Just wondering if anyone knows if there is a (decent) manual lens coming
for the H1 (like that of the 16x one for the XL1s) but in HD or whether
my 16x manual will be fine even though its not 'HD'...(can people really see the difference?)

I see they've released a new lens with the iris ring on the lens itslef for the H1 but for some reason its only 6x zoom and still has silly focus and zoom rings....

I gave up waiting several months ago and bought a 16x. I had a long phone conversation with a Canon rep who said that she had no inside news of anything in the offing other than the new WA that you mentioned... and that lens, while it has a "real" iris ring, does not have a focus ring with infinety stops...

As for the 16x - there has been much written here and elsewhere about it, mostly referencing standard testing procedures - which is the way it should be evaluated for across-the-board understanding of its advantages and its drawbacks..

My technique is to go out and shoot stuff I usually shoot and see how it compares... And I would say that it compares very favorably. I just finished a five minute film for a client, fairly large budget.. I had a full crew, including a gaffer and makeup person, dolly grips, HMIs, the whole nine yards. I wanted shallow depth of field and I wanted to follow focus to draw the viewer's eye, so I shot everything at f1.6 to f2 with the 16x, and it looks pretty terrific.

The 20x has a very nice "look" that I like alot, but I hate trying to maintain selective focus with that lens....

Hi, thinking about picking up the 16x lens for the basic focus and zoom at the same time feature that Canon keeps ignoring on their digital lenses. Anyone using the 16x manual know if the EVF Peaking / EVF Magnifying feature works with this lens? Thanks

Yes -- both focus assist features (peaking and magnification) work with the 16x manual lens.