Video quality on Canon S1 IS compared to a digital camcorder

I'm curious if the video quality on the Canon Powershot S1 IS is as
good as that on your average digital camcorder. In other words - if I
buy this camera, would I need a separate camcorder? Thanks for any
advice/testimonials.

 

You'll need separate camcorder if you want to shoot long movies. Note that
S1 can only shoot short clips - if you have 1G card, about 7 -8 minutes, i
believe. Even if you buy bigger card (2 or 4 G), one clip can't be longer
than 1G -this is file system limit, so you'll have to end clip after 8
minutes and start again.
But, overall quality is quite good. Taking into account 640x480 at 30 fps -
size is almost as big as in camcorders, whihc is just over 500x something.
Sound is also pretty good, since it has 22k sampling rate.
Remember that S1 is mainly photo camera...

 

Whether or not you need a separate camcorder depends on how you use it.
For me, 90% of the time it works fine and I've used it for things like
recording the kids plays and family gatherings with good results. As the
previous post states the record time of each clip is limited to one gig,
which at the highest resolution averages about 9 1/2 minutes each. You
can drop to lower frame rates and resolutions, which extend each clip
time up to one hour each but these settings, are not comparable to an
average camcorder. Besides the time limitation, many camcorders have
zooms exceeding 10x and have low light shooting capability. If you are
use to using these features in your camcorder you will definitely miss
them as the S1 is limited to 10x and the recordings get grainy in low
light. Its important to make sure you get a compact flash card that
writes fast enough to record with having to use the buffer. If this
happens the record time of each clip is reduced. I read various posts,
which place this threshold at 12x to 16x, but I'm not sure if they are
accurate. Here is a helpful forum thread with individual results

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1010&message=11038851

I'm using a 2gig 80x Lexar and have never had problems shooting long
movies. To transfer movies to your PC I suggest using a firewire card
reader, or at the very least USB 2, because of the large file size. I'm
using the Lexar firewire reader and I'm very happy with the speed of
file transfer.

You can find some sample movie clips and reviews here
http://www.steves-digicams.com/2004_reviews/s1is.html
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canons1is/
http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/canon/powershot_s1-review/index.shtml
http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/S1IS/canon-powershot-s1-IS-A.HTM
http://www.megapixel.net/cgi-bin/fs...gapixel.net/reviews/canon-s1is/s1-review.html

 

SleeperMan,

which isn't much of a limitation. One scene longer than 8
minutes would be rather unusual.

Generally we will see the difference between camcorders and
cameras disappear. It's already happening.

Hans-Georg

 

True, i guess.It's only...let's say you buy 4G card..first of all, you must
have rather fast one (at least 20x speed), then it's bloddy expensive, and
you have only about 4x4=16 min of video. On camcorder, you have (normally)
60 min cassette, it's way cheaper, you have extra spare in your pocket...
Don't get me wrong... i don't have camcorder and i don't plan to buy it any
soon yet. I have 256M card at the moment and i usually only make videos at
home, where i take 2.5 min long one, transfer to PC and do it again...
Like i said, i find S1 movie totally compatible with camcorder, and better
than most analog ones.
Currently, only downside i can find on S1 is that microphone is turned
towards me instead towards scene to be shot, so if i make at least a bit
noise, it's recorded bloddy loud...

 

From my calculations, longest movie on 1G highest res is 8 min 20 sec (1980
kb/sec), while at a bit less quality is 11 min 28 sec (1440 kb/sec). Speed
of CF card must be at least 9.6x for normal 640x480, and at least 13.2 for
finest quality movie. (note that 1x speed is 150 kb/sec)

 

Those numbers seem about right. The difference is due to the level of
compression because both are a 640 x480 30 FPS. The question now, even
though subjective, is how much better is the image quality when shot in
the lower compression mode?

 

Hm...to be honest, i didn't test it yet, although it seems a bit funny...
maybe i'll do that soon in future days..just to see

 

On Sun, 2 Jan 2005 09:45:42 +0100
In message <KwOBd.7680$>
Posted from Slovenija OnLine - SiOL

Things are about to change rapidly now that
JVC is finally testing the consumer waters:

http://www.jvc.com/product.jsp?modelId=MODL027324&pathId=119&page=1
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/con...&A=getItemDetail&Q=&sku=353289&is=REG&si=feat

From the pdf instructions, with a 4GB CF card/micro-drive:

ULTRA FINE - 60 minutes 720 x 480 pixels, 8.5 Mbps (CBR)
FINE - 90 minutes 720 x 480 pixels, 5.5 Mbps (CBR)
NORMAL - 120 minutes 720 x 480 pixels, 4.2 Mbps (VBR)
ECONOMY - 300 minutes 352 x 240 pixels, 1.5 Mbps (VBR)

It would be kinda fun to mount one on a flash bracket. I played with
it in a store and liked it. The swivel body is similar to the Nikon
900 series. First of it's kind. (as far as I know) Works as
expected for a small video recorder. Overpriced :-0

Some hands on testing (which the store is willing to set up) is
required to find out if the "WIDE" function will master an anamorphic
16:9 image in those 720x480 pixels. If it does...what a cool toy, eh?

Jeff

 

snip

but isn't DV on tape 25 Mbps?

 

But isn't the S1 IS restricted to 2GB as it doesn't/cannot use NTFS? Or was
that a feature added in the 1.0.2 .0 firmware upgrade?

 

NOt that know off.. as far as S1 exists, it was told that 8G microdrive can
be used.

 

You're (probably) right: just found this link at Canon:
http://www.canon-europe.com/For_Hom...ras/Digital/PowerShot_S1_IS/index.asp?specs=1
relevant bit of which is "Compatible with 2GB memory cards & larger", which
is a comment affixed to "Memory card type: CompactFlash Type I/II
(Microdrive compatible)".
Being a cynic where promotional material is concerned, I note that it says
"compatible with", which may not mean that it can store/read up to 8GB, or
whatever the max MicroDrive is. I think I got the 2GB limit from Steve's
DigiCams sometime last year so, hopefully, that is out of date.

 

The S1 IS supports FAT32 and can use CF cards of any size.

The size/length limit on movie clips is 1 hour or 1GB per clip,
whichever occurs first. Multiple clips can be stored on a
single CF card.

 

I know i've read one review where they tested S1 with 4G microdrive, so it
must be working.

 

See this site
http://www.twenga.com/rev/861/1/1/0/0/CANON/PowerShot+S1+IS/ .

They aggregate product reviews from the web. They have more than 40
reviews on the Canon S1 IS digital camera. Seems that it's a great
camera (however, be careful about the battery life !)
You would not probably need a separate camcorder.

Best

 

What I wanted to hear: now I KNOW I should have asked for an enormous
Microdrive (or two) from Santa.

 

Well, almost any size. Here's a Canon rep's response to an inquiry about CF
size:

"Any card with a capacity up to 2048GB that adheres to the Type I or Type II
CompactFlash card standard should work in your camera."

It was a little hard for me to believe at first so I asked them again "Are
you sure you mean GB?!?"

They assured me they did.

 

However, if I remember the S1 manual, a single video on the S1 cannot be more
than 1 gigabyte, and FAT32 doesn't allow files to be greater than 2 gigabytes.

 

Fat32 file size limit is 4 gig.