Logitech HD Pro Webcam C920

Share a video travelogue on Facebook™ or YouTube™. Email your mom a record of your child’s first steps. Without the long, long, long wait for the video to upload. Catch up with a friend through a video call. Without seeing the choppy call on your display.

It’s time for video to move quickly. Fast video uploads and smooth video calls. Without sacrificing the razor-sharp quality of HD. That’s where Logitech HD webcams featuring H.264 compression enter the picture.

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What is H.264?

H.264 is a standardized digital format for compressing high-definition, high-bitrate video. It can transform a large, raw video file into one that requires about half the space of the MPEG-2 format (the standard for a DVD-quality video). And H.264 is versatile. It can vary the amount of compression to meet the requirements of ISPs, Web sites as well as devices, including your laptop.

Why does compression matter?

Consider an elephant trying to squeeze into a mouse hole. The raw HD video recorded through your webcam or digital camera can take up tremendous space on a hard drive—gigabytes you probably need for other files. And Internet sites, including Facebook and YouTube, and ISPs such as Comcast and ATT have file-size requirements. Raw HD video can often be too large for the sites and ISPs.

What’s more, even if a video can squeeze in, the larger the file, the longer it takes to upload. So if you want to share a video in a timely manner, you’ll want to put your elephant on a crash diet. And compress.

How does H.264 work?

Video is a stream of individual pictures or frames. H.264 removes reuses redundant information from the stream. Each frame is divided into tiny blocks of one quarter of a pixel, for precise analysis. When processing a frame, the compressing agent (the encoder) searches the blocks on the previous frame just encoded and the next one in line. It figures out what’s the same and what has changed. It then eliminates the redundant information. The process is repeated throughout the stream.

That action compresses the file size significantly–more than even MPEG-4. When the video is played, the decoder in the playback device pulls reassembles the information from multiple frames to complete the Hi-Def picture.

How does H.264 work with a Logitech webcam?

Seamlessly. Turn on the camera. Lights. Action. Video is captured with the webcam’s sensor, digitized and compressed with H.264. The video data is then sent through a USB cable to your computer for viewing. For a call. For Facebook. For YouTube. For the hard drive. For Mom. Extremely fast. In amazing HD.

Bye bye, blur

A lot of webcams out there want you to stay put. Move or get too close and the camera can have a tough time automatically focusing on you—even if it’s got a good lens. That can leave you looking hazy and out of focus. And that’s probably not the look you’re going for.

At Logitech, we don’t want your video to become a blur. So we created an autofocus system that lets you move around. It zeroes in on whatever’s in the center of the frame, like your face. When you move, the webcam automatically tracks your motion and refocuses the image. You’ll be crystal clear in less than three seconds

See all webcams with autofocus.

Ready for your close-up

Want to zoom in for a kiss? Or hold something up to the camera? Our autofocus system can handle it. It focuses in and out automatically with precision and speed—even if the item is only 10 cm from the camera. No choppiness. No blur. Just a clear, sharp image.

How’d we do that?

We used the same type of motor used in mobile-phone cameras, a voice coil motor (VCM), and optimized it for webcams. They’re compact, don’t use a lot of battery power, and can handle shock and vibration. The lens moves back and forth to adjust focus until the webcam gives you the sharpest image possible. It also helps stabilize the webcam so your video and photos are in focus and have low distortion. So, you can go ahead and make your move.

A focus on the lens

If your webcam’s lens isn’t good, your image quality won’t be good either—no matter how many megapixels you’ve got.

At Logitech, we want you to have the best image quality—not just the highest resolution images. That’s why we teamed up with Carl Zeiss, a leader in the optics industry since 1849, to bring you a better webcam lens.

More light, better images

A webcam lens captures the light that the sensor then transforms into the image you see. You need a high-quality lens to capture more light and produce the best images. Together with Carl Zeiss, we created an advanced lens design to give you more clarity and less distortion.

An updated classic

Our Carl Zeiss webcam lens is a new take on their Tessar® lens design. While the original Tessar design was patented back in 1902, it’s the most famous camera lens for a reason. It delivers sharp images in a compact, lightweight form—which also happens to make it perfect for webcams.

To bring you the best webcam images possible, Logitech and Carl Zeiss turned the classic four-element Tessar design into a five-element design. Two of the lenses in the lens stack are cemented together to focus the light onto the sensor with maximum detail and minimal distortion. You can see the difference in your images.

Playing around

Looking to add a little entertainment to your video calls? Logitech® Video Effects™ can really spice things up.

You can be a talking shark one minute, an Elvis impersonator the next, and a chalkboard drawing after that. When you download Video Effects, you’ll get:

• Avatars
• Face Accessories
• Video Masks
• Fun Filters.

See all compatible webcams.

Download Video Effects now.

Make your move

These aren’t just plain-old static effects. Video Effects technology uses face tracking to find your face and track its moves. Then it either maps a Face Accessory over your real face or completely replaces your video with an Avatar that moves like you.

So when you choose a dinosaur avatar, the dinosaur moves its head the way you do, talks when you talk, and winks when you wink. When you put on glasses, they stay on your eyes—even when you move around.

Avatars

Feel like being someone or something else today? You simply pick out a character and watch it become you. We’ve got an avatar for every mood and season. You can be a sock puppet, cat, alien, dollar bill, Santa, and lots of other people, animals, and things.

Face Accessories

When you want to be you with a little something extra, you can just put on a Face Accessory. You’ve got options galore, including a pirate hat, crown, scuba mask, vampire teeth, antlers, and a pig nose. Or you can put on a full mask.

Fun Filters

Ready for a new twist on the real you? Fun Filters apply photographic filters or manipulate your video in real time. You can transform into a comic book character, get all twisted, alter the colors, and more.

See all compatible webcams.

Download Video Effects now.