Sony DCR-HC26 "PAL" Digital Mini-DV Handycam Camcorder with 2.5" Swivel Touch LCD Screen, 20x Optical Zoom, 800x Digital Zoom

The DCR-HC26 from Sony gives you a full-featured, compact MiniDV camcorder at anentry-level price. Highlights include the Advanced HAD CCD imager, which captures stunning detail and clarity, and the Digital Zoom, which focuses on distant subjects providing clear close-up images with less distortion. The Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar lens offers less glare and increased contrast for vivid, more life-like color and tones.

Make your personal videos complete with additional customization features such as Picture and Fader effects for creative and professional looking enhancements.Photo Mode allows you to capture and store hundreds of individual still images, and Picture Package software helps you easily organize and edit still images and video.

The 1/6" Advanced HAD (Hole Accumulation Diode) CCD with 340K (effective) pixels provides stunning detail and clarity with exceptional video (up to 500 lines of horizontal resolution) and still image performance. The camera offers up to 500 lines of horizontal resolution, 3X the color bandwidth and a significantly higher signal/noise ratio, to provide spectacular video performance.

The 20x optical zoom helps to bring the action close up from far away. In addition the 800x Digital Zoom Interpolation means that extreme digital zooming is clearer, with less distortion than previous types of digital zooms. Carl Zeiss lenses have an advanced optical multi-layer coating that offers less glare and flare with increased contrast. This results in vivid image brilliance,true-to-life color saturation and perfect renditions of subtle tones.

The 2.5" Touch Panel SwivelScreen LCD Display provides excellent viewing clarity with improved resolution. The high resolution 123K pixel LCD screen rotates up to 270 degrees for multiple viewing angles providing sharp, detailed images for monitoring or playback. Using a camcorder can be intimidating for some people, so with a press of the Easy Handycam button, most of the advanced features of the camcorder are locked out leaving only the buttons essential for recording operational.

Enhance your personal videos by adding professional looking fader effects. Choose from Black, Mosaic, White, Monotone. Get creative when recording or playing back your videos with Sony's Picture Effect Modes. Effects available in Camera mode: Pastel and Mosaic. Effects available in Playback mode: Negative Art, Sepia, Monotone and Solarize.

Using Sony's Adaptive Frame Interpolation for better image quality, you can store hundreds of individual still images with 7 seconds of audio on the videotape (Depends on the amount of vodeo recorded on the tape). Easily organize still images and video, and turn them into stunning music videosusing the supplied software.

Program AE modes make recording easy even when filming in challenging situations. Choose from Portrait, Beach & Ski, Sports Lesson, Landscape, Spotlight or Sunset & Moon modes.