Camcorder Review~Canon FS11

Camcorder Review~Canon FS11

This article appeared in AsiaONe Digital on Wed, Aug 13, 2008
Canon Camcorder FS11
Dr. Chan Teng Heng
Introduction
The Canon Camcorder FS11 is the top range of Canon's three models for standard definition video recording equipment. There are also two other high definition models. These camcorders which came in metallic grey, with black and silver color schemes, has high quality finishing, representative of Canon electronic products.
The FS11 has 16GB of built-in flash memory, with a card slot for SD memory card. It is a solid state camcorder, which means no moving parts for recording. Hurray for new technology. The slow winding mini-tapes as the medium for recording vide are being replaced. This flash technology therefore allows the product to be down sized to a compact and light form.
The video cam weighs less than 10 ounces or 300 grams! It fits my average sized palm nicely, and can be carried in my jacket's pocket or any small bag. It does not look toy like but would be if not for the quality finishing of the camcorder.
The video recorder is a 1 megapixel videocam and only 0.8 effective megapixels for still pictures. It has 37xzoom, 55x advanced zoom and 2000 times digital zoom (I thought it was an error! Most video cams have only a few hundred times zoom). It comes with a lens that has f-stop of 2 to 5.2, which allows wide aperture for video and still camera picture taking. It has three white balance controls, auto, daylight and tungsten.
If this is not enough, you can use the manual control to change the settings. There are also settings for night modes, with low light shutter and night scene modes. The LCD screen is 2.7 inch in size, but the resolution of 123,000 pixels is too low. Viewing is difficult in sunlight as there is no back viewer. Overall, the FS11 is a solid state light camcorder that is easy to carry or stow away.
Key Outstanding FeaturesThere are several outstanding features of the video cam that attracted me and other people who were invited to view and use the equipment. They and I were impressed with the following features:
-Small and compact size: Everyone was impressed with the compactness and size of the FS11. It fitted nicely into the palms of most users. After handling it, they were also surprised how light it was.
-Easy to use: With just brief instructions on the usage, many users were able to take their first videos without much further handling or searching for control buttons.
-Video Recording and Playback Controls: Controls were straight forward. A large sized Record Start / Stop button situated in the middle of an even larger jumbo sized mode dial situated at the back of the camcorder allowed videos to be taken (first press) and stopped (second press). The zoom control was very light and sensitive. Zooming in or out was therefore easy. Turning the dial to red video symbol allows recording, and turning the dial to blue video symbol enables video play back review.
-Still Camera Image Taking and Playback Controls: The same dials turned to allow the videocam to take pictures (red symbol) and view them (blue symbol) in the LCD screen.
-LCD screen: The 2.7inch LCD screen (width) is located on a left side panel where a joystick allows controls of the video activity. Selecting the video clip review function is very easy. Functional controls are situated just below the screen.
There is no bulkiness in this video camera. Handling of the camera and controls are straight forward and easy.
-Flash memory: The use of flash memory helps to cut down the time for saving the recordings. Taking one hour of video on tape used to take another hour of running the video tape to download on to the computer, followed by converting the format of the video, before burning to a DVD/VCD for viewing on players.
With flash memory, downloading of the video was very fast. I downloaded 13 minutes of video clips in less than 10 seconds! By connecting the video to the computer, recognition of the FS11 was almost instantaneous. I could then play back the video immediately.
Using the internal 16 GB flash card was obviously a good idea by Canon, and flash memory will definitely be the future technology to be adopted. Because of the low megapixel (0.8mp) of still images that can be taken by the video cam, transfer of still images from the SD card to the computer was very fast.
In summary, the FS11 video cam appeals to many first time users for its light and compact size, ease of handling and the fast speed in video transfer to storage. which was enabled by the use of flash memory. There are however some features and performance that the FS11 could improve upon. These are discussed below.
Performance Areas that Could be Improved Upon
-SD memory card transfers: The FS11 has a SD memory card slot that allows the transfer of files from the internal flash memory to SD cards. I tested this transfer of video clips comprising a total file size of 173MB, made up of 9 files with a total play time of 25 minutes. This transfer from the flash memory to the 2 GB high capacity SD card in the video cam took about 2 minutes.
This was longer than similar transfers would have taken from the internal flash memory to the computer. In addition, it took an additional 5 minutes to transfer the video clips from the SD card to the computer. Transferring the same video files from the flash memory to the computer took less than a minute. Although compact flash cards are more expensive and bulkier than SD card, use of such compact flash cards would have shortened the transfer time.
-Video Quality: Despite the low megapixel of the video cam, the standard definition images of the video recordings are acceptable, when viewed on the computer and even in your living room's 32 inch LCD TV. However, when the video cam was zoomed to even 10 xs, the quality of the video deteriorates, with double images showing. The video quality was not good. The FS 11 may therefore appeal to certain segments of buyers, the entry level buyers, or upgraders of older (technology) video cameras.
-Still Picture Quality: Because of the low pixel of the videocam, camera can only be taken at 0.8 megapixels. We therefore expect the still pictures that can taken are of low quality. The image quality was much better than expected, with good lighting and under certain conditions. At maximum zoom, chromatic aberration was very evident, with highly visible mauve colors showing up, when I viewed the still pictures taken of crows flying and resting on the top of trees.
In low light situations, the picture quality deteriorates. Using the night scene modes improves the quality of pictures. By comparison, better quality pictures could be taken with current models of phone cameras, some of which have up to 5 megapixels lenses. However, this facility of taking still photos while recording the video with the FS11 provides the convenience of dual format images to be taken. Comparison of the pictures with and without zoom is shown in the tables below.
-Ease of Focusing and Capturing Images: Taking videos at normal settings is quite easy as mentioned earlier, due to the effective image stabilizing features and handling of the video cam. However, capturing video becomes difficult under high zoom, since the video cam does not have sufficiently wide angle lens. It is only 41.7mm (at 35mm equivalent) at the lowest zoom point (video) and 41.5 mm for still pictures. For wide angle views, focal lengths of at least 27 mm to 36mm would be more ideal. The smallish LCD screen when viewed in bright sunlight does not help. Unfortunately, there is no back viewer that one can fall back on.
-Bundled Pixela Software: This editing and conversion (to Quick time or Mpeg formats for easy playback) software is very basic and meets minimalistic image editing. However Canon files are in MOD form when stored in SD memory card and converting to Mpeg/AVI formats takes time, especially if you have a slow PC. Using a faster computer, with a dual processor, overcomes this problem.
Summary
There is much to like about this smallish "flashy" videocam wonder. The FS11 is stylish and sleek, and of quality build. Easy to operate, small to bring along and easy to download and store, this camera is very suitable for someone who wants a point and shoot video camera. You can have your first video viewing less than 5 minutes after you are given the camera. Large buttons and even larger dials make start and stop recording easy. The flash memory is fast and reflects the new technology that is becoming more popular with manufacturers of electronic products. The 16GB flash memory can hold 220 minutes of video (at highest quality setting). In addition, this video cam allows still images to be taken. .
The quality of video is not high, but of acceptable quality, which deteriorates under less ideal light conditions, such as under full zoom situations. Still image quality could be better improved, but with 0.8 megapixels, there is not much that can be done. With editing using appropriate software, it allows better quality still pictures to be easily up loadable on to the internet. The setback of owning this video cam is minor. FS11 has direct competition from Sony and Panasonic which uses hard disk drives against the faster and less bulky flash memory. This faster downsizing of the video clips makes this video cam product so appealing.

Still photo taken at maximum zoom at 96.2mm, at f 11 and 1/100" exposure.
Severe chromatic aberration is found.

Sharp still images are possible with rich contrast colors and correct auto white balance when taken at normal, unzoomed conditions (2.6mm f/2 and 1/12"). In the picture below, photo snapshot of video clip taken by FS11 at zero zoom is shown.
Photo snapshot of video clip taken by FS11 at mid zoom conditions. The last photo snapshot shows the video clip taken by FS11 at maximum zoom. Camera shake was difficult to control because of the small size and light weight of the camcorder.


Photographs and Text by Dr. Chan Teng Heng, A Biz Professor Who Loves All Techie, Imagery and Digital Stuff.

Excellent and helpful review. It's interesting that you note "The video quality
was not good." (when the video cam was zoomed to even 10 xs)
The still-frames don't look too bad, but perhaps I have low expectation? How do
other cameras compare? Also, while the clip is moving (i.e. not a still frame),
is the issue so noticable?
I think I will choose this model to purchase for my first serious camcorder (all
previous have been hand-me-downs without much choice) based on:
* excellent zoom
* light weight
* internal memory
* expandable memory
* ease of use.
I would have *loved* to have seen some night-time
clips and/or still frames.

Chris
Posted by: Posted at Tue Dec 09
13:09:53 SGT 2008