I haven't been out with the cameras in weeks. I miss it. I really do miss doing photography and shooting footage. I think it's time to make a few changes in my personal life. I have to clean house as they say. I think a few life changes are in order again. Work has been busy as I'm training two new guys. We've been going to the gym 3-5 times a week. I've got two hernias that I have to take care of. Went to a clinic to get some ultrasounds done today and actually get some pictures taken of the hernias.
Thankfully it's the weekend in one more day and I get to relax. Girlfriend has a lunch date with some girlfriends so I get some time alone finally. So I'll just take the camera out and do some photography on Saturday since I haven't done it in ages.
Yes. It's the best prosumer camcorder ever built. It shoots 1080p/60fps. No it does not shoot 4k. I'm glad it doesn't. Yes 4k televisions are falling in price. In Canada, the major cable providers only have 1 or 2 4k channels. With dwindling cable subscribers I don't see the major providers upgrading their equipment to fully support 4k in the near future. I have a 4k television at home with an Apple 4k TV set top box which we, being my girlfriend and I don't hardly watch. We don't watch a whole lot of television rather looking at our phones or iPads or computers which only support 1080p or 1440p. But on a phone, you cannot differentiate between 1080p and 1440p. There are a few phones that have 4k displays but again, they're a small screen factor. That is why I'm still shooting 1080p.
Lets get back to the Canon Vixia HF G40 camcorder available for purchase here. Like I've written previously it does shoot at 1080p/60fps. What Canon does right with this camcorder is colour reproduction. It does come with 20x optical zoom and 300x digital zoom. Thanks to the sensors enhanced sensitivity, the Vixia HF G40 provides vivid, accurate recording through an improved signal to noise ratio. The camera shoots in both MP4 and AVCHD with MP4 being web ready. The camera provides dual SD card slots for never ending storage. I have 2 64GB cards in the camera and I can shoot the whole weekend and not fill up both cards. You can record to both cards at the same time just in case one fails. I did buy an extra battery for longer shooting. I can shoot about 90 minutes with the battery that comes with the camera and with my larger battery I can shoot over 220 minutes on a single charge.
The OLD screen is big and bright even during sunny days. The electronic viewfinder shifts to 45 degrees and is easy to use and see thru. For a guy with glasses, it's a big help. The optical image stabilization is great when you want to shoot that is far away from you. The lens is great on this camera being a f1.8 to f2.8 which means it's great in low light and is extremely sharp.
Here are some of the pros of the camera:
Great price
Great lens
Portable
1080p/60fps
Focal lenght
Multiple hot shoes to attach accessories
OLED screen
Viewfinder
Comes with remote control and lens cap
Weight of 1.7 pounds
Reach of 26.7MM to 576MM (35MM equivalent)
Wide angle and zoom lenses available
Has Wifi and FTP
Superb video
Superb colour reproduction
Here are some of the negatives:
Does not shoot 4k (is that a negative?)
You can buy two teleconvertors. One wide and one a telephoto. I currently have the wide lens and it's amazingly sharp. The camera does have audio in which unfortunately doesn't provide phantom power. I currently use the Rode Video Mic Pro+ available here.
When I was in Calgary last year for work I brought this camera with me. I decided to buy a Sony 4k camcorder thinking 4k is the future. Let's just say I sold the 4k camcorder and I kept the Canon. With the Canon I don't need that many hard drives as the files are smaller and I don't need as much processing power. If I wanted I could use my iPhone 8 Plus running iMovie to edit my Canon clips for my portfolios. You can check my portfolio links on my blog to see what the camera is capable of.
So I wanted to do a review of the Canon Vixia HF G40 last week. Life always gets in the way as a friend and fellow photographer lost her life to cancer at the young age of 28. I hadn't gone shooting for a bit with the camcorder as my day job seems to get in the way.
But this past week, I got to shoot the Casino de Lac Leamy fireworks. I had missed the previous show as I totally forgot about it. And yesterdays event, let's just say, whoever went to it got soaked in the torrential downpour.
This was the first time I had used a camcorder at night. Shooting video is a little bit different than shooting photos at night. Especially fireworks.
I had set the camera at ISO 100, f1.8 and exposure of 1/8th of a second. Let's just say that didn't work out as I thought. The exposure was way too low so I increased it to 100th of a second and voila, problem fixed. So setting with ISO 100, f1.8 and the exposure was 100/1000 of a second. Problem fixed. So I thought. My external mic died about halfway thru the show. Hence no sound on the video. For this Wednesday's show, I have a fresh battery in the mic and I know what my settings have to be. I also have a better idea of how to frame the shot as I framed it wit htoo much empty space to the left.
Overall, I think the Canon Vixia HF G40 is an excellent daytime and night time camcorder. You can control pretty much any setting on it as far as exposure, white balance, mic etc. I am really happy with the camcorder.
One of the reasons I bought the camcorder was to do a lot more video work at Parc Omega where I get pretty much all my wildlife shots. I hardly go there in the summer as the animals hide in the shade of the forest because of the heat. I'm planning to go a lot more starting in September as it's mating season and the fall colours start. Also the fur on the animals thickens as they prepare for the colder temperatures of Canada's northern climate.
So today I finally picked up the Canon Vixia HF G40 camcorder. I wanted this prosumer camcorder so bad. I upgraded it from the Canon Vixia HF R62. The G40 provides a few bit more controls when shooting video like Exposure and ISO settings. I can actually physically attach an external mike as well to the G40. It's more of a prosumer camcorder rather than a top of the line consumer camcorder. I will post a better review when I actually start using the camcorder in real life situations.
I've started to shoot video for uploads to the various micro stock agencies that I deal with. If you asked me 2 years ago or even 18 months ago, I'd say you'd be crazy saying I'd be shooting video as well. I was all photography, all the time. I knew Photoshop and Apple Aperture 3.0 inside out. That's all I wanted to know and do. Now I just use Adobe Photoshop Lightroom CC to edit my photos and Apple Final Cut Pro X to edit my videos. I am learning Photoshop CC again to get my certification.
As far as shooting video I just use a Canon Vixia HF R62 to shoot 1080p 60fps video that I upload to sites like Pond5, Videoblocks, Fotolia and Shutterstock. I mostly edit the video on my early 2013 Macbook Pro which has enough horse power to edit 1080p video. Last year I bought a 2015 iMac with a 27" 5k monitor to do 4k videos. After shooting with the Sony FDR AX33 4k camera and uploading to the various websites, I only sold 1080p video. Nothing 4k. So I sold the Sony FDR AX33 4k camcorder earlier this year. Since my early 2013 Macbook Pro has the horsepower to edit 1080p 60fps video, I'm looking to trade or sell my 2015 iMac for a Canon Vixia HF G40 video camera which is more of a prosumer camcorder than the Canon Vixia HF R62. Mind you the R62 is a great little camera which does what I want. Another reason I want to sell the iMac is that I want to be portable. My 2013 Macbook Pro allows me to do that. I just add an external hard drive to my laptop for off line storage and I'm ready to go anywhere at anytime.
So if you're looking to buy a mint 2015 iMac with a 27" 5k monitor with upgraded RAM, let me know.
