Thursday, May 28, 2009

Critically acclaimed photojournalist Simon Norfolk is going to deliver a lecture on 11 June in London, as part of the PhotoVoice Lecture Series. The lecture will cover a number of topics ranging from early photojournalism to the “sublime awfulness of modern weapons systems”, from 18th century Romantic paintings to the questions of how to photograph a nuclear missile and how to “yomp 12,000 watts of lighting through the jungles of the Yucatan”. The lecture will be held at Conway Hall, South Place Ethical Society, 25 Red Lion Square, starting at 7:30pm on Thursday, 11 June. Tickets are £10 in advance and £12 on the door.

Website: Online Booking

Kate Labs have released Frame 1.0, a piece of software developed for testing digital cameras and lenses. The application is available for Mac OS X and Windows, and offers a graphical user interface as well as a command line prompt. Frame 1.0 can be used to conduct tests of exposure, signal-to-noise ratio, dynamic range, tonal range, colour sensitivity, resolution and vignetting. All results can be exported to standard ASCII, XML, HTML, and CSV documents, which enables compatibility with third-party applications. The price is €99 and a 14-day trial version is also available.

Website: Kate Labs

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Online photo site snapizzi, the one-stop shop for portrait and event photographers, today announced that it has added an array of new web tools and print products. The photo site recently added a suite of high-quality print products that includes a variety of formats (matte, gloss, lustre) as well as a wide choice of print sizes (from wallet to 20”x30”).  snapizzi also added an FTP uploader that allows high-volume photographers to upload hundreds of photos at a time – up to 4 GBs worth, since most photographers allegedly use 4-GB memory cards.

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The winners and finalists of the second International Garden Photographer of the Year competition are featured in a new exhibition, which is now open at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. The exhibition displays over 100 images from the second International Garden Photographer of the Year competition, specially printed and created for viewing outside in the delights of the Kew Gardens situated between the Pavilion Restaurant and the Pagoda. The exhibition will be on display at Kew Gardens until 3 September 2009.

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ViewSonic has announced a new line of digital photo frames called TrueView. The new product family includes the 10.4” VFD1020, 8” VFD820 and 7” VFD720 digital frames, which all feature an aspect ratio of 4:3. The two smaller frames have an 800x600 high-resolution LCD panel, which is particularly unique for the 7” frame class since most frames this size on the market today do not offer such high resolution, ViewSonic claims. The 10.4” model coming in June will offer 1024x768 resolution. The frames are compatible with CompactFlash, MMC and MemoryStick cards and come with 2GB of internal memory as well as a USB 2.0 port. ViewSonic’s new digital photo frame line will be available in the second half of 2009, at $129.99 for the 10.4”, $89.99 for the 8” and $79.99 for the 7” models.

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Adobe Systems, Apple, Hewlett Packard, Nikon, Nik Software, Wacom and X-Rite have joined forces for a unique, nine-city Creative Alliance Tour across Europe. The tour has been set up to provide creative professionals with a comprehensive insight into a complete digital workflow. A full-day seminar will take place at each city stop, hosted by renowned photo professionals and “evangelists” - Robin Preston, Boudewijn Krijger and Guy Gowan, among others. The seminars will consist of inspirational presentations and in-depth technical workshops, with the opportunity to share questions and experiences with the experts. The Creative Alliance Tour will begin in autumn 2009, with stops in the Netherlands, UK, Spain, France, Germany and Italy.

Website: Creative Alliance Tour

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Sigma have released a firmware update for the Sigma DP2 digital compact camera. Version 1.01 promises improved AF accuracy and addresses the issue of intermittent camera freeze under certain conditions. The Sigma DP2 is a compact camera with a fixed 41mm equivalent f/2.8 lens and a nearly APS-C sized Foveon sensor, boasting a resolution of 3 x 4.7 million pixels.

Website: Firmware Download | Sigma DP2

Sony have announced two new, slim and stylish digital compact cameras, the Cyber-shot W180 and the Cyber-shot W190. These easy-to-use snappers feature a 3x zoom lens, a 2.7” LCD screen, Face Detection, Smile Shutter and SteadyShot image stabilisation, and come in silver, black and red colours. The Sony Cyber-shot W180 is a 10-megapixel model, while the W190 boasts 12.1 million pixels. Both models will become available from July.

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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Starting June, Digital Camera Buyer magazine will be sold under the title Digital Camera Essentials. The renamed magazine features the same in-depth reviews, hands-on group tests and 25-page buyers’ guide it has become famous for, but also now incorporates a large photo techniques section and editing tutorial. Along with the new name and a new look for the magazine, June will also see the launch of a new subscriptions offer for Digital Camera Essentials.

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Canon have announced a new firmware update for the EOS 5D Mark II DSLR camera that will enable manual exposure control when shooting video. Available for download from 2nd June 2009, the 5D Mark II firmware update will include the following manual controls when shooting video:

- Full aperture selection
- ISO speed: Auto, 100 – 6400 and H1
- Shutter speed: 1/30th – 1/4000th second

Manual exposure control while shooting video on the EOS 5D Mark II is expected to make a big impact with cinematographers and videographers using the 5D Mark II for high-end HD video production.

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