Canon HV40 Review

Introduction

Design & Usability

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Recording to tape has its advantages, but it's an entirely different workflow than recording to a memory card or hard drive.

Because of its bulky size and complex menus, the HV40 is not as easy to use as most camcorders on the market. Yes, there is something to be said about the simplicity of recording to tape, but most people these days are probably just as comfortable working with non-linear media like memory cards or internal hard drives. But with tape you do get an instant, physical backup of your video, which is something that some people desire. Recording to a memory card means your videos only exist digitally, and you have to go through the annoying process of burning them to a DVD in order to get a physical copy to someone. In the age of YouTube and iPhones, however, having digital versions of your home movies makes them just as easy to share than if they're all on MiniDV tape. It's really about using what is most comfortable for you, and for many, the thing that's most comfortable is recording to tape.

Because of the MiniDV tape deck on the side of the HV40, the camcorder is a whole lot larger than Canon's flash-memory camcorders. This changes the entire design and feel of the camcorder, as does the HV40's lack of any modern commodities. The camcorder has no touchscreen interface, its LCD is small and unimpressive, and the design of the camcorder simply doesn't look stylish. Unfortunately, Canon didn't include a lens ring on the HV40, even though the camcorder is certainly large enough to accommodate one. Instead, there's a tiny, inadequate control wheel that is used to make adjustments to focus and exposure.

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Features

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The HV40 has a number of controls that should appeal to old-school videographers.

This recording to tape thing that the HV40 does has a bunch of hidden uses. On the back of the camcorder you'll find a FireWire port, also known as an IEEE 1394 interface. This port's primary purpose is for "capturing" video recorded to tape in order to import it to a computer. Camcorders that don't record to tape have little use for this port, so you rarely find it these days. But pros love FireWire ports because they allow you to do some interesting things. You can connect a flash recorder to the HV40 via this port, thereby allowing you to record to tape or a tapeless media recorder. Thanks to the HV40's AV-DV conversion feature, you can also use this port to digitize analog video, although that process is somewhat confusing.

Since the HV40 records to tape, the camcorder uses the HDV codec. Simply put, this codec produces video files that are a fraction of the size of camcorders that record to tapeless media (usually using the AVCHD codec). So, if you capture footage off of the HV40 and work with those files on a computer, your videos won't take up nearly as much space on your hard drive. It's also pretty easy for computers (even older ones) to handle HDV video. The same can't be said about newer codec options.

Performance

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Video performance was no match compared to Canon's tapeless HD camcorders.

Other than the convenience of not having to work with tape, one of the big reasons manufacturers are moving towards tapeless media is in an attempt to improve image quality. Recording HD video to tape requires the limited HDV codec, which has a fairly low ceiling when it comes to video performance. Sure, video shot with the HV40 can look quite good, but it will never be as sharp as the new, tapeless camcorders that are coming out right now.

With battery life, the HV40 did do a respectable job, leaving us wondering if recording to tape actually requires less power consumption than recording to a memory card. The camcorder continually recorded for around two hours in our battery life test, which is a good 20 minutes longer than the Canon HF S100 tapeless camcorder lasted in this same test.

Conclusion

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As long as there are people who want to record to tape, there will be fans of the HV40.

Since the HV40 is only a minor upgrade over last year’s HV30, it seems that Canon isn’t putting too much effort into its tape-based HDV models. The HV40’s flash-memory counterparts have more sophisticated designs, better handling, and more useful features, which leaves no doubt that they're Canon's camcorders of the future. These models, which include Canon's top-of-the-line HF S series (HF S100, HF S10, and HF S11), also outdid the HV40 when it came to our video performance testing.

That doesn’t mean there still isn’t a place for tape-based camcorders in today’s market. Many people are still more comfortable working with tape, and the difficulties associated with tapeless media and the complex AVCHD codec can be too much for some to bear. The HV40 is also a bit cheaper than most of the high-end flash memory and internal hard drive camcorders out there. Still, it would have been great if Canon had put some effort into improving the HV40's menus, user interface, and handling like it did with the rest of its 2009 lineup. For this reason, the HV40 seems out-dated, old-fashioned, and clunky.

If you’re looking for a consumer-level HDV camcorder, there really isn’t much to choose from, so the HV40 is probably the best option by default. Since Canon didn’t change much (other than adding the native 24p mode), looking for a cheap HV30 might be a good idea if you're hard on cash. If tapeless media doesn’t scare you, however, there are plenty of camcorders that perform better, look cooler, and handle smoother than the HV40.

Science Introduction

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Canon, like most manufacturers, has clearly put its energy into improving its line of tapeless camcorders. This means the HV40 is being left in the dust, unable to compete with new models when it comes to performance. The HV40 isn't an awful camcorder, though, and it put up respectable numbers in all of our tests. But its weakness showed in our sharpness test, where the HV40 simply couldn't keep up with the competition.

Sharpness Performance

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No matter how hard it tries, the HV40 can't produce an image that's as sharp as its tapeless-camcorder counterparts.

Video sharpness is a key element to measuring video quality because it gives you an idea of how much detail a camcorder will be able to capture in its image. The Canon HV40 was quite good with sharpness, but it was definitely a notch below some of the high-end AVCHD camcorders out there. The HV40 measured a horizontal sharpness of 700 LW/PH and a vertical sharpness of 600 LW/PH. Compare these numbers to the Canon HF S100, which earned 800 LW/PH horizontal and 650 LW/PH vertical, and you can see the difference we’re talking about.

During the test, we noticed the Canon HV40 managed a vertical resolution of around 750 LW/PH when the camcorder and the subject we shot were perfectly still. Once we put the camcorder in motion there was a lot of aliasing and the lines on our sharpness chart began to break up around 600 LW/PH. We score our sharpness test with the camcorder in motion, however, which is why we gave the HV40 a final vertical sharpness of 600 LW/PH. This is actually a very common occurrence with camcorders, although the difference between sharpness in motion versus still usually isn’t that substantial.

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Motion Performance

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The presence of a new native 24p frame rate is a key component to the HV40.

One of the new features on the HV40 is its native-progressive 24p frame rate option. Most alternate frame rates on consumer camcorders actually record at 60i and convert the footage to 24p or 30p using a pulldown system that eliminates certain frames. The HV40’s native 24p mode is the real deal: it actually records to tape at 24 frames per second. The HV40 also comes with non-native 24p and 30p modes as well, both of which record to tape as 60i using the method discussed above. Now, we didn’t notice much of a difference between the two 24p modes when we viewed the footage on a television, but the native 24p option gives you significant advantages in post-production.

The HV40 had a bit more artifacting than the AVCHD Canon camcorders (the HF S100, HF S10, HF S11, HF20 and HF200). This means AVCHD has come a long way as a compression system to outdo a classic codec like HDV. The HV40 did have a slightly smoother image, however, and it showed less trailing—although not by much. Overall, we give the edge to the HV40 in our motion test because of its extra frame rate option, but the Canon HF S series of camcorders is really just as good at capturing motion.

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Low Light Performance

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More noise than the competition, but other low light results were in the same ballpark as the competition.

The Canon HV40 has a similarly-sized CMOS sensor to the Canon HF S100 (and the rest of the Canon HF S series), but it has a far smaller pixel count. We guessed that this should result in better low light sensitivity for the HV40, and our tests confirmed this hypothesis. The HV40 required only 12 lux of light to reach 50 IRE on our waveform monitor—less than the 16 lux required on the Canon HF S100. This is likely a result of the pixels being less dense on the Canon HV40’s sensor. That allows the sensor to absorb more light, hence improving the low light sensitivity of the camcorder.

The HV40’s low light noise measurements were slightly higher than the Canon HF S100, although the two camcorders had similar numbers (1.5325% on the HV40 vs. 1.3525% on the HF S100). These are both reasonable noise scores for low light, but the Panasonic HDC-TM300 and Sony HDR-XR520V were better.

The Canon HV40 didn’t have great color accuracy in low light, but its results were about average for a camcorder of its class. What the HV40 did have was deep, vivid colors in low light—a testament to the 74.9% saturation we measured in our low light test. The Canon HV40 registered a color error of 5.3.

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