Panasonic SDR-H40EG-S

Panasonic SDR-H40EG-S ... subjects. But with long-distance zoom shots, even a tiny bit of hand shake has a huge effect on picture quality. That's where Panasonic's Advanced Optical Image Stabilization (O.I.S.) comes in, suppressing the effects of hand shake as you shoot. The system uses gyrosensors to detect hand shake, then shifts a lens and adjusts the optical axis to compensate. This all happens a remarkable 4,000 times per second. And because the system is optical, no image quality is lost. Thanks to Advanced O.I.S., the images you capture look incredibly clear, sharp and blur-free even at high zoom levels.

The SDR-H40's 40 GB internal hard disk drive lets you record continuously for up to 36 hours (in LP mode) without changing a disc, tape or other recording media.

Panasonic's Anti-Shock Shield helps protect recorded video data from damage due to jolts and impact. The Drop Detect function senses if the camera is falling and moves the head away from the hard disk. The Floating Structure protects the hard disk should the camera fall or be dropped. And the Buffer Memory automatically backs up data while the camera is falling.

This hard disk drive camcorder has a USB Host function, which lets you connect directly to a DVD burner via a USB cable. You can then copy recordings from the hard disk to a DVD disc by simply pressing a button.

You can transfer the motion-image data from the SD card or the camcorder's hard drive right to your PC using your PC's USB port. Then with the included VideoCam Suite 1.0 software, you can easily put scenes in a different order and delete the ones you don't want. When you're finished with your video production, you can resave the edited version onto an SD memory card and a DVD disc.