the camera settings they used not the dvd per say. David said if you remind him that he would send it to you.