Canon followed its PowerShot upgrades thos morning with the release of the HR10 HD camcorder. The camera maker labels the new entry as one of the easiest ways to capture HD video: owners can record footage at up to the full 1920x1080 resolution of HD directly to mini DVDs, allowing rough edits to be played immediately from Blu-Ray and DVD players that support AVCHD (H.264) movies. Also new to Canon's HD home user cameras is a specially tuned 2.7-inch LCD which the company says is viewable at up to 135 degrees off-center and has a much-improved color range for accurate previews. The HR10 likewise shares many of the features of existing models: the 10X optical zoom lens can take 3.1-megapixel still images during the shoot or pull 2-megapixel images after the fact. Video can be scaled to a 24 frames per second, progressive scan Cine mode for replicating the speed of movie theater video.
Canon plans to ship the HD camera in August for $1,199.

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