The Danish website Akamera.dk have just reviewed the 6 megapixel Acer CR-6530 digital camera.

Website: Akamera.dk - Acer CR-6530 Review

DigiCamReview have reviewed the 5 megapixel Olympus MJU DIGITAL 500 digital camera.

“The Olympus Mju Digital 500 is a very nice digital camera - it has an excellent large 2.5” screen, good image quality, a stylish weatherproof metal body, an excellent super macro mode, and is extremely fast and easy to use as well. The only negatives I can think of are the lack of custom white balance and other more advanced controls, the movie mode is fairly average, and the lack of an optical viewfinder may put some people off. “

Website: DigiCamReview - Olympus MJU DIGITAL 500 Review

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MediaGear XtraDrive is lauched today. The MediaGear XtraDrive allows you to turn memory cards into USB devices. The XtraDrive supports Secure Digital (SD), MultiMediaCard, Sony Memory Stick, Compact Flash Types I and II, MicroDrives, SmartMedia and xD card formats. The The MediaGear XtraDrive will cost $14.95 MSRP and be available this month.

MediaGear Press Release

MediaGear Launches New See-Through XtraDrives That Turn Your Unused Flash Memory Cards into Convenient USB Drives

April 4, 2005 – Santa Ana, CA –MediaGear announced the next generation of its popular Keychain drives called “XtraDrive”, to help satisfy the growing consumer demand for convenient extra USB flash drives created from unused memory cards.

XtraDrives have a colored, transparent cap that allows the user to see if a media card is installed. Also, to eliminate crowding of several drives together on a PC or notebook, the XtraDrive package also includes a USB adapter cable.

“Photographers have an abundance of old memory cards that are no longer used because of their low megabyte storage. The new XtraDrive gives these outdated memory cards a brand new life,” noted Terry Smith, VP of Marketing at MediaGear.

Further evidence that the digicam boom is slowing down comes from a Reuters report which says that Japanese exports of digital cameras fell for the first time ever last month. A sharp drop in shipments to Europe was blamed for the 0.9 % decline. Exports to Europe in February dropped by over 10%. Japan’s Camera and Imaging Products Association (CIPA) compiled the report.

Website: Japan Digital Camera Exports Down First Time

Canon Europe Press Release

Amstelveen, The Netherlands, March 2005. Canon, a leader in photographic and imaging technology, has been awarded two prizes by DIWA (Digital Imaging Websites Association) for outstanding digital cameras: the Canon EOS 20D received DIWA’s Platinum Award for the best ‘Digital System Camera’ of 2004, and the Digital IXUS 40 won a gold medal in the Amateur Digital Mini Camera category.

Throughout the year, DIWA members rigorously test and review digital imaging products, awarding those with the highest scores gold, silver or bronze medals. Once a year, one of the gold winners from each of three categories is selected by the members as the best of the best – honoured by a DIWA Platinum Award.

“At Canon we are passionate about photography, so we are delighted to receive these two prestigious DIWA awards,” said Mogens Jensen, Head of Canon Consumer Imaging Europe. “The awards reinforce our commitment to Canon customers and cement our dedication to continually setting standards in digital photography technology.”

Trusted Reviews have published their review of the new waterproof Pentax OptioWP digital camera.

“More seriously, the WP coped very well under water and sub-aqua operation had no deleterious affects. The image quality was actually reasonably sharp and colours where reproduced well, despite the light bending watery environment. Detail is not quite up to that of the air breathing world, but it’s far better than the results I’ve obtained from those disposable underwater cameras. I’ll also add that the water in the fish tank was crystal clear and very still, and I’d imagine that taking pictures in our Worlds’ not so clean seas could result in murkier results. That said, Pentax include an Underwater mode that brings out the blueness of the sea for that added bit of vibrancy. The other point I should make, if you haven’t already noticed from my first picture, is the fact that the WP doesn’t float so be sure to keep that hand strap wrapped around your wrist before you wade in.”

Website: Trusted Reviews - Pentax OptioWP Review

Steves Digicams have reviewed the new A3+ printer from the HP, the Photosmart 8750, which was announced at PMA in February.

“For large format printing the HP8750 isn’t what I would call “fast,” taking 13 minutes to make a borderless 13x19” print that the Canon i9900 cranks out in two minutes and forty seconds. Not sure how HP came up with the 3.5 minute figure in their specs as no one is going to print a 13x19” photo using less than “Best” quality. The HP 8750 does produce superior black and white prints over any of the Canon printers due to its photo gray inks. The only other wide carriage printer that does B&W this well is the Epson 2200, which also has a dedicated photo grey (light black) ink cartridge.”

Website: Steves Digicams - HP Photosmart 8750 Review

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It might be Staurday today, but that hasn’t stopped Mike Johnston from celebrating the 3rd anniversary of his “Sunday Morning Photographer” with a look at digital black and white using ConvertToBW Pro v.3 from The Imaging Factory.

“There are all sorts of ways to convert a color digital image to B&W. Some cameras have it as a capture option; you can click on “grayscale” in most image-processing programs; and there are various different ways you can do it in Photoshop, such as using Channel Mixer. Then there are a number of freeware, shareware, and commercial applications, several but by no means all of which I’ve tried. This column’s home base is The Luminous Landscape, and thanks to a recent recommendation from Michael Reichmann, the site’s proprietor, called Three Must-Have Photoshop Plug-ins, I got turned on to what I think is a really great one: ConvertToBW Pro v.3.”

Website: The Sunday Morning Photographer: A Digital Black and White Update

A new version of Qimage has just been released. Qimage is a software application that is designed to make image printing easy.

New features in Qimage v2005.200 include:

Direct email support: v2005.200 offers the ability to send multiple images via email by opening your email client and preparing a message with the images already attached. Images may be selected by selecting multiple thumbs and right clicking “Send via Email” or by using the “Create email/web copies” function from the queue. See the help on this function for more details.

CNET have just reviewed the 5 megapixel, twistable Pentax Optio X.

“The Pentax Optio X’s stylish appearance and distinctive design will appeal to snapshooters looking for a pocketable conversation piece, but molasses-slow performance, mediocre image quality, and lack of manual controls will turn off both casual and serious photographers looking for high-quality results.”

Website: CNET - Pentax Optio X Review

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NikonNet and ‘Legends Behind the Lens’ Honor the Work of Esteemed Nature Photographer James Balog

MELVILLE, N.Y., April 1 /PRNewswire/—From the beauty of endangered animals to the destruction of natural disasters, nature has many sides that a photographer can capture. The true legends in this field respect nature’s awesome power while working to share its vast beauty with the rest of the world.  It is the secret behind the success of one of the world’s most respected nature photographers, James Balog.

This April, NikonNet’s inspiring monthly, “Legends Behind the Lens,” honors the work of esteemed nature photographer James Balog.

“NikonNet is pleased to honor the images and extraordinary career of James Balog in this April’s ‘Legends Behind the Lens,’” said Tracy Mack-Jackson, Senior Manager of Internet Development and Programs at Nikon Inc. “For many, Jim has been our eyes in some of the most breathtaking parts of the world, delivering inspiring images and shedding much needed light on many of the issues that affect the globe. His work is truly exceptional.”

Nikon have announced a number of money-off rebates on their SLR range of cameras, including $100 off the Nikon D70 digital SLR with 18-70mm DX lens. This follows the news that Nikon are set to introduce 2 new DSLRs soon, the Nikon D50 and Nikon D70s. Other rebates include $100 off the F100 film SLR camera and up to $150 off a wide range of lenses.

Website: Nikon USA - SLR Rebate Form

Adobe Press Release

Adobe Collaborates with IPTC and AdsML To Extend Metadata Standards

XMP ensures metadata content is preserved throughout advertising and creative publishing workflows

SAN JOSE, Calif. — March 31, 2005 — Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced results of its collaboration with the International Press Telecommunications Council (IPTC) and IDEAlliance with development of a new public specification, IPTC Core Schema for XMP. Exposed through Adobe® Creative Suite software, “custom panels” are now available at www.iptc.org , giving photographers and news services immediate access and compliance with a standard that aims to streamline data capture for images used in news outlets. Additionally, Adobe announced that it is working with the AdsML™ Consortium (Advertising Mark-up Language) and IDEAlliance to implement advertising standards using XMP within advertising workflows.

Back in January 2005 Olympus and Panasonic signed a joint development agreement for DSLR cameras. Now Matsushita (who own the Panasonic brand) and Olympus have announced plans to jointly-develop new DSLRs based on the Four Thirds System, which was established back in 2002 by Olympus and Kodak, and present them at the PMA Show in February 2006. Olympus already have two Four-Thirds DLSRs, the E-1 and new E-300 (look out for my review soon…), but this would be the first digital SLR for Panasonic, and more good news for the Four-Thirds standard.

“Matsushita said it planned to develop a digital SLR and sell it under its own brands, which include Panasonic, expanding its product lineup beyond compact models and helping it achieve its goal of having 10 percent of the global digital camera market in two years.  “Launching a digital SLR will do much to strengthen our brand in the digital camera market,” Fumio Ohtsubo, senior managing director at Matsushita, told a news conference.”

Website: MSNBC - Matsushita, Olympus to develop digital SLRs

Charging $30 for something that should have been in the original design seems more than a little unreasonable to me, but if you own an iPOD Photo then you’ll naturally be interested in finding out if the new iPod Camera Connector actually works. Playlist have a review for you…

“A question on the minds of many of those with more expensive digital cameras is whether the iPod Camera Connector supports RAW images. The answer is “not exactly.” Although the device will download RAW images to the iPod, those images can’t be displayed on the iPod. In the thumbnail display you’ll see RAW images represented by the word RAW surrounded by a gray circle. When you select one of these images and press the Select button, you see this message: “This photo format cannot be viewed on iPod. Transfer imported photos to your computer and synchronize through iTunes to display them on iPod.” For professional photographers, this limitation may queer the deal.”

Website: Playlist - iPod Camera Connector Review

Epson have released a new firmware update for thier P-2000 Multimedia Storage Viewer, which I enthusiastically reviewed earlier this week.

The firmware provides the following enhancements:

1) Supports JPEG images from digital SLR cameras with an image-capture sensor of up to 17.8 megapixels.
2) Added Histogram information that shows the photo’s distribution of highlights, shadows, and mid-tones.
3) Additional RAW file support. The P-2000 now supports images in RAW format with the following digital SLR cameras..
EPSON R-D1, Nikon D100, D1H, D2H, D70, D1X, D2X, Canon EOS D30, EOS D60, EOS 10D, Kiss Digital, EOS 1D Mark II, EOS-1Ds Mark II, EOS Digital Rebel, EOS 20D, Konica Minolta Maxxum-7D, Pentax *istD and*istDS

Website: Epson America

DPReview have just posted their review of the 6 megapixel Pentax *ist DS DSLR.

“The *ist DS is one of those cameras which grows on you, it’s certainly compact and well put together but when you first pick it up you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s a bit basic. In actual fact it packs more features and controls than most other budget SLR’s and has some impressive performance to back that up. In use we found the *ist DS a very nice ‘photographic tool’, it always does the job, auto focus is reliable, that big viewfinder is a welcome change from some of the ‘tunnel like’ viewfinders found on other digital SLR’s. Put it this way you’re never left thinking you bought the second-best Pentax digital SLR.”

Website: DPReview - Pentax *ist DS Review

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Digital Outback Photo have reviewed BreezeBrowser Pro, a software application that allows you to present and organise digital images, convert raw images, generate web pages, produce proofs and contact sheets.

“With Breezebrowser Pro, you can quickly view the thumbnails of all the files on a particular DVD. What is so outstanding is how fast Breezebrowser Pro will load the individual thumbnails. When you compare it to the older Breezebrowser software you will really see an impressive difference in that Pro will load the files about 10x faster. I often will have many files saved in the Photoshop “psd” format since the particular file has layering involved. Many browser software tools have problems with these type of files especially if they are 16 bit. I have noted that Breezebrowser Pro loaded a 16 bit “psd” file just a tad slower than a 16 bit tif, but the difference is minimal. So after I have burned a backup of a folder of files, I will quickly review them in Breezebrowser Pro.”

Website: Digital Outback Photo - BreezeBrowser Pro Review

DIWA member and German website digitalkamera.de have published their review of the new 8 megapixel Canon EOS 350D / Digital Rebel XT DSLR.

Website: digitalkamera.de - Canon EOS 350D Review

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DCResource have published a joint review of the 4 megapixel Nikon Coolpix 4600 and the 5 megapixel Nikon Coolpix 5600.

“Overall the image quality on both cameras was very good. The images from the Coolpix 4600 seemed slightly sharper, though that’s probably just an effect of the lower resolution. On the whole I would’ve liked the images to be a little sharper, but that’s just my opinion. Color accuracy and noise levels both look good, and purple fringing was not a major problem.”

Website: DCResource - Nikon Coolpix 4600 / 5600 Review

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