Tag Archives: Canon

Unboxing a refurbished Canon Vixia HF20

I just got a “new” Canon Video Camera, a refurbished Canon Vixia HF20, I was really eyeing this camera last year. Someone had it way on sale, I ordered it and they never shipped (and didn’t charge me either). And it’s just had everything I liked: good reviews, option for an external microphone, seems to be compatible with iMovie, relatively easy to use and refurbished meant it had a good price (plus, I had a coupon code).

I’ve purchased refurbished equipment before and it’s always worked out for me. As I started opening the box I liked the way they had it all together in some pretty generic packaging, so I closed it and started filming (yes, it’s as boring as it sounds).

And you can play it in HD too!

As I said, the camera itself isn’t so much the story, since the camera has been out for a while, it’s all about the generic packaging (boring). FYI, I shot this with my iPhone camera, hopefully I’ll be posting more videos with my new camera soon…

My New Digital Camera is NOT Waterproof

This is a problem!!!

Someone else dropped something into the river and I made a grab for it an my camera fell out of my pocket. I meant to only leave it in that pocket for a minute when I thought the water might reach my pants pocket and I forgot to move it back. I’m am so bummed…

The lens was closed, it was under water for just a few seconds, I wiped it off with a dry towel immediately and pulled out the battery. Needless to say I didn’t take any more pictures, I had a few from today of the ocean and monkeys but I bet those are fine. I hope the monkey shots are, I got a monkey (with a baby on it’s back) that managed to snatch a shaker of parmesan from a restaurant and were eating it up in a tree!

Now the camera, the chip and the battery are in a zip lock bag with some dry rice (to soak up the extra moisture). I’ll leave it for a day or so and see how it is. Kitty litter is supposed to work well too, but I didn’t need a 25 pound bag of it in my tiny room.

It’s a great camera, I’d definitely recommend the Canon SD1100 with image stabilization. It’s been in my sights for ages and I recently found a great on-line deal for it from Dell (that’s where I bought my SLR Canon camera too).

I’ll definitely be adding the WP-DC22 Waterproof Case to my wishlist (assuming the camera still works). It’s good for 40 meters underwater (130 feet) and is supposed to also be great for “beach, rain and on the ski slopes”.

Later: Oops, the waterproof case is more expen$ive than the camera was!!!