Canon Vixia HF S100 Camcorder Review

Handling & Use Summary
• The easy mode is deceptively named (Dual Shot Mode) and hard to find • Custom control dial makes manual focus adjustments smooth and easy • Body is large, but comfortable in the hand • Menus can be a chore to navigate—options are spread out across three separate menus • Battery life is average and there's no viewfinder, which somewhat dimishes the usefulness of all the great manual controls
	Still Features	(Page 9 of 17)	Playback & Connectivity

Ease of Use (4.85)

The Canon HF S100 features some of the same changes we saw earlier this year in our review of the Canon HF20. Unfortunately, a few of those changes make the camcorder less beginner-friendly than last year's HF11. Canon has done away with the prominent "Easy" button that was formerly located smack dab in the middle of the LCD cavity. The button has been replaced by the superfluous Video Snap button, just as it was on the HF20. Maybe Canon thinks that beginners will be eager to shoot lots of ten-second clips, but we think they're more likely to shoot in cruise control for as long as it takes to capture baby's first steps. The now absent Easy button was a great choice for novice videographers, locking them out of menus and manual controls.

There is, technically, an auto mode on the HF S100, but it has a misleading label. On the mode dial, you'll find a green icon of a camera and a camcorder together—"Dual Shot" mode. This is the mode where Canon locks you out of the menus and puts the user in cruise control. Don't be deceived: you can shoot photos and videos simultaneously in regular video mode too. "Dual Shot" mode is simply an erroneously and poorly named easy mode. We think that easy mode should be the easiest thing for users to find. In this regard, the 2009 Canons are a disappointment.

Regular movie mode and camera mode are simple to use, but there's a steep learning curve in familiarizing yourself with all the ins and outs of the HF S100. Of the four major manufacturers (Canon, Sony, Panasonic, JVC), Canon offers the least in the way of tool tips, descriptions, or other contextual aids. Panasonic's Info feature can be activated to bring up a short explanation every time you select something in the main menu. Sony has a similar feature for their main menu, plus short text descriptions inside the camera settings menu. JVC has scrolling descriptions of the features within their menus. As for Canon, it's all a bit opaque. If you don't know what a feature does, you'll probably need to refer to the instruction manual. Fortunately, Canon has excellent documentation—all available as pdf files online, in case you lose the paper manual that comes with your camcorder.

The HF S100 also continues Canon's tradition of splitting features into several different menus, which can be quite frustrating until you learn your way around. Some options are double-featured in more than one menu, but most live in just one of the three different menus: the main administrative menu, the function menu, and the joystick menu. This makes the camcorder a bit cumbersome even for more experienced users. To adjust aperture, you'll need to activate Aperture Priority mode. To adjust white balance, just pop into the function menu. To shift exposure, use the joystick menu. To shift AGC limit, navigate to the second tab of the administrative menu.

The image adjustment process can be streamlined a bit using the fantastic custom control dial, but even that isn't as easy as it should be. You can't switch dial functions on the fly; you have to go into the admin menu to select which of the five functions you want assigned to the dial.

Requiring this kind of mastery over the menu navigation really places the HF S100 out of reach for less tech-savvy beginners that are considering venturing into the realm of manual controls. Experienced users will adjust quickly, but first-time videographers will probably want to look elsewhere.

Handling (7.45)

The Canon HF S100 received a design overhaul compared to last year's models, including a couple features that will change the way you use the camcorder. The most significant new arrival is the custom control dial, which gives users a smooth interface for making manual focus, exposure, and audio level adjustments. This method is far superior to the joystick-only operation on Canon's HF- and HG-series. The joystick on those models (and on the HF S100) is too small and too imprecise for something like manual focus adjustment.

The custom control dial is great, but could have been implemented better.

Unfortunately, the custom control dial is really only designed to handle one manual control at a time; you have to delve fairly deep into the menus in order to assign a function to the dial. While you can assign one of five different functions (exposure, focus, focus assist functions, microphone levels, and gain limit), it's too much of a hassle to really do on the fly. You'll want to choose your preferred control—probably focus—and stick with that.

The custom control dial in action.

The Sony cam control dial, on the other hand, allows you to quickly switch back and forth among four options: focus, exposure, AE shift, and WB shift. We wish the HF S100 had this sort of easy flexibility. Complaints aside, kudos to Canon for imitating Sony's excellent dial mechanism.

The HF S100 is large, but fits well in your hand.

There have also been some changes to the form factor, with a new, larger lens completely dominating the body. There's never much to grasp with a flash memory camcorder, but the HF S100 has a bit more bulk than the slimmer HF20. As a result, the HF S100 is a lot more comfortable in the hand. The zoom toggle rests easily underneath the index finger and two small lines of rubber gripping are underneath the middle finger. The new design means that it's easier to hold, but it also means that the accessory shoe is up front—where most manufacturers typically place it. If you plan on using the shoe often, make sure you're comfortable with the new architecture before taking the plunge.

Canon rarely disappoints with its hand strap design and the Canon HF S100 is no exception. The soft suede lining on the interior and a decent amount of cushioning should make long shoots easy on the hand.

We have few complaints with the button layout of the HF S100. Most of the switches and buttons respond well and are conveniently located. The joystick is small and finicky, but it feels better than the ambiguous action of the joystick on the Sanyo VPC-HD2000. That will probably be good enough for navigating the menus, which aren't particularly easy to navigate as it is. (See Menus.)

The joystick on the LCD panel...		...and another view of the joystick

The ports on the right side are poorly placed.

Perhaps the most curiously frustrating aspect of the HF S100's design is the arrangement of ports. The only positive thing that can be said is that the ports are located on the camcorder—some camcorders have the ports available only via a separate docking station. On the HF S100, however, there is a large port cavity on the right side of the camcorder inconveniently tucked underneath the hand strap. There's no practical reason why you can't place the ports there, but we just don't like the cheap port cover or the hassle of pushing the strap aside to access HDMI, component-out, and USB terminals. Add to that the completely exposed microphone input in the front, the ill-fitting port covers for the DC input and AV output, and the flimsy card slot cover. Port design is just not the strong suit of the Canon HF S100—or any of this year's Canons, really.

The HF S100 from the back

Speaking of cheap or flimsy parts... the HF S100 continues Canon's tradition of producing not particularly sturdy-seeming products. Once again, a Canon camcorder greets us with that familiar rattling of internal parts that's a bit unsettling on the ears. When you're in photo or video mode, the rattling subsides, but in playback mode or when the camcorder is powered down, the rattling is very distinct. We thought at first that this was the lens cover, but the sound comes from further up the barrel and it occurs even when we hold the lens cover in place. Whatever the sound is, it's not something you like to hear from a thousand-dollar piece of equipment. Nor do we like the thing, high sound that our finger makes when we tap on the plastic parts. The inside may contain excellent processing and optics, but the outside feels cheaper than the competition from Sony and Panasonic.

Stabilization (1.61)

The Canon HF S100 is equipped with optical image stabilization (OIS) to reduce shake in video footage. While the OIS did reduce some shake in our tests, its overall performance was not particularly strong. The HF S100 improved stabilization by only 28% in our low-shake test, and by 12% in our-high shake test. (More on how we test stabilization.)

Canon HF S100 Stabilization Effectiveness

At Low Shake (above), an 28% correction At High Shake (below), an 12% correction

In the graphs above, the blue lines represent the camcorder's motion with OIS turned off, while the orange lines are with OIS engaged. As you can see, the Canon shows little improvement at both shake levels when using OIS. The video below shows the same concept—the stabilized footage doesn't look much better than the regular video (with OIS turned off).

Both the Sony HDR-XR520V and Panasonic HDC-TM300 did a much better job in our stabilization test. Each is equipped with an optical image stabilizer and reduced shake upwards of 80% in our low-shake test. The Sony HDR-XR520V also has two levels of stabilization: standard and active mode.

Stabilization Score Comparisons

Portability (5.15)

In practice, the Canon HF S100 is as portable as any other consumer camcorder: it's too big to fit in your pocket and small enough to slip into a camera bag or purse. If you're the sort of person that carries your camcorder around on a regular basis, however, you will notice that the HF S100 is larger than many of its competitors. This is thanks, in large part, to the sizable lens barrel dominating the body of the camcorder. It's a larger lens than anything you'll find on the top-of-the-line models from Sony, Panasonic, or JVC. As a result, the Canon is slightly larger than the Panasonic HDC-TM300 or the JVC GZ-HD300. Honestly, the increase in size makes the HF S100 a little easier to hold; smaller camcorders often feel slippery or cramped in your hand. The Sony HDR-XR520V, however, feels bulky and a bit unwieldy. The lens barrel isn't as big, but the hard drive adds a considerably amount of weight and girth. The HF S100 sheds some weight by relying on flash memory.

While the HF S100 does not have any internal memory, SDHC cards are small, durable, and convenient. If you enjoy the extra flexibility of recording to internal storage media, you can always upgrade to the HF S10, which comes with 32GB of internal flash memory. You can also save some space in your bag by leaving a lot of cables at home: there's no need to rely on an external dock, like you do with the Sanyo VPC-HD2000.

Battery Life (4.9)

The Canon HF S100 lasted 97 minutes, 54 seconds in our battery test. This is an average result and is nearly identical to the battery life we measured on the smaller Canon HF20. All four camcorders in this testing set had very similar battery lives, with the Panasonic HDC-TM300 providing the most recording time at roughly 105 minutes. If you want to increase the battery life with the Canon HF S100 that shouldn't be a problem—the camcorder has an unenclosed battery compartment, which means you can easily upgrade to larger, longer-lasting battery packs. (More on how we test battery life.)

Battery Life Comparisons

The HF S100 with rechargeable battery pack.

LCD & Viewfinder (7.88)

The Canon HF S100 features the same 2.7-inch color LCD as the Canon HF20 and HF11. In fact, all of Canon's current HD models feature LCD screens of this size and have 211,000-pixel resolutions. While this is a decent size and resolution for an LCD, it is nothing compared to the 3.2-inch, 921,000-pixel screen found on Sony's HDR-XR520V. The Sony HDR-XR520V also has an electronic viewfinder—something that is not included on the HF S100 or any of Canon's flash memory camcorders. The Panasonic HDC-TM300 has an electronic viewfinder as well.

Although it's still 2.7-inches in size, the LCD has a new bezel  and better button design than other models from Canon.

The design of the LCD panel on the HF S100 is good, however, and represents an upgrade over the HF20, HF200 and last year's models from Canon. The new LCD screen features a flat, glossy bezel that runs the entire length of the panel. This gives the screen more protection and should prevent dust and lint from collecting underneath the LCD. The VCR buttons are also vastly improved on the HF S100. On other models, like the HF20, HF200, and HF11, Canon utilized somewhat unresponsive "membrane" buttons that were difficult to press, especially as the camcorder got more wear and tear. The new buttons are large and well-designed, although using them to perform zooms still doesn't work very well.

We can't give the new LCD design a completely free pass, however, as its glossy design may pose more of a problem in high-glare situations. To account for this, the LCD screen's brightness can be adjusted with 44 increments of control. While adjusting the brightness, a grayscale display appears at the bottom of the screen so you can calibrate the brightness to match your shooting conditions. In addition to the brightness adjustment, the screen has a dimmer feature that can be turned on and off. Using the dimmer or running the LCD with lower brightness should help you extend the camcorder's battery life.


Menus (3.5)

The Canon HF S100 features the same bothersome, multi-layered menu system we've come to know from previous Canon models. Options have been spread across three different locations, leaving you to guess which place to look for a particular feature. The more significant image adjustments are located in the Function menu, where you select a recording quality, bitrate, and image effects. This is also where you can access Aperture and Shutter Priority modes.

The function menu in video mode		The function menu in still mode

Quick image adjustments that you might want to make on the fly are located in a quick menu, mapped to the joystick. Manual exposure and focus adjustments are both part of the joystick guide.

The joystick menu in video mode		The joystick menu in still mode

Everything else is lumped into one giant administrative menu, divided into several different tabs. Navigation of this menu could be a lot easier. Instead of pressing left or right to change tabs, you have to navigate up to the top, then left or right to change tabs. In fact, the joystick menu is finicky and counterintuitive to operate as well.

The main menu in video mode		The main menu in still mode

These minor navigation issues only exacerbate the troublesome split menu design: not only do you have to search for your desired option by process of elimination, but you can't always do it quickly either. So, if you're looking for the gain control, you might strike out in the joystick guide (even though that's where focus and exposure are located), then strike out again in the Function menu (even though that's where you control aperture, shutter speed, and white balance), then finally land in the second tab of the administrative menu at a feature called AGC Limit. On top of all this, Canon doesn't provide tool tips or text descriptions of any of these features. If you don't know what "AGC Limit" is, you'll need to consult the operating instructions or just leave that feature alone. The same goes for BLC (backlight compensation), tele-converter, and several other features.

This may only be a minor nuisance to the experienced videographer, but it can make the technology a lot more daunting to first-time users. Fortunately, Canon does provide a very thorough instruction manual, so if you're willing to spend the time reading up on your purchase, you may be able to take advantage of the depth of controls available on the HF S100.

For a little bit of added flexibility in your menus, there are two font size options (the captures above use the smaller of the two sizes) and 23 language options.