Side by Side Comparison of: Sony vs Canon

Received this camera as a gift (before this I made short films with just my iphone, a tripod, and a remote). This camera stepped up my amateur cinematography game up to an unprecedented level. Despite being beginner friendly, it has many advanced features that I learned about and now know how to use which I believe make it an excellent mid-level video camera. This camera gives you videos you could only dream about capturing in comparison to your normal point and shoot or smart phone. Cannot express enough how happy I am to have been given this camera :)

Super broadcast quality recording even in very low light. This camera does more than I could hope for. Still finding new features all the time. Great camera in a vary small package. It's equivalent predecessor was three times this size! Records for hours on a 64 gig chip.

It's not movie pro quality, but if you're looking to make YouTube videos it's more than enough. Gorgeous image quality, very good sound quality, and extremely easy to use. I have small fingers and had no trouble with the menu buttons as other reviews said. It may be a finger size thing?Con: The battery and memory that come with it are only good for a few hours, so be aware if you're trying to film on-site somewhere remote.

I selected this camera for a replacement for our church. All I can say is that this camera is outstanding. Night and day in quality from old Sony CX330. Great lowlight quality during communion and other events. I just ordered another one to replace the other consumer HD camcorder. All of these cameras are setup at 1080i 59.94fps connecter through an Orei XD700 HDMI to SDI converter and then connected to our BlackMagicDesign ATEM Television Studio.

This camera was bought as an upgrade to the CANON VIXIA HF M300 that I have had for 5 years. That was a great little camera, but this camera is so much better! The quality of the lens and the manual focus are great for long distance and low light. I record a lot of indoor stage performances and it is perfect no matter where I sit. Canon accessories are still compatible (I have an external microphone). Love this camera!!!

Bought this for my wife for a holiday gift based on the reviews about its quality. Wish I had this one years ago. The video quality is fantastic. I'm a bit picky on audio and video quality, so much so I gave up on getting video. But after seeing what this camera can do, I'm back to watching the video. The quality this camera can deliver is excellent, far better than anything I've own or seen that other people own. It reminds me what I have seen from professional cameras, but without the bulk.If you care about video quality, this is probably the least expensive way you can go and still be happy with the quality.

Good camcorder.

Its a fun little camera with a lot of features and the size allows you to take it anywhere. BUT, for some reason it did not come with a manual. WTF AMAZON and CANON? and even stranger, there was a full minute of footage recorded on the camera of some guy "filming" his neighbors. Did I get a BRAND-NEW camera? Probably not, but its in fine condition and works for me.

Bought this hoping that the eye piece viewer would suffice for outdoor shooting...didn't work nearly as well as I hoped.The qualify of the video is great...also found that downloading is a hassle...I prefer to have video record to SD cards soI can quickly remove and upload. THis one I have to use the cord (hope I can find it when needed)...it has a hard driveor memory inside where it records...but the two SD backup sockets work well, but at least I don't think you can tell itto use only the SD cards....or at least I can't find how to do that.

Software for editing can be confusing...camera is GREAT!

The HF G20 is an upgrade to the smaller HF M31 that I have used for the last three years with wonderful results. I have yet to test it fully, but so far it has met my expectations, and since I expected it to do very well I am super pleased with the purchase. It's a little bigger and heavier than the M31 and it gives me more stability in non-tripod use. It's low-light performance is great and the lens hood adds both protection and a more professional appearance. It has 2 SD card slots instead of one and they are in a more easily accessible location. It also has an eye piece in addition to the large screen, which is handy when the light from the screen is a distraction.

Does everything I was hoping it would. Low light capability is quite good, and audio is better than average.I do wish it had a greater optical zoom range though.

Was supposed to receive a new Camera, I could tell, that this one was possibly purchased and then returned, so it was not a new product.

The video quality is relatively low. Looking back now I wish I would've not get this and safe the money to get a DJI drone. This video camera is not useful. It cannot replace the video quality of an iPhone. It's bulky so it's hard to put in your purse. Exporting the video is a pain, the manual book is as thick as a bible. Idk what people find so great about this camcorder.I guess you can already tell that I use this mostly for traveling. However, I also use it to create videos and movies and this still doesn't beat most of cameras and camcorders out there. I have a Sony NEX-5TL Mirrorless Digital Camera (or something a little bit below that) and it records better videos than this camcorder. The touchscreen is a pain in my bottom, It's like we're back in 2008.There are better and cheaper video camera out there, or just get a smartphone all together.The only positive thing I can say is that it looks cool and professional. When I'm using it people will look at me and become self-aware like i'm a videographer goddess. Lol, anyways. Decisions decisions

Seems good overall, touchscreen is a pain to deal with though...I returned and went with the canon t5i instead for dual purpose (photo and video)

This is an OK camera for the size.Basically the next version of this camera HF G30 is better than this one. This camera is not something that a professional would use. It is a small light camera to take with you in your purse. The video is OK, the controls are not very good, there is no manual zoom, the view finder is rubbish, and the flips screen is flimsy. The price for this camera is too high for the quality, and there are better cameras available. Not impressed. I use it for B rolls and in situations where I can not use my big camera.The rest of the info is on YouTube video.Here is my Video Review complete with lots of footage. Unfortunately Amazon only allows 100MB for a video review, which is way to little. When Amazon increase the limit to 4GB I will start using amazon video reviews. Until that day, YouTube...www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lCXBy4rsGE

Not bad but no DSLR. My Cannon t5i is just a full step ahead. I thought I would use it more but I prefer my DSLR.

Another reason to check it out at brick and mortar store before you buy it.I know it must be against the law to sell you a refurbished item when you paid for a new one , but sometime I have to wander

did not work well in low light at all.

Didn't work well with my Mac. The video quality was good, but not worth the price. I returned it.

Be warned: the USB connection on the camcorder is *very* flaky. It works only occasionally, which means transferring video to a computer is a huge pain. I will be returning mine, as this is unacceptable.

This camera has fantastic image quality and more manual controls then most people will ever need. I ultimately had to send this back because without 60P, video quality was not as expected when output to my HDTV.For the price, I don't feel I should have to compromise in that area especially when every other camera competing in this segment was able to provide 60P. In my opinion, its not High Definition without it.

Canon's customer support is awful! They supply the software to download the videos on cd only. If you do not have a cd drive, you are screwed. I tried calling customer support and they told me to call Pixela. Pixela only provides the updater. Pixela told me to call back Canon. Canon told me that they do not have any software that will transfer videos on to your computer. They suggested I find a third party software (not free) to do this. The guy told me he didn't have any suggestions and that he couldn't get me software he didn't have. This kind of crap from Canon is why we have changed all 8 of our dslr's and other camcorders over to Sony.

no good

I generally shoot video using my Nikon D5100 or my iPhone in a pinch. I'm tired of lugging around all my Nikon gear and wanted to give a pro-summer level camcorder a try. This canon seemed to fit my limited requirements - lightweight, small, shoot in HD, have an external mic jack and use SD Cards. I just assumed it would be easy to use. I also want to be able to take photos while recording video at the same time - something I can't do on my Nikon, nor my iPhone. I frequently find myself in situations where I'm recording something and wish I could also get a still shot - without going through the hassle of trying to export a still frame from a video.I should have known when I took a glance at the 200 page "User" manual that's written using a ridiculously small font. I've used a lot of Camcorders in the past - before I went to DSLR and figured how could this be. Point and shoot, keep it moving. Boy was I wrong. The first thing you'll notice is the weird lack of buttons. There's no button for simple functions like zooming, everything is touch screen - which I LOATHE, especially if I want to shoot something or zoom on the fly. Fiddling around with a touch screen is irritating.The menu navigation seems straight forward but nothing worked well. I just wanted to film footage directly to the SD Card slot so that I could easily import the footage onto my mac. For some reason that I can't fathom, I can't get it to record directly to the SD Card, even though I'm pretty sure I have the setting that says SD Card. Since this camera uses non-standard ports all over the place this camera will be completely useless to me if I end up being forced to use the internal HD before it goes over to the SD Card. The annoying thing is, it did record photos to the SD Card, it just didn't record any video.I was trying to take some video footage of a speaker and for some reason I couldn't get the thing to easily and quickly go to video mode. It keeps starting up in editing mode and no matter what I do it won't switch until I closed the lid. It's stupid. I know you are saying, this person is an idiot and should just read the instruction manual. Did I mention how poorly laid out and written it is? And it's a camcorder, I should be able to just point, shoot, dump it onto an SD Card and keep it moving.When I finally did find something that I recorded, the quality of the picture was pretty great, but the low light video was terrible and the lighting wasn't even that low. My iPhone did a far superior job with that same lighting setup. Overall, I'm really disappointed and will probably be sending this back.

The product's instructions were in Japanese and completely unusable. Previous review was not accepted by Amazon

probably ok for personal use but i wouldn't recommend for any kind of professional use. i returned mine...