Panasonic has announced a new SD card based AVCHD digital camcorder today. We first saw the prototype at the beginning of last month, and I must say the final product looks a whole lot better. The Panasonic HDC-SD1 features the full gamut of 1080i, 3CCDs, and recording onto SDHC cards. The Leica lens allows for a 12x optical zoom, and the 3 inch LCD screen should let you see all the HD action easily along with the ever important focus.

Up to 90 minutes of footage can be recorded onto the 4GB SDHC card included with the Panasonic HDC-SD1. There is still no viable way to edit AVCHD footage, and no word yet as to what solution Panasonic will bundle with the HDC-SD1.

Each CCD on the Panasonic HDC-SD1 is 1/4″ in size, which are sufficiently large and should result in great color accuracy and sharpness. Although the AVCHD codec is capable of higher bitrates, the HDC-SD1 will max out at 13Mbps, which is also shy of Sony’s HDR-SR1, which records at 15Mbps. This may or may not result in more noticeable compression artifacts, especially when there is a lot of movement in the picture.

Other features on the Panasonic HDC-SD1 include HDMI, microphone jacks, and the ability to record in Dolby 5.1 surround sound. The HDC-SD1 is slated for release in Japan on December 1st. There is no word on a U.S. release, but you can bet it will be coming. Pricing is set at 180,000 yen, or just above $1,500 U.S.

Press Release [ via CCInfo ]