Canon VIXIA HF11 AVCHD 32 GB Flash Memory Camcorder w/12x Optical Zoom

Best camcorder I've bought in the past 10 years.

Stability, along with high-speed performance, and video/picture quality is what I needed to take along in my travels. Works great with the SDHC Sandisk Extreme III 8GB memory card that I bought after it since it can hold up to 16 hours of my MPEG-4 videos along the road.

Current Best Offer: $849.00

Get Adobe Premier Elements 7 or Pinnacle Studio Plus 12 to edit your Canon AVCHD files!

While Adobe Premier Elements 7 is a big joke for the MP4 AVC/H.264 formats...it is a superstar with the AVCHD / .mts files this Canon HF10 generates.

Before I bought my own HF10 I was asked by a buddy to edit and burn some youth football footage from his newly acquired Canon HF10 with SDHC card. I was excited. Although I had no clue what an .mts file was Adobe PE 7 not only recognized it and imported it quickly...but I proceeded to edit both video and audio (together and separately)as well as burn to a regular DVD (not BluRay). My jaw just dropped and I said WOW!

I will add that while I am not a big fan of the GUI of Pinnacle Studio Plus 12 it also handles the AVCHD / .mts from the Canon HF10 just fine...and also handles those other MP4's just fine too.

The really important part is that while I have a nice amount of ram (4GB) my computer is nothing special at all. I am running Vista Basic on a Celeron 1.60Ghz processor (Dell Inspiron 530 desktop) with the 4GB of ram.

Now that I have purchased my OWN Canon HF10 AVCHD camcorder Adobe PE7 is my go-to program for this type of footage. Again, it handles the AVCHD / .mts file format flawlessly. Check out my other reviews for some other programs I have tried like Corel VideoStudio X2 and Magix - Movie Edit pro 14. If you are going to be working only with AVCHD, specifically from any of the Canon HF series camcorders that put .mts on sdhc flash cards...then I believe Adobe Premier Elements 7 is the best option.

Warning: If you are going to rely on ONE software solution for multiple formats other than AVCHD, Adobe PE7 is not the way to go! I use several little camera/camcorders other than the HF10. They all use the MP4 AVC/H.264 format...while the previous version of PE handled them fine, Adobe PE 7 HATES the MP4 format! You can't even add them to the time-line without it crashing! If you are looking for a single editing program to handle not only the AVCHD from the Canon HF10, HF11 or HF100 but other formats as well...specifically the MP4 AVC/H.264 format then I would go with Pinnacle Studio Plus 12. Like I said before, the interface and work flow is nothing like Adobe's but it works fin with the multiple formats.

Current Best Offer: $849.00

HF-11

So I did a lot of research on which camera to buy and yes the HF-10 would have been cheaper and more economical, but sometimes one always goes for the newest.

I got a price that was about $400 less than what I thought I was going to pay and man I am excited. The Sony Hard Drive cameras were attractive as their menu system is still the best, but proprietary features made it less attractive for use with an iMac. The JVC and Panasonic camcorders in the same price range had some better features and some that were not as good but their prices were very attractive, I ended up with the canon simply because I like the brand i suppose.

I transferred my first video using the 24p cinema mode to my iMac 24" and struggled with it at first. The weird thing was that the photos did transfer over but the video would not. Then I realized you need to have the camera plugged into the outlet using the AC adapter in order to have the transfer occur. I am not excited about this requirement, I mean if I have the battery power available why can I not do it. I can imagine that if I did not have the power though would the video breakdown or corrupt itself somehow. It is a minor issue simply because I plan on doing 95% of my video transfer at my main computer at home, but if you need to travel and transfer video DO NO forget your AC Adapter.

You do have the option to transfer your video to the SDHC card and then transfer video that way, but i am not sure if this is possible with only battery power.

Visually I have been impressed with 24p cinema mode. It is like we are filming a low budget documentary with a hand held device. The light feature for night shots has also been useful and works well.

The camera is OK. It is nice to have and also great to have the wide aspect, but it does not replace a 10 MP point and click device. It is just convenient at this point.

I know there is more I could say but I want to spend more time filming and less time writing.

Current Best Offer: $849.00

Wonderful

Great device. Shocking how small it is for the punch it packs. Be sure you have a late model very capable computer if you wish to edit the files. They are large. Get an extra battery and the wall charger to make life less hassle.

You can burn about 35 minutes of high res video to a standard DVD. The is about all of your vacation that was great anyway. Get one and have fun making and recording memories.

Current Best Offer: $849.00

Not Recommended for mounting in Car

Overall, this is an excellent 5 star camera. I bought it with the intent of recording in-car HD video at track events. Unfortunately, the OIS on this and other HD canon cameras interfere with the stability. After careful research on various forums, I found that any camera with optical image stabalization will have this problem. (please note that it is not a "you need to turn on/off image stabilization" problem) I am still searching for an HD in-car camera, but in the meantime, I'm using the Canon SD750 (Canon PowerShot SD750)--one of the latest non-OIS PowerShot cameras that record up to an hour of video. (grab one while you can-Cannon just depricated the 750.)

Current Best Offer: $849.00