A birthday present, my wife (and I) love

With our first child on the way, we wanted some way to remember her entire childhood.

After a lot of searching (price, product, CCD size etc) I finally settled on the Canon Elura 70.

There are many reasons why I bought this, firstly it was just in the price range I wanted to pay, it had MiniDV (a professional quality format), and A/V/IEEE 1394 inputs and outputs, and it was lightweight.

[Pros]

I do love this camera, it has so many features, whilst retaining only the ones you "actually" require. For example, the digital zoom is very poor, but the optical zoom excellent, which is really what you need.

Ease of Use ~ It is easy to use, comes with a simple menu instructions, a clear screen, easy to hold (not too heavy), compact, nicely weighted, all required buttons are within easy reach (and do not require your hand to twist into strange shapes), and last it fits into the palm of my hand very nicely.

MiniDV ~ There are several formats out there, but MiniDV is by far the best (in this price range) there are of course DVCam (which is very similar) and ProDV (which is more expensive) and the newly introduced MicroMV (which is terrible, and should have never been). MiniDV is used in more professional environments (although not for movie making) and produces excellent quality recordings (roughly equivalent to MPEG-2 uncompressed, i.e. higher than DVD quality). For this market, you cannot go far wrong.

Input/Output ~ One thing I do love about this camera (and one reason I bought it) was the ability to input and output so many different formats (IEEE 1394, S-Video, Composite, etc). An additional, and priceless benefit, is that it can actually convert between each format (S-Video to Composite, IEEE to S-Video, etc); plus you can record at the same time. Additionally, this camera has sockets for headphones and an external microphone if you need one (not all have this tidy feature).

Extras ~ The Elura 70 comes with a better zoom than the 60, but otherwise it has two (as far as I know) extras: a wide angle lens attachment - which is simple to use, and a larger capacity battery.

Quality ~ I have used several of Canon's products in the imagary department, and I can honestly say they have some very clear and true reproduction. The CCD is of an adequate size, with enough lines to make it a high-quality reproduction.

Zoom ~ It has a good optical zoom, clear and smooth transition. The zoom function is sensitive enough that you can make small movements, but not sensitive enough that you are oscillating back and forth.

Menu ~ The menu is easy to understand and use, and there are enough options to enable you to do what you want, but not enough that you are forever searching for items. I do have a small niggle about this (see Cons), but otherwise fine.

Batteries ~ Most importantly (and really the point that grabbed my attention) the batteries from our digital camera (Canon Powershot S45) slot right into this camera (even though they were made several years apart) so don't need as many batteries to operate. This is fantastic, because we don't need to worry about extra chargers etc.

Software ~ In terms of software, we use Adobe Premiere 1.5 which is excellent (sorry, didn't even look at anything of the included software, as I love Premiere 1.5). Connection was a dream, control of recording and playback through the IEEE 1394 slot was so easy, and really not a problem to capture movies.

Stills ~ Whilst I take only a few stills, this is very easy to use. The button is right there, and easy for you to quickly take a still picture.

Price ~ The price is just perfect, I could not find a better quality camera for a better price; plus DELL (where we bought it) were selling it for $80 off high-street prices .... couldn't go wrong for that.

Sound ~ The sound is very good, and never really had any complaints, but for the things we are filming this is not something really pushing the camera's limits (it does have an external microphone and headphone socket, which many don't have).

Misc. ~ Generally I found this camera to be good in low-light (but not tried it in something really dark). It has a very sturdy/solid construction, something you would feel that even if it dropped it would still hold together. Tapes are easy to load and unload (as long as you don't forget not to push it - which it tells you).

[Cons]

I would not call them cons, but niggly things.

Menu Access ~ The menu access button is behind the LCD, which is a little annoying when trying to scroll through the menu. You have to keep your finger on the button. Some of the menu selections are not so simple either, and if I haven't used the camera in a while, it can take a while to remember what to do.

The output to A/V or S-Video needs to be set in the menu (I would have preferred it this to be automatic ~ perhaps it is not really possible as both can be used as input).

Button Functionality ~ Some of the buttons do not do what you would expect if you are in the wrong mode. Being in the right mode is very important.

Flash Card ~ I would have preferred that the flash card was the same as our stills camera, but its an SD card. Whilst this isn't a big problem, and I understand size wise, I must say I was a little disappointed.

Single CCD ~ It does only have a single CCD, which is not in the professional range (which use 3), and this can be a problem for certain colour qualities. Again something I niggle about, but certainly not able to get a 3CCD Camera for this price - really I should stop complaining.

[Other Information]

Neither a Pro, nor a Con really, but couple pieces of information I would like to pass on.

Digital Zoom ~ Many cameras are advertised for their numbers, i.e. zoom, hours, size etc. One thing which really strikes is the "Digital Zoom" on the Canon Elura 70 it is 360x with 18x optical. The Digital Zoom, however good, is only expanding the size of a pixel - therefore a high zoom factor (I have seen some with 800x) is basically taking a pixel and multiplying this. Therefore you are not getting a higher zoom, but just larger pixels (i.e. you will not see more detail). Optical Zoom is different, it actually zooms to give present a single pixel as a smaller (i.e. closer) object. Therefore, look for high optical zooms, and don't worry about the digital (personally I have digital switched off).

MiniDV/MicroDV ~ One thing I shall add as a word of warning, avoid MicroDV. It sounds very similar to MiniDV but is far lower quality. Something which surprises me of the maker (Sony).

Input to Camera ~ Beware that many cameras will allow you to output in several different formats, but input to a camera is slightly more rare and should be checked if you want to record back onto tape (or do a conversion - as I do a lot). This is not always clear in the specification and should be checked.