Maxell announced that it will begin shipping a new 8cm Blu-ray BD-R write-once and BD-RE rewritable discs for the HD camcorder market.

The Maxell 8cm single layer Blu-ray BD-R and BD-RE are compatible with the latest Blu-ray camcorders providing a recording capacity of 7.5 GB.

The new products feature a special HG hard coat technology (hard coat layer) to protect the recording surface from scratches, dust and fingerprints, which can cause playback errors in camcorder media.

The Maxell 8cm Blu-ray discs will be available in the U.S. starting in September to coincide with the release of Hitachi's new Blu-ray camcorder. Discs will retail for $24.99 for the write-once single sided disc and $34.99 for the rewritable version.