Canon HF10 First Impressions Camcorder Review

Other Features

Digital Effects - For those who want to have a little bit of fun with their video before you get it to an editor you can add fade-t and wipe transitions and Black & White, Sepia and Art (or solarization) effects.

Backlight Compensation - This feature adjusts the light to expose the foreground better, so if you have a subject standing in the shade with a lot of light behind them BLC will allow you to bring out the details in your subject better.

Quick Start - This places the Canon Vixia HF10 in a low-power standby mode that consumes less power but lets you start the camcorder up more quickly as opposed to turning it off completely.

Conclusion
The Canon Vixia HF10 is the first Canon camcorder to catch the wave of the future with recording to flash media. There are several benefits to flash media, including the speed, not worrying about damaging it with a drop, and the ease of popping out a memory card and transferring your clips to other devices. Also, the on-camera playback mode is mush faster and the battery time is increased. We’re happy to see that Canon isn’t forcing you to go out and purchase an SDHC card, as the Canon Vixia HF10 has 16GB of internal memory to get you started. Of course the problem with flash compared to an HDD device like the Canon Vixia HG10 is that storage is more limited. However, card capacities are growing quickly and at a certain point you will have “enough” storage.

Apart from the support for flash media the Canon Vixia HF10 also add support for full 1920 x 1080 video capture at 17Mbps. This is a slightly higher bitrate than the Sony HDR-HR12, which tops out at 16Mbps with the same resolution. The Canon Vixia HF10 also adds 30P recording, which will aid in the quality when downcoverting to a web-friendly 15fps, and provides yet another look for your video besides 60i and 24P. The Canon Vixia HF10 also shed some weight and size, making it one of the smaller HD camcorders on the market. This comes at a cost, however, as the Canon Vixia HF10 has contracted the “mini” disease with both mini HDMI and a Mini Advanced Shoe. Be prepared to shell out for some new accessories.