Summary of my opinions:
Ease of Use
It’s easy to use considering what it does. It does so much that it is a complicated device and there is some learning involved in using it. However, once you get through the learning, the buttons and menu items are all in the right place and you can get it to do some amazing things that will help you make films.
Depth of Options
Filmmakers will buy this camera for HD, native 16x9, 4:2:2 color sampling, Cinematic Gamma, Cinematic Color, 24 fps progressive recording, and Variable Frame Rate recording. All these features make the HVX200 competitive with 16mm film cameras and even 35mm film in some applications. This is the first video camera that I’ve used that I didn’t feel like something was missing.
Performance
The camera is rock solid in my experience. I wish it had a little better sensitivity in low light. And I wish that it had a little less noise in the dark areas of the image in low light.
Value
Shot on video – looks like film (at least in my opinion). There is an up-front cost to get into the HVX200. But then what you get out of it would cost many thousands of dollars to duplicate with film or high-end pro video cameras. In my opinion, it’s the best value for the price in video cameras bar none.
Final Comments
This is the “Swiss Army Knife” of video cameras. It’s got everything a filmmaker would want to continue shooting in video and not move to film. Its revolutionary.
