Hey guys,

For the last few years I've been shooting with a VX2100 which I got in the middle of 2006 - probably not the best investment seeing as by then it was already on the way out.

I really need to upgrade to HD, but have just been putting it off. As time goes by, I find myself low-balling my prices as I can't justify charging proper rates for SD. I primarily shoot and edit music festival clips but have also worked on a lot of stuff from art gallery exhibits to ad agency market research interviews.

The FX100 really appeals to me due to it's size, image quality and price point, but after being out of the HD technology loop for awhile I was a bit shocked at the prices of high performance 64gb CF cards. HDV is an option, but then again I think that I'll just be buying into tech that will soon be out of the scene as tapeless totally takes over.

I generally shoot a lot of footage (tape is cheap) and I'm wondering what size CF card (if any) the XF100 comes with out of the box. I'm also considering initially shooting at 25mbps which I think would still be world's apart from the image quality of my faithful VX2100 while giving me more recording time. I believe a 64gb card at 25mbps allows for about 5 hours of shooting time - so if the XF shipped with one and I invested in another, it should hold me over nicely.

From what I've read, the XF100 is probably the best camera I could upgrade to in the price-point which would still require me to sell my VX2100 for as much as I can, scrape together additional funds and live a bit poorly for a couple of months until I can recoup the investment. I also feel it's somewhat more futureproof due to its 50MBPs 4:2:2 specs which I would eventually be able to properly utilize for bigger projects once I'm able to stock up on CF cards,

Other than the title question, would the XF100 be a good investment or is there another I should be looking at? Should I try find a second hand FX7 or A1 or would that be somewhat counter productive? Sony and Canon are more well represented in this country compared to Panasonic and JVC and I obviously have a good trust in he Sony brand after using the VX2100 for so long.

Here's an example of the kind of stuff I shoot. Beartrap Productions: Celestial Beings 3 - YouTube

Thanks for any advice. :)

The XF100 doesn't ship with any CF card. I like to use these:

SanDisk 16GB CompactFlash Memory Card Extreme SDCFX-016G-A61 B&H

I like to use a smaller card than the 64GB card. I get a little nervous putting that much info on one card. Love the camera. Have fun!

Thanks mate,

Here in South Africa those Sandisk cards are going for R1100 which is about $150. I see that 16GB at 50Mbps will get me 40min of shooting time which probably means I'd need at least 5 to feel comfortable. Any advice regarding shooting at 25Mbps or should I just bite the bullet and invest in stocking up in CF cards?

What's the bokeh like with the camera?

I shoot 80% of the time at 720 and 30fps for my web site and I get 57 minutes from a 16GB card. I guess it mostly depends on how you want to deliver the material. I think the last 25 or so videos on my site are shot with the XF100 at these settings if you want to take a look.

I use the camera wide open with a wide angle adapter on it pretty much full time so bokeh really doesn't enter the picture for me.

Hi:

Check the cards $/GB you might find that 16GB or 32GB are the better deal and stock up on those. I checked one dealer and found that SanDisk ExtremePro 90MB/s, 32GB was the cheapest when looking at $/GB.

You don't need more than two and a spare if you can offload to your computer while recording. The camera supports swapping out the card in slot B while recording to slot A and vice versa, even as it automatically switches to the other slots when one card is full, so 3 cards should be enough. In this case, you may find the 16GB to be the better choice.

BR, Erik

Whatever you do don't be cheap & buy a CF card that is not on Canon's list of blessed cards. Canon Professional Network - CF card compatibility for XF305 and XF300 camcorders (http://cpn.canon-europe.com/content/news/CF_card_compatibility_for_XF305_and_XF300_pro_camcorders.do)

Yep, make sure you buy within that list, the last thing you want is to buy a non-approved card, pop it in, 10 minutes into the recording, the camera throws an error at you because of the slow card.