Canon Optura Xi Mini DV Camcorder
- Recording System: NTSC
- Camcorder Type: Digital
- Recording Media: Mini DV
- Optical Zoom: 11x
- Weight: 1.6 lb.
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Great dual-purpose camera
Pros
Ease of use, good photos, great video, nice lens and accessories, Canon optics.
Cons
Switching between memory card and tape (awkward), eject interferes with quick-release plates.
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
A great buy. You can get a 1000 bells and whistles on a camcorder for much less, but in the end - software can't make up for lousy optics.
The OpturaXi is a great little camera. We had thought about purchasing a model that uses discs instead of tape so we could easily view them with our DVD player, but settled on this model and simply load the tapes to PC for DVD burning.
The photos we've taken on the memory card make beautiful prints every bit as good as regular film for 4x6 prints using our Sony PhotoStation.
I've also been using the camcorder to convert some older Video8 and VHS tapes to disk.
We found indoor shooting to be a little dimmer than our previous 2 cameras in auto-mode so we added the optional video light (very small) that compensates nicely.
We've ordered the optional lenses (tele/wide) because Canon really does know how to make great lenses.
Switching between the memory card and tape is not perfected. You have to constantly be aware of whether you are recording to tape or card. If you find yourself missing a few photos after a trip, there is a menu option to search the tape for photos and move them over to the card. These appear as 5-second stills in your video, so editing them out of the tape on a PC is still required.
In short, I love the camera because it is a canon lens going straight to digital tape, I don't often use the special effects because so much can be done on the PC during editing.
The photos we've taken on the memory card make beautiful prints every bit as good as regular film for 4x6 prints using our Sony PhotoStation.
I've also been using the camcorder to convert some older Video8 and VHS tapes to disk.
We found indoor shooting to be a little dimmer than our previous 2 cameras in auto-mode so we added the optional video light (very small) that compensates nicely.
We've ordered the optional lenses (tele/wide) because Canon really does know how to make great lenses.
Switching between the memory card and tape is not perfected. You have to constantly be aware of whether you are recording to tape or card. If you find yourself missing a few photos after a trip, there is a menu option to search the tape for photos and move them over to the card. These appear as 5-second stills in your video, so editing them out of the tape on a PC is still required.
In short, I love the camera because it is a canon lens going straight to digital tape, I don't often use the special effects because so much can be done on the PC during editing.
