Canon Vixia HF S11

Compression (7.00)

As with all high definition flash memory camcorders, the Canon HF S11 records video using the AVCHD codec. Though AVCHD started out as a proprietary Sony/Panasonic compression method, it’s now the chosen format for Canon and JVC as well. That means that AVCHD is more common and, therefore, more widely compatible with video editing programs. However, it still requires a powerful computer to manage the files—AVCHD files are much more processor-intensive than HDV files. If you’re considering making a transition from standard definition or HDV, make sure your computer can handle it first.

With the announcement of last year’s HF11, Canon became the first manufacturer to produce a consumer camcorder that recorded at a 24Mbps bitrate—the maximum bitrate allowed by the AVCHD codec. The latest models from Canon continue this trend, with the HF S11 offering two 1920 × 1080 recording at either 17Mbps or 24Mbps. Read more about the advantages and disadvantages of various high definition compression types.

Media (9.42)

The HF S11 offers very few upgrades over the HF S10 released earlier this year. One of those upgrades is recording media: the HF S11 has 64GB of internal flash memory—twice that offered by the HF S10. With 64GB of internal memory, you can record about six hours of the maximum quality footage. If you buy some SD/SDHC memory cards, you can extend that to about three additional hours per 32GB card. That’s a lot of footage, even for a long vacation or a wedding.

We like flash memory a lot, especially when it’s built into the camcorder. Flash memory has no moving parts, so it’s a bit more rugged than hard drives. It’s also more reliable than memory cards, which take a beating every time they’re swapped in and out of the camcorder or thrown in a camera bag. Flash memory might not be up to the huge capacities offered by some hard drives, but you can fit an awful lot of footage on the HF S11. Read more about the advantages and disadvantages of various media types.

Still Features (12.21)

The HF S11 has the same extensive set of still features as the other top-of-the-line camcorders from Canon. It can capture 8-megapixel still photos natively (at a resolution of 3264 × 2456) and offers numerous smaller photo resolution options. In comparison, the JVC GZ-HM400 can take native 9-megapixel photos, the Panasonic HDC-TM300 hovers around 7 megapixels, and the Sony HDR-XR520V can capture 6-megapixel photos natively.

In addition to its photo size options, the HF S11 also has a built-in flash, three metering modes (evaluative, center-weighted, and spot), and a couple of continuous shooting options. The continuous shooting modes can be set to normal, which takes 3 photos per second, or high-speed, which does 5 photos per second. Both modes can take up to 60 photos in a row if you hold down the shutter button. There’s also Auto Exposure Bracketing on the HF S11 that takes three photos at three different exposure levels (dark, normal, and light in 1/2 EV steps). This is a high level of sophistication for any consumer camcorder.

You can capture photos in any of the camcorder’s shooting modes—Dual Shot, video mode, or still mode. Still mode obviously gets you the most photo options, while Video Mode only allows you to capture still images at a 3264 × 1840 or 1920 × 1080 resolution (to match the 16:9 aspect ratio of HD video). In Dual Shot mode, photo size is more of a mystery: you don’t have access to the camcorder’s menus, so photos are captured in the size that was last set in still mode. That means that you can be recording video one moment, then be capturing maximum resolution 4:3 photos the next. We wish this weren’t so confusing in Dual Shot, but we also wish you had this degree of flexibility in regular video mode.

In photo playback, you can use the zoom toggle to digitally magnify your still photos up to 5×. You can also cycle through your photos, view them as thumbnails, start a slideshow, and delete photos— either individually in groups. The camcorder has direct to printer options and photos can be captured from a recorded movie as a sequence (up to 100 photos) or as single images.

The HF S11 put up slightly better numbers in our still color testing than in our bright light video color test. The camcorder earned a color error of 3.87 with a saturation level of 93.7%. These are certainly good scores, but the three other camcorders we used as comparison models all were better. Topping the charts was the Panasonic HDC-TM300, which managed a 2.65 color error.

All the camcorders have above-average still image capabilities and their excellent color performances show off this fact. Both the JVC and Panasonic models show more color depth than the Canon and Sony, but all the camcorders render strong colors in their digital photographs. The Canon does appear a bit washed out due to its higher automatic exposure level, but this can be manually adjusted to your liking.

The HF S11 averaged 1.06% noise in our still image testing, which is a disappointing score. Unfortunately, this also seems to be a common trend; most of the high-end camcorders we’ve tested have done poorly with with still noise. The JVC GZ-HM400 had 1.14% noise and the Sony HDR-XR520V had 1.07%. The Panasonic HDC-TM300 (0.79%) is one of the few flagship camcorders to have good still noise scores this year.

Still sharpness is the most important still image test because it lets you know how much detail and how crisp of an image your camcorder will be able to capture in a photograph. The Canon HF S11 did fantastic in this test, measuring a horizontal sharpness of 2886 lw/ph with 5.2% oversharpening and a vertical sharpness of 1477 lw/ph with 6% undersharpening.

The Canon even outscored the JVC GZ-HM400 in this test, despite the fact that the JVC has a higher effective pixel count for still images (9 megapixels vs. 8 megapixels). The Panasonic and Sony, while still having decent sharpness scores, were well behind the Canon and JVC. One reason we do this test is to show that camcorders are rarely capable of producing actual line widths per picture height (lw/ph) that match the resolution of the image. So, even though the Canon HF S11 is capable of taking still photos at a 3264 × 2456 resolution, its sharpness isn’t nearly that high.