Canon HF100 Review

This Camera Offers More Than a Standard Point and Shooter

The latest in high definition cameras comes from Canon's long history of optical excellence, advanced image processing, stunning performance and technological innovation in photographic and broadcast television cameras.

The light and compact Canon VIXIA HF100 offers superb Advanced Video Codec High Definition format recording with the ease and numerous benefits of Flash Memory. The world's most ground-breaking electronic products uses this same function.

Moreover, it has Canon's 3.3-megapixel Full HD CMOS sensor and advanced DIGIC DV II Image Processor, SuperRange Optical Image Stabilization, Instant Auto Focus, 2.7" Widescreen Multi-Angle Vivid LCD and genuine Canon 12x HD video zoom lens. This is a Flash Memory camcorder which is uniquely Canon.

The HF100 more than meets the requirements for point-and-shooters. Camcorders that work well in Auto mode have always been Canon's standard. The menu system is quite complicated. Spending some minutes with the manual would benefit even the greenest videographer up to speed on all the setting and their locations.

The HF100 has a grand manual control package for advanced shooters. It has exposure, aperture priority, shutter priority, focus, white balance, a variety of Scene modes and a Canon-exclusive selection of "Image Effects" which provides control over saturation, sharpening and contrast. Only Canon offers the actual degree of control over the last parameters. The HF100 has a joystick that is well located however it makes fine adjustments less pleasant.

A notable feature is its very small size. Canon however has chosen to make the HF10 and HF100 small but controllable even as manufacturers have been trying to get the indefinable award for "world's smallest HD camcorder". The HF100 feels solid in the hand.