WHICH ONE - Canon HF S21 - Sony HDR-CX550V - Panasonic HDC-TM700 - Page 4

I didn't say it didn't have avchd. I said it doesn't have (or use) the standard avchd file structure. If you try and do a log and transfer in Final Cut Pro, the program will not recognize the files if you have copied them to a hard drive. On the other hand it DOES recognize the same thing from both Canon and Sony camcorders.

hi, i'm looking to get either the Tm700 or the HFS21 soon. The 60p mode of the Panasonic sound pretty nice, but I'll mainly use it for 1080/24p recording and editing.

Which of the two would you guys recommend for this?

thanks for any help.

This all depends on the features you like. For me, I like the TM700 because of the focusing ring and the 1080 60p mode but what I can't stand about it is that Panasonic just had to put 24p within 60i unlike the Canon HF S21. What this mean is that you'll have to remove pull-down beforehand in order to get pure 24p with the Panasonic. The best way is by purchasing NeoScene which does it automatically but I wish it didn't have to be that way. At least I'm glad they both have view finders. I mean you can't always rely on an LCD screen to shoot something especially when you need to make sure the picture looks the way you want it to look. Plus the stabilizer and the low light capabilities of the TM700 is a bit better. Keep in mind that the HF S21 costs almost double that of the TM700. For several hundred dollars more than the HF S21 you can get the HMC40 with the XLR adapter. I'm waiting for Panasonic to replace that camcorder to have a faster lens and 1080 60p.

Something to keep in mind is that with 1080 60p, you can also slow it down to 24p for excellent slow motion sequences. I've fooled around with other's people clips in Premiere and they really look incredible. I obviously can't post any of it because they didn't come from something I shot. If only I had one.

thanks man, i'm leaning towards the S21 right now for the native 24p mode.

Any other opinions are welcome

i just ordered the s21 along with the Wide converter Lens.


anyone knows a good lens hood that would fit the Canon WD-H58 Wide Converter Camcorder Lens? would any 77mm lens hood work?


plus anyone knows of an accessory bracket that allows the lcd screen to open all the way with no problems or extra adjustments?


thanks

Can't you shoot under Digital Cinema mode? I thought Digital Cinema mode is shooting under 24p.

The Panasonic HDC-TM700
I was looking at the camera on Amazon and some reviews are complaining about the fan noise.
Is this an issue?


"Just bought this camera based upon reading the reviews and speaking with a number of customer service reps. I have to say that the on-line reviews are very accurate. The optics are beautiful in this camera, and it handles great. That being said, the noise from the fan is a complete deal-breaker, making the camera essentially useless. I regret my purchase very much and would not recommend this camera for anyone. Save yourself a lot of grief and look elsewhere for a camcorder." Amazon review.

If the audio clips I heard are accurate, this is a deal breaker for me.

Discussed at great length in numerous threads here.

Is it possible to turn the mic off on the Panasonic? There are times when I'm shooting something and I dont want the sound. We load up videos on the net for our customers and the audio just adds to the file size.

You can remove audio before uploading.. After all, you have to convert video before uploading anyway (if it's for streaming). I never thought about needing mute on camcorder though.. maybe it can be done..

As for the fan noise - some people either get faulty cams or complain about it too much. I've got TM700 and still haven't noticed it in any video so far.

I have spent a little bit of time with the 700 after considering these same 3 camcorders.

I have heard the fan on some recordings on quiet sections. However, I don't consider it a deal-breaker. First, IMO the main requirement for me on the camcorder was video quality, particularly color, and I'm very happy with the panasonic there. Secondly, I've been extremely impressed with the on-board microphone in extremely difficult situations, and the auto-gain control on the audio works very well. Thirdly, I'm not sure how common it would be that you'd really be filming very quiet things, and you should be able to isolate and eliminate that noise very easily with a sound editor like Soundtrack Pro. It's an extra step, yes, but then it would seem to be an uncommon need on the rare occassion you're really trying to capture something very quiet, and a problem that is relatively easily fixed because it's a very stable and constant noise source which can easily be cleaned.

Lastly, if audio is a key requirement, you're not going to be using the on-board mic on any of these camcorders anyway.

I shot this clip full-auto on the 700 in a very reverberant venue, and the dynamic range was ridiculous, and got deafeningly loud, but the onboard mic did a very respectable job with it, music begins at about 5min mark, I was stunned that the applause didn't totally overwhelm everything and clip it all to s**t:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVSh976i300&hd=1

My most significant audio issue so far has been wind noise, actually, I just ordered a wind-stopper to put on the camcorder, and this is an issue that would exist on pretty much any camcorder. The wind-stopper feature didn't really do much, nor did I really expect it to.

So in my perspective anyway, I don't consider the fan noise (which I was aware of before purchase) to be a very big issue. Again mainly because if audio really is important to you, you shouldn't be using the on-board audio on any camcorder, you should be using a LAV or a shotgun mic or something either jacked in, or to a separate audio recorder.

So in my perspective anyway: is there fan noise? Yes.
Is it bad? No. Only going to be audible in very quiet situations, where you're going to have a bunch of background noise being picked up anyway regardless, and only when the camera gets hot.
Does it really matter? I don't think so. Because if audio is important to you, either 1) you should know how to fix the noise relatively easily with a sound editor, eliminating the problem, or 2) you shouldn't be using the on-board mic on any camcorder in the first place, duh!

HFS21 or TM700

I would like to ask if they can be used for shooting commercials and music videos and working with chroma keying? And which one is better for these things..?


thx btw...

Im just learning so please be easy on me.....

I originally wanted the Canon HF S20 or 21 because of the 24p mode, but if I end up with the TM700 can't I simply slow down the 60p footage to achieve 24p?

Thanks

Sure you can. It will look slow.

The TM700 supports 24p, so there's no need to "slow down" 60p mode. You can't really do that anyway, unless you're trying for slow motion effects. It's easy enough to shoot 1080/60p and convert directly to either 1080/60i or 720/60p, but if you want 1080/24p, that's not an even conversion. And while modern NLEs do frame rate conversion, it's never as good as native.

And really... bottom line, no on-board mic is worth using if audio quality it a high priority. Your quality will bump up very considerably with even a halfway decent add-on mic. The Rode mic I use on my HMC-40 cost about half of what I paid for the TM700, and that's rather a bargain for a good mic.

And yeah, noise of some sort or another had been a problem for small camcorders for years. There's handling noise -- the fact that an in-camera mic will pick up just about any activity performed directly on the camera. And noise sources... you may be able hear the TM700's fan, but it's a far cry from the tape motors in pretty much every small DV camcorder made. I used to have a fairly compact JVC model, back at the dawn of DV, and had to filter just about everything through a notch filter I made up in Vegas. But yeah, a very specific, very narrowband sound, and I could kill it without much obvious effect on the rest of the audio.


There's just not that much you can do about wind noise on an internal mic. For my external mic, I have a "dead cat", which pretty much kills wind noise, even on very windy days (I shoot outdoor sports every week, so I'm pretty well versed in dealing with wind noise), but there's really no way to deal with an internal mic in the same way. Not to mention that the TM700 would nearly fit inside my dead cat, in lieu of the mic.


Absolutely.

It is. The Panasonic consumer models have kind of a retarded menu structure. You get the 1080/60i via the quick menu on-screen. You have to find the the 1080/60p button to get into 1080/60p mode. Or you have to navigate through the "Record Setup" section to select "Digital Cinema" to enter 1080/24p mode, only, you kind of just have to know this mode exists... you don't see it reflected in the on-screen display. And if you set "Digital Cinema" and then hit one of the modes not supported ("HX" or "HE"), you just leave 24p mode, no warning.

Contrast this to the HMC40, which is a pro model built on much of the same "Digital DNA" as the TM300 and TM700. When I go to the mode setting -- first quick menu entry, same as on the TM700, I get all options, equally offered: PH1080/60i/30p/24p, PH720/60p/30p/24p, or HA/HG/HE options at 1080/60i. One single setting, not one button, one menu, and one other menu. This camera is for pros and high-end consumers, I suppose. Why make the consumer model so much more complex, for absolutely no good reason? Consumers will understand things like "60i", "60p", and "24p" far more than they'll understand magic code names for different modes. "HA", "HG", "HE"... which is higher bitrate (quick, without checking the manual)...

So, in short, Final Cut Pro is flawed. Don't blame the camcorder.

This was the case with quite a few NLEs a few years ago. The AVCHD spec is complex, and a number of them didn't support every camcorder on the market. But most PC-based NLEs, perhaps seeing more competition than Apple, have now resolved these compatibility problems.

Case in point: Sony Vegas. Along with Panasonic, Sony was one of the founders of the AVCHD format, which, after all, is a spin-off of Blu-Ray. When Sony first supported AVCHD in Sony Vegas, it didn't work with files from Panasonic and several other camcorders. An update or two later, and the only incompatibility I've seen has been with a malformed MP4 (not AVCHD, which is based on MPEG-2 Transport Stream wrappers) video file from Sanyo camcorders (it has negative timecodes -- provably incorrect... and using software tools to reformat the MP4 and eliminate the negative timecodes, it works properly in Vegas).

If anyone had incentive to not support Panasonic, it would be Sony, a direct competitor in the market. For Apple to not handle Panasonic AVCHD files is a strike against Apple, not Panasonic. No self-respecting NLE company would do a major release without testing against common hardware. Panasonic is certainly one of the "big four" or even "big three" (depending on your feelings about JVC) in consumer and pro video.

Not that Apple's toolchain is a good platform for Blu-Ray anyway. Steve Jobs wants people to download low quality videos to iPods and Apple TV, so he's not allowing Apple software to support Blu-Ray at all. Sure, there are tools from other companies... but if you need to got to Adobe or someone else for Blu-Ray authoring, why not get their NLE as well, and bypass all of this aggrevation.

You may well decide to schedule your hardware purchases around the capabilities of your software, but that's very obviously backwards. FCP has plenty of other issues -- last I heard, it doesn't support native AVCHD editing anyway (it wants to transcode to ProRes, whereas pretty much every PC-based NLE, as well as at least Adobe Premiere on MacOS, works fine at native AVCHD editing, as long as you have a fast enough PC... I've been doing it for several years).

I used to feel that way, until I started shooting lots of sports. These days, I'm shooting sports in 720/60p or 1080/60p (though in fact, the superior camcorder in all other ways, my Panny HMC40, doesn't have the 1080/60p mode).

It's not just the interlace artifacts, it's the AVC compression you're fighting with. AVC and MPEG-2 both count on moving objects to be located with a not-so-much moving frame. When you get that, the video looks good; when you don't, it tends toward horrible, as the whole MPEG algorithm breaks down.

When you double the frame rate, you also double the speed at which motion remains an acceptable thing. Yes, you can also lean to shoot better -- particularly when shooting in HD, you can pull back more, and pan less.

This is ENTIRELY different than what I'd like to see on ABC, NBC, ESPN, CBS, etc. They have dozens of cameras available -- they never actually have to pan anything to follow motion. When it's just movement on the field, you don't get into many bad situations, and pretty much don't need 60p. But for High School or College sports shot from a single camera, I must have 60p.

So, after hours and hours of reading through forums and threads, I almost bought the Pannasonic TM700. In fact, I had already added it to cart and was about to check out, but something told me I should try out the raw video file samples on my desktop computer with calibrated monitor.

I ran them through Premiere CS5 and viewed them on a CRT Lacie Monitor calibrated with Color Munki and I have to say, I am not impressed with the Panasonic picture quality. Here's my gripes with the Panasonic picture quality

- Dynamic range looks poorer than the Canon S21. The TM700 seemed to blow out the highlights very easily while the Canon S21 seemed to handle them better while retaining detail. Perhaps this is also related to exposure control on the Canon being better or the dynamic range of the sensor being better.

- Contrast rendition is better on the Canon S21. It seems to me that Panasonic TM700 is trying to provide "sharpness" by providing more color contrast. I think the Canon S21 provides better picture quality by providing a flatter contrast and showcasing micro-contrast where you can see the textures.

- Shadow detail seems better in the Canon S21. Perhaps the TM700 has better low light capability, but in a scene with lights and darks, I think the Canon S21 is able to provide better shadow detail.

- The lens on the Canon S21 is better. You just have to hold it in your hand and you can tell it has more glass. I'm sure there a weight to quality equation out there. The TM700 should actually weigh a lot more considering how wide it goes. Wide lenses are supposed to be heavy. The Canon S21 with the WD-H58 is more like what I would expect a good quality lens system to weigh that goes wide. Sure the stock lens is not as wide as the TM700, but put the WD-H58 on the S21 and it is actually goes wider than the TM700.

- Color rendition is more natural and beautiful on the Canon. It just looks like art to me. I can especially appreciate it on a calibrated monitor. The Panasonic looked very unnatural. I could almost decide to reject the Panasonic on color rendition alone. I know some people like that vivid look, so this is also a matter of preference. I just can't stand the world looking like it has been coated with neon radiation. I know post-production can solve some of that, but I would much rather add color to a more neutral image than have to shift colors around with every clip to correct an image. I would have to get out the greytag macbeth color swatch and do some serious calibrating and who knows what you end up with at the end. Anyhow, I suspect that the TM700 will end-up with some clipping colors in some scenes and you can't recover detail in those cases.

- Post-processing seemed better with the Canon S21 clips. I think this might be related to the compression used by the TM700. Some reviews stated that they found artifacts in the results from the TM700. Well, what happens when you process a file with artifacts? You get more artifacts! I would much prefer to have a camera that provides a cleaner file than have to deal with artifacts. And I was using the TM700 1080/60p files! I think the Canon S21 compression is better and provides a cleaner file to deal with.

I was a bit suprised that a 14 second 1080/30p clip from the S21 was about the same size as a 14 second 1080/60p from the TM700. Perhaps the TM700 uses much stronger compression? That's speculation, but I certainly am suspicious that the TM700 compression is not as good as the S21.

- 60p just doesn't impress me right now. I looked at a number of clips on the monitor at 60p that provide that smooth panning and such and I must say that even though technically it is superior and that there are particular circumstances that it shines, in the end I actually liked the 30p and 24p looks. Perhaps it helped that I was watching on a CRT monitor rather than a LCD. Even with fast motion, the 30p and 24p had a very pleasing look, especially when you add up all the above pluses for the S21.

The only drawbacks for me was the S21 being more expensive and not having the wide-end. So I'm buying a WD-H58 and getting even more wide-end compared to the Panasonic. Total price from Amazon with the S21, WD-H58, and a BP-819 batter was $1450. My current Canon Optura XI lasted 7 years and I think we paid about the same. If I get another 7 years out of this, it's well worth it.

I am down to the Panasonic TM700 with Panasonic VW-BN2 Portable DVD Burner and the Sony CX550 with VRD-MC6 DVDirect DVD Recorder? I will be doing just a straight shoot and burn to DVD, no editing or anything. I read where one does something like 24p and one does it at 17p but I dont understand any of that. I just want to shoot and burn and get the best picture possible, and still have a camera with the ability to save and edit HQ HD video as I learn. Anybody use these together? Also, Sony says there burner will work with any camcorder but user reviews say it wont, since I cant find the Panasonic burner anywhere has anyone used the Sony burner with the TM-700? Thank You!!

No matter what your monitor is, the best way to experience 1080 60p is one that is progressive and have a native resolution of 1920x1080p.

But if the Panasonic TM700 doesn't look as good as the Canon S21 on a CRT, how is it going to look better than the Canon on a progressive LCD? Anyhow, the value of 1080/60p format really goes close to zero when you have to view it on specialized equipment. Heck, Imax looks really good in an Imax theater, but it's unreasonable to expect everyone to go out and upgrade their equipment to handle that format, even if the format is the future. I'll just wait and let the future become the present and work in a format that's is better for today. In my opinion, the Canon S21 provides better support for today. I'll let the beta-testers, R&D, and standards committee's deal with the future.

I was just speaking about the motion quality saying that you can't really judge the pure benefits of 1080 60p unless your viewing the materiel on a fully compatible TV such as most LED Back let LCD screens and Plasma Screens. Most new HD TVs are already fully compatible. Still, if the HF S21 works for you than that's your decision. At least you wont have to remove pull-down like you have to with the TM700 if your very into the 24p look.

I've been using the TM700 for several months now, owned an HFS21 as well, and just purchased a CX550 a couple of weeks ago.

To make a long story short, while I feel that nothing beats the TM700 in 60p mode, I have concluded, that of the 3, the Sony probably makes the most sense. 60p is just not as practical (at least not yet anyway) for me, as my goal is always to end up with something on a blu-ray disk. I know of no authoring solution that allows one to burn 1080 60p footage onto blu-ray. I had been converting to 720 60p but doing so quite frankly just does not take full advantage of this camcorder. This footage just does not look any better than what I can get out of the Sony. Yes, it's a bit smoother since it is progressive, however in most other regards the Sony 1080i footage looks just as good if not better. Again, record in 1080 60p and the Panasonic is the winner, but I am tired of the converting and ending up with results that just do not warrant any of it.

As far as the Sony goes, there are some real advantages that I have found.
1 - Widest lens of the bunch. There IS a tendency to show some flare if pointed towards the sun, but this is done away with when using a hood.
2 - The OIS is wonderful in this camcorder. Better than that on either the Panasonic or the Canon.
3 - The video output while nothing spectacular just looks good. Color is pretty accurate (more so than the Canon), sharpness and auto focusing are very good.
4 - There is a remote socket where I have plugged in a Varizoom adapter cable. This cable will convert a standard lanc cable to the proprietary socket used on the Sony, so I can use a lanc remote control to be able to control both start/stop and zoom functions from the handle of a tripod. This is invaluable and something that the Panasonic unfortunately misses.
5 - No more fan noise. Yes it's very slight on the Panasonic, and yes I had found that putting my thumb over the fan does away with it, but you know what? It shouldn't have been there to begin with. Now I don't have to deal with it at all anymore.

So while I feel there are some really great aspects to the Panasonic, there are some serious shortcomings as well. I think the Sony will be a pretty good fit for me at this point.

I thought Sony added their "vivid" character to the color. And from the reviews, it would seem the Canon is more accurate on color.

There are some video sample on Vimeo of someone who was seeing a blue laser-like dot in his video from lens flare. I personally would much rather have a lens that handles flare better. I think the Canon probably beats Sony on lens technology.

There's already a thread on this forum that discusses the blue-dot issue. It's fairly easy to find sample on Youtube and Vimeo too.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1239369

1080p60 @ 18 Mbit/s looks great on my 50-inch plasma, played from an AVCHD disc by DMP-DB80 player. I would not call a $140 player "specialized equipment".

Also, true progressive works great for computer viewing and viewing from a set-top media player. My ASUS O!Play does not deinterlace properly, losing resolution. At the same time 28 Mbit/s of 1080p60 is too taxing for it, it chokes. So, 18 Mbit/s 1080p60 videos that play fine on my BD player also play just fine on my Asus player, and on my computer. Win - win - win.

As for the Sony, no manual audio control and no full exposure control kills it for me. It does not even report current settings it uses in auto mode. I probably could live with 1080i, but I don't want to shoot in auto all the time. Yeah, I know, exposure. But it is just overall exposure level, not shutter/aperture. There are aperture and shutter priority modes, but if I understand correctly, I cannot use exposure bar in a priority mode.

I sold my TM700, but I am thinking of buying another one. I can use my variable ND filter on it and forget about exposure control. I would set shutter speed and aperture just once, then I would use the filter to control exposure, and the ring to control focus. Um... No. Switching from manual focus to auto and back will still be as painful as it is now. I will wait for a next model. Panasonic should stop ruining the ergonomics of its cams, there should be some improvement. The SD300 was used to create the HMC40. Maybe it is time to use some of the HMC40 controls in a future consumer cam, eh? Or add 1080p60 to the HMC40 and I will buy it. Panasonic, are you freaking listening?

The most beloved of my cameras, the HDC-SD1, shoots 1080i60 only. I deinterlace it into 720p60 for editing and for final rendering. Again, works for my BD player, for my set-top media player and for my computer. Not as detailed as 1080p60 though.

I've reproduced the blue dot myself. It happens when the camcorder is set to its widest lens setting and pointed in the general direction of the sun. It's easily controlled by using a lens hood so I am not concerned.

The Canon color is ok. The only problem I had with it here is that in sunlight it tended to go a bit blue unless I set it to the overcast day setting. I had other issues with the Canon...lack of a real wide angle lens being the biggest. Poor low light noise reduction and color accuracy were others. It's not a bad camcorder otherwise.

As far as vivid colors go, I think the Panasonic colors are a bit more vivid than the Sony depending on the subject matter and lighting conditions. Either way, I agree the Panasonic colors are better overall.

Ungerman, I hear you on the manual controls. While I would prefer to have some more manual control, it is not a deal breaker for me that the Sony lacks this. I don't use this camcorder for the more important things, it's just a fun, family oriented one as far as I am concerned.

It just got reduced to $751 at both Amazon and B&H so you might as well take advantage of that deal.



Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Bah its $20 less today(from B&H), I ordered my Panasonic HDC-700 last night, It will be here on Wednesday. I can't wait.

Although I had fun today messing with my friends Canon 7D that he let me borrow.

EDIT: this is my first post on the AVS forums.