Canon HV20 review

Sales of high-definition camcorders are increasing rapidly and provide the clearest evidence yet that older, established formats such as MiniDV are approaching obsolescence.

It's no surprise when you consider HD-ready TV sets are sweeping aside their analogue counterparts in homes, so it's natural to assume that an HD camcorder will be the next item on shopping lists. To this end, there's an abundance of new models - even if the number of recording formats is still confusing for the newbie. When it comes to importing HD clips into a computer, however, it's a big enough problem for PC owners; for Mac users, it's doubly important to carry out careful research before flexing the plastic.

The reason for this is simple. Unless video arrives at your Mac from a tape (rather than from a hard disk drive, DVD or memory card camera) Mac OS X doesn't want to know. It's unfortunate that neither iMovie HD nor Final Cut Express HD (the two applications most likely to be used by home video makers) can deal with tapeless camcorder clips properly without the intermediate use of third-party plug-ins such as MPeg Streamclip, so for the moment, Mac users are best sticking with HDV.

Camcorder makers are also cutting back on just about every feature that's considered to be superfluous in order to minimise costs, so it's good that Canon is now giving us a fully featured model that not only shoots and exports full-specification HDV 1080i video, but can record and play back standard DV as well. Even better, it's possible to record as HDV and export to your Mac as standard DV via FireWire. That means you can edit projects as DV while retaining the HDV master tapes for future use. And if that's not enough, the HV20 can also be used to re-record analogue material from VHS, Video-8, Hi-8 and so on, thanks to its AV-DV input conversion feature.

The HV20 uses the newer Cmos imaging technology, rather than CCD, to generate its 1920 x 1080 pixel widescreen images. Using a 1/2.7in Cmos chip to produce 2.07 megapixel (effective) 16:9 widescreen video images and up to 2.76 megapixels for Jpeg images stored to a miniSD card, pictures are impressive both outdoors in optimum light and also indoors. What's more, picture quality is excellent whether you're shooting in HDV or standard-definition Mini DV.

Where the HV20 stands head and shoulders above comparable camcorders is the degree to which it offers fully manual operation in addition to its auto modes. Switching the cam to its 'P' mode gives the user access to all manual operating parameters, from focus to white balance (including lots of preset filter modes), and exposure to shutter speeds and image effects. You make menu navigation and selections using a mini joystick mounted at the rear, with tape record and playback controls provided on the LCD frame.

It's quite a heavy device, but great to handle. There are loads of buttons, and it's very easy to make a quick manual adjustment even while recording. A thumbwheel is provided for manual focus, while you can make other adjustments using the joystick and on-screen graphic displays. It has the full range of input and output connections, too: FireWire provides both HDV and DV output to a Mac, in addition to enabling re-recording of edited projects back to either HDV or DV in the camcorder. For HDTV display, there's an HDMI socket in addition to full Component connectivity. A USB 2 Mini-B socket enables you to transfer images and compressed movies stored on the miniSD card, too.