Footage
 

I Know this is way to early to ask but has any body know where to get some footage from these camcorders. some is bound to ask is there any footage so why not me.

Well the A1 doesn't ship until late October and the G1 not until mid November. So it'll be a good little while yet. Somebody in Japan will probably get the first one... I'll bet you a six-pack of Shiner Bock that our own Kaku Ito will be one of the very first people outside Canon to get his hands on it. Remind me to send Kaku his new DV Info Net media server upload account info.

Wait, I don't think you're of age for Shiner Bock. Better make that Red Bull.

mmm.... Shiner....

It's not only the National Beer of Texas; it's the Official Beer of DV Info Net.

not only will the first footage come from japan, but it will feature either close-ups of flowers or ducks.. or mountain bikes if it comes from kaku.

If the sensor/inner workings are the same as the H1 (maybe even improved), Then can we assume comparitive imagery to that of the H1? That is, is the results so close that you could intercut it?

My marketing instinct say's there has to be 'some' limitation. Maybe it's the lens? Don't know. If canon feels that it's worth risking to lose some H1 sales, but realize more profit overall?

Example the HC1/A1U intercuts with FX1\Z1U, but it's a noticeably softer image.

For the canon, If it's just a fixed vs. interchangeable lens...

Hmmmm, maybe after four beers I'll see this more clearly : )

Well there is an additional factor, the jack pack version is going to sell for 7 grand. That's a pretty good chunk of change and I don't think that people forking over 7K for a studio camera are going to be happy if the image is noticably softer than the XLH1. If the FX1 can resolve around 700 lines I'm pretty confident that the Canon will at least match that and maybe even push into the 750+ area (in 1080i mode anyway).

www.philipwilliams.com

I see your point Philip, it's not how close the image is to the H1 that is concerning, but it's how much better it is than the FX1.

Remember the good old days when gas was a dollar a gallon and Canon could be counted on to make sure the GL cameras were lacking enough professional features to make sure it was snubbed by the professional market? If you wanted a 'real pro' camera, you got the XL, if you just needed good video and had limited funds, you got a GL (like I did). Now, it looks like Canon is more interested in taking a bite out of Sony than it is in protecting the H1.

Based on what little I've read, the images from an A1 should be virtually indistinguishable from H1. The specs are the same. In the past, Canon GL video looked as good as contemporary XL video, even with the smaller CCDs.

The only complaints I could come up with at this stage is: 1) the LCD screen is 2.5" while Sony's palm-sized AVCHD cameras managed to squeaze a 3.5" screen. 2) Sony's Z1 successor will likely offer the new H.264 format, which is said to be twice as efficient as the HDV format. But, these quibbles can't shake my excitement on seeing a $4K version of the H1.

It may very well be H.264 but when? H.264 encoding is very intensive to get the beautiful quality/size ratio it can achieve. That's why it's not an acquisition format at the moment. You need some good real-time hardware encoding chips which are just now coming to market.

-gb-

I can't believe that the Spoetzel Brewery isn't a DVINFO sponsor yet. You need to work on that. (hehe)

-gb-

I've shot many multi-cam shoots, and a for while, I rented the XL's. Then I tried a GL and it's media intercuts nicely (you had to knock the sharpening down a bit though). It was the perfect B-cam, smaller and easier to mount cramped locations or on the wall. Yet not tempting enough to be stolen when left alone on a tripod on a balcony, etc.

The only issue with the A1 is the lens quality and will it resolve a comparable image to that of the H1.

I'm not worried about H.264 as a rival format. It take some time for that to grow into a useable system, (for which I don't want to be a beta tester). I'll stick with HDV for both the warranty period of the camera and my workstation.

Funny, I'm so far away from the action I still consider HDV users as beta testers. Doesn't seem that long ago that HDV was being dismissed as a consumer novelty format. If I was a betting man, I'd put some money on Sony announcing a Z1 replacement with h.264 before November of this year. I use a scientific formula known as Roark's Law. Its kind of complicated, so I'll type slowly:

Roark's Law: When you are finally able to assemble a computer powerful enough to ingest the latest video format, then the industry will adopt a new format.

I have been thinking about the lens quality and I think maybe it is going to be very close. The new cameras still have a 72mm thread which means they are fairly large in size. This could be almost the same exact glass and lens system used for the lens on the H1. Only this time it is built right onto the camera. Both have a 20x zoom and the same thread size. I see no reason why they couldn't be the exact same lens. I would also think low light should be exactly the same as well. If the lens is the same and we know the CCD's and dsp are the same then the image quality should be exactly the same.

We know that the CCD block is the same between the XL and XH, but the focal length of the 20x lenses is different. XL is 5.4 - 108mm. XH is 4.5 - 90mm.