High definition is the way of the present in other countries. Over here, we are buying HD ready TVs in the hope that one day HD ­television will come, but you can bet that by the time HD does come, there will be a fair number of people who are onto their second HD TVs. But if you must see something in HD now, then an HD camcorder might be just the ticket.

Now, Sony did come out with the first HD camcorder, but not to be outdone Canon brought out two really good HD camcorders of its very own. The HV20 is regarded by those in the know as being the best of the bunch and HG10 is a very good hard-disk based camera. Prepare to meet the third in the Canon stable, the HR10. At first glance this looks just as good as the other two. It is also based on Canon’s 1/2.7in CMOS sensor with 2.96 megapixels and has the high-end image stabilisation, not the rubbishy electronic kind. It even has the same lens specification. Something most people won’t really pay attention to, but that does have an impact on the final outcome of the video ­capturing your kid’s first steps, is the top data ­transfer rate. The HR10 has 12 Megabits per second as opposed to the 15 you could have on the other models.

Where the HR10 does do the family name proud is in the recording quality. It’s very good, whether in real or artificial light. The HR10 also has a proper HDMI connector, so you can hook it up to your TV and, for the very first time, see what high definition actually looks like. The biggest problem that you’ll face, is the space on the storage medium – DVD. The 8cm DVDs only manage 1.4GB, enough for about 14 minutes of ­uncompressed HD video. The RRP is R11 499.

For more info go to www.canon.co.za.