I have the XF300 - traded up as soon as I could from an EX1, which I'd had since they came out.
Shot this on it on the very first day:-
http://www.simonscans.com/tour/tours...215&seriesid=8
First video I've ever used where default preset white balances are usable.
The XF300 is bloody lovely, CF cards are cheap and we have lots from the still cameras anyway, the AF works, all the controls fall to hand and its just a typical Canon bit of kit - everything works and it's all very familiar to other Canon gear
The EX1 I truly and utterly hated from moment one. The AF was patchy, the cards expensive and all the controls just in the wrong places or worse still hidden in fucking menus. Colours by default are a bit odd too, but there's custom settings downloadable everywhere now, which fix it, by why the hell should I have to? Shouldn't default be good enough?
Back in the day Sony on a product meant something - now it usually just means, badly thought out, expensive and a proprietary format.
Add to this a codec that wouldn't play in Premiere for about a year after I bought it and the "coming soon" update finally arrived. Add to this a Matrox edit system that never really worked right and I wasn't a happy bunny. FYI Matrox's support team is beyond useless and I will never, ever own another Matrox bit of kit again.
The output from an EX1 is noisey compared to more modern cameras, but that's due to its small pixels - it's about the only camera from that time that doesn't upscale from a less than HD sensor, so it's not totally surprising. It's a trade-off, sharpness over sensitivity.
Full 35mm sensor chips are just too damn big for porn video - low depth of focus is a lovely thing on some types of content, but shooting up close and wanting fanny and face in focus, makes it not ideal. F11 is going to take quite a lot of Kinos. Also the lack of an angled viewfinder leaves the operator grovelling about on the floor, when shooting human females who usually have their interesting bits best viewed from well below waist level. I had a 5d mk2 but never got beyond playing with it on tests - editing the native MOV files was very tempting compared to another screen punching afternoon on the phone to Matrox.
I also had a Canon HFX11 I used for a bit - had to order one from the US to get one capable of 30P not the european standard of 25P, it's a GREAT porn camera, small with shockingly good AF and image stabilisation, way better than the EX1 on both counts. It's only downside is that the video it produces struggles in the highlights, they look blown out very easily. I sold it when the XF300 came along, and kinda wish I hadn't.
The Camera you actually want is the Canon XF100 - it's almost as small as the HF11, but shoots the same format and codec as the XF300. Single chip instead of 3 chip - but this barely matters any more as its a CMOS not a CCD. They aren't quite out yet - they're due early next year. Smaller, cheaper and good enough.
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/digitalcam...amcorders/3689
Shooting wanky art for vimeo is perfect for 5D's, but for shooting day in day out, just earning a living then an EX1 or XF300 or XF100 would be - and is - my choice.