Panasonic takes your digital recording experience to greater heights with the introduction of its latest DVD-based camcorder, the Panasonic VDR-D400. It is basically an improved Panasonic VDR-D300 featuring a remarkable 20x Leica optical zoom, making it the world’s first 3CCD (800,000 pixel) DVD movie camera with 20x optical zoom. It retains VDR-D300’s optical image stabilization feature, 2.7-in LCD screen, 3.1-megapixel pictures and stylish silver color.

Apart from the abovementioned features, the Panasonic VDR-D400 also comes with SD/ SDHC card slot, integrated LED color enhancement light, and Hi-speed USB 2, MPEG-2 DVD recording in three different modes, 16:9 widescreen format recording, easy to use joystick control, and video editing software. Its DVD-Ram format allows advanced non-linear editing in the camcorder itself.

The Panasonic VDR-D400 will be out in September initially in Japan and will be sold for about $1050.