HD Recording quality

[mrbuckenmeyer]

Hi,

My camera broke and was under warranty. Canon couldn't find the parts so they sent me a new one. The one that broke was a standard cheap one, cost me about €240 eur. The replacement they sent is a FULL HD Legria HF S200. I was in shock! It costs 4 times what I paid for the other. Thank you Canon!! Anyway..

It has 5 recording modes: MXP 24 mbps, FXP 17 Mbps, XP 12 Mbps, SP 7 Mbps, and LP 5Mbps.

Can anyone recomend which would be best/necessary? WIll I get any real benefit from using the highest quality settings?

Thanks!

[edDV]

Hi,

My camera broke and was under warranty. Canon couldn't find the parts so they sent me a new one. The one that broke was a standard cheap one, cost me about €240 eur. The replacement they sent is a FULL HD Legria HF S200. I was in shock! It costs 4 times what I paid for the other. Thank you Canon!! Anyway..

It has 5 recording modes: MXP 24 mbps, FXP 17 Mbps, XP 12 Mbps, SP 7 Mbps, and LP 5Mbps.

Can anyone recomend which would be best/necessary? WIll I get any real benefit from using the highest quality settings?

Thanks!

Consider FXP 17 Mb/s as normal (1440x1080i/25) --- adequate bit rate.

MXP 24 Mb/s (1920x1080i/25) --- 50% more horizontal resolution at the same bit rate per pixel as FXP

The lower settings will be bit rate starved for HD (more compression artifacts) but will work with cheaper (level 2) flash media. FXP needs level 4, MXP needs level 6.

If you plan to edit, expect significant recode loss with h.264. To compensate you should use the higher settings. It is possible to I frame edit h.264 with no recode loss (1/2 second accuracy).

For legacy family/travel type recordings be careful of "looks good enough" judgements based on computer monitoring or a cheap small HDTV. In the future large good HDTV sets will be affordable and you will be glad you shot FXP/MXP. Figure the "economy" setting is FXP, not XP. Use XP only if level 2 flash is all you have.

[mrbuckenmeyer]

edDv,

Thanks for the response, it was very helpful. So the lower settings are actually lower resolutions, I thought it was just more compressed.

When you say level 2 on flash memory are you referring to the space on the memory card? I looked up level 2, 4 6 on google but couldn't find any reference to that.

Thanks

[edDV]

The top two settings are typical for AVCHD camcorders. The XP 1440x1080i 12Mb/s is bit rate reduced AVCHD. The lowest settings will be explained in the camcorder manual. Some models reduce resolution to 720x480i SD. Some offer a DVD MPeg2 720x480i.

Flash media comes by capacity (GB) and class or levels for bit rate spec. Canon requires Level 4 or Level 6 flash RAM for the top two FXP, MXP settings. These are best purchased online. Stores don't always carry them or charge $$$.

http://camcorders.about.com/od/accessories/a/guide_to_SDHC_camcorder_cards.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AVCHD

[mrbuckenmeyer]

Ah I'm looking at two flash cards I have, one is 4 gig and has a little 4 with a circle around it below and the other is 8 which has a little 2 with a circle around it below. I'm assuming those are the levels, allthough my camera seems to records with both of the cards at highest quality. Odd.

Thanks!

[edDV]

Make sure before you record something important. Also flash media slows down with age/use so check it periodically.

[Steve Stepoway]

...allthough my camera seems to records with both of the cards at highest quality.

You say it "seems" to record OK. Have you actually copied those files into your computer and tried to play them? I've heard of cases of people with slower flash media that "seemed" to record OK, only to discover that, when they tried to copy the files into the computer and play them back, the files were corrupted and didn't play. As EdDV said, test, test, test. And don't take chances on anything important -- media is too cheap to take chances.

Steve

[mrbuckenmeyer]

Ok, I'll be sure to use at least class 4 memory, just in case...