Excellent video quality; extremely customizable; great lens and optical stabilizer; fast focus....No 720p recording capability; coarse, low-resolution LCD....At its lowest gain, video looks incredibly smooth, and even as high as 3dB you can shoot in low light with relatively little noise...They're good sizes, and various bumps and divots in the buttons provide enough tactile feedback to operate without...

Total control, Reliability, image quality...Not for novices : - ), weight...Had an A1 for nearly 20 years & put (literally) thousands of film through it...I've used this camera with 3200 ASA colour film & 2 minute exposures (4 x 30 seconds using multi-exposure...Many A1's have been used by Pro's & Semi-Pro's so, when buying secondhand, check that the shutter fires at both low & high speeds & doesn't...

Following its foray into HD with the successful XL H1 camcorder, Canon has just announced the addition of the three-CCD HD XH G1 ($6,999) and XH A1 ($3,999) models to its product line...With the XL H1 sitting at the high end, the G1 and A1 are helping to expand Canon's reach to now include everyone from event videographers and hobbyists to broadcast and production pros who want to...

Some may say that HDV codec is not as good as DVCpro, but my eye does not see it...Though the Sony has proved to be a great camera in its own right, it doesn't cut well with the XL-H1, and the image quality in bright light was near as good, in darker settings, things just fell apart...The XH-A1 performs every bit as good, but lacks that effect to the same degree (though it still looks pretty "professional...

Bad Points I find this a very special stuff for me...I would recommend this camera with a few caveats...Many older cameras need shutter lubrication and new seals so a trip to a trusted repair shop is recommended...

Picture quality on land has been quite good...The Canon A-1 is a tough camera that takes great pictures on land (as good as can be without zoom), and decent underwater pictures too...If you don't have good lighting from the sun, you won't get a clear picture...