Settings
 

I use my XH-A1 to film hunts. I have been playing with the XL presets and several other settings. What would you all recommend to use for this type of filming. Obviously its outdoors filming people and animals. Landscape shots, Rolling clouds, beauty shots of leaves blowing, etc... Just trying to get the most out of this camera. Thanks for the help in advance.

Vividrgb accentuates the reds so you probably don't want to use that.
How about Panalook2.

Haven't tried that one I tried the original PANALOOK. Also preset 10 or DISJECTA.

Presets
 

I would not use any presets. Just shoot with the camera default settings. I shoot practically all of my video in outdoor settings. My own preference is to do any adjustments (if needed) in the editing software. Pay attention to the light, white balance often, try not to shoot between 10:00am and 5:00pm and you will do well! I also personally believe presets are a sort of gimmick, to give leading edge advocates a new experience to play with. Perhaps not, but I have tried a number of presets and simply get better end results with the standard Canon settings.

re
 

It is not good idea, because custom preset can adjust signal in better quality (1920x1080, 422 in DSP). If you make adjustmen in post, you are in 1440x1080 420. Correction colors maybe difficult in post, if there is poor quality color levels in signal.

I film from sunrise to sunset unfortunately. In the outdoor t.v. industry you film a lot of low light shots as well. Unfortunately that's when you have the most action. What I have noticed with several of the presets is the colors look more vibrant but the footage is much darker.

I think it is important to add that you should shoot as flat as possible and get good clean colors, if you want a certain look, if you want it warmer or cooler, I would suggest doing that in post.

Once you shoot your footage you are stuck with what you have. I always shoot so that it will be easy tweak it one way or another. I would suggest the outside setting. It has worked well for me in varying light situations outdoors.

To use neutral or non-neutral in-camera presets?
 

I've heard that you should get the right settings for the look you want in-camera because a lot of information is lost after the video signal is compressed to DV or HDV. A bit like when a RAW photograph is compressed to a jpeg I suppose.

This is an important issue. Anyone have an opinion on it?

I think there's a need to create some presets for indoors with low light settings and others for outdoors with much more light.

re
 

Yes, using a right custom preset is radical change in lowlight conditions (level of noise), with high contrast scenes (level of black for example), or for right levels of colors (faces ...). The corrections in post are much more limited.