Hi again. I watched your video and can see the problems. Low light and high detail combined together are the most difficult conditions for video. Additionally, you're shooting in Winter so that there is an enormous amount of detail in the branches and twigs of the dormant trees. This means that the camera has to compress an enormous amount of information per frame with a minimal amount of light.
The result is always a lifeless looking image. The other scene was shot in summer and in sunlight. Direct sunlight, properly exposed with ND will always give the best image. So I would say in that situation, it would be virtually impossible for you to match the crispness of the image you're comparing two.
Yes image stabilization does crop the picture a bit. However, handheld, especially in that situation demands IS. The best you could have done in that situation is to go with a low aperture (in order to soften the complex background) and have your subjects agreed to some softened fill lighting.
I am confident in that camera. It is arguably the best camcorder on the market. Here is a video that was filmed mostly with a 605. All the wildlife footage was. In these scenes, we used a Raynox 1.8x teleconverter and still produced stunning results.
Regarding framerate, learn the 180 rule and follow it, until you have an advanced understanding.
When I first started out, I was always frustrated with low-quality imagery like yours. Since we shoot mostly wildlife, the circumstances were often just like yours. So you have to learn how to optimize your footage by choosing your dates, locations, angles and things I mentioned above. Thanks for sharing this! I'm happy to see that others are having to face a similar learning curve 😄
https://www.dallasnaturechannel.com/videos/dallas-winter-wildlife-birds/
