[Owen Dawe]

I recently bought two Blackmagic Video Assist units to attach to two Canon xl h1s cameras. It has certainaly put a new lease life into these old cameras. I make short filler programs for a tv station. Whenever I have a reject I ask if the quality is too low and do I need to buy new cameras? It’s always the content that brings a rejection. Not the picture or audio.

I record to SD cards in either proress 422 or proress 422 hq. I find there is not much difference between the two which probably is a result of the cameras. After all the cameras are old technology now. I wonder if there are any other prosumer cameras of that vintage that can bring such a good result. I never record to tape and have never had a failure with a file.

I have a xl h1 as well but the audio is not embeded into the sdi stream.

So to answer your question. Does the XL-H1 Still hold up? I must reply in some situations it holds up very well. They are perfect for what i do so I have no plans to replace them as long as they keep working.

Owen Dawe,
Fan of Retro Gear.