Samsung is launching a multi-million pound advertising campaign this week including a heavyweight TV campaign. The new campaign – with an investment of £3million - focuses on on Samsung’s new NV24HD camera and launches with a 30 second spot on 9th June, and runs across ITV (London, Midwest, North, South East and Scotland), Channel 4, FIVE, Sky and a host of other stations. “This campaign shows how we give consumers exciting and innovative technology that helps them to capture their world,” says Robert King, Director of Samsung Cameras. “The new Samsung NV24HD offers cutting-edge functions and outstanding picture quality to satisfy users of all abilities.”

Website: Samsung NV TV Ad

Nikon UK has extended its spring cashback offer on the Nikon D60, with up to £90 / €120 off until June 30th 2008. Current cashback offers on the D80 kits and D40 kits still apply and are also valid until 30th June 2008. All claims must arrive by 31st July 2008 to be eligible.

DIWA (Digital Imaging Websites Association) has given a DIWA Innovation Award to the Casio Exilim Pro EX-F1 camera. The EX-F1 is capable of ultra-high speed shooting of 60 frames per second for 6 megapixel still images. Kai Thon, DIWA’s test manager, says: “Casio initiated the digital amateur photo age about a decade ago with its legendary QV-10. Since then, digital cameras have gradually become faster, even amateur models are nowadays capable of shooting several frames per second. With the EX-F1, Casio more than tenfold the top speed of the currently fastest competitor. That’s truly innovative!”

Olympus UK are offering a free FL-50R wireless flash worth £450 with any purchase of an E-3 DSLR camera. All you need to do is buy an E-3 between 1 June and 31 August 2008 and register it online by 11 October 2008. The Olympus E-3 is now available from around £1100 body only.

Reader’s Digest readers have voted Canon the most trusted camera brand in Europe for 2008. Research was conducted locally in 16 European countries with over 23,000 questionnaires. The UK online survey took place from November to December last year. What do you think - do you agree with the Reader’s Digest readers?

US bag manufacturer Think Tank Photo are offering a free trip to the Photokina photography show in September. If you are a photographer, you are eligible to enter Think Tank Photo’s drawing for free round-trip airfare, hotel, spending money, and exhibition passes to photokina, the world’s leading photo and imaging trade fair. Join over 160,000 visitors from 156 countries in exploring 1,600 exhibitors of cutting edge imaging products from almost 50 countries. And, you get to hang around Cologne with the gang from Think Tank Photo (what could be better!). Go to www.thinktankphoto.com/photokina to enter.

Photo Recovery Software v3.0 from Stellar Phoenix recovers digital photos from all external storage devices. Images lost due to accidental deletion or formatting of the media can be recovered using Photo Recovery Software v3.0, which supports a wide variety of RAW file formats as well as Jpeg, Tiff, BMP, GIF and PNG files. Photo Recovery Software 3 is available now for MAC and Windows and costs $39 / €31 + VAT.

Photoshop CS3 Accelerated can help you navigate Photoshop, whether you’re a beginner or a pro. With easy-to-follow exercises, Photoshop CS3 Accelerated gives you a visual walk-through of meaningful hands-on functions and design projects. Full color, crisp screenshots on every page give readers a clear picture of what’s possible, and the CD included with the book contains all of the source files needed to complete the exercises. Photoshop CS3 Accelerated costs $24.99 USD, £14.99 GBP and is available now.

The Official Photodex Guide to ProShow is a new comprehensive guide to creating slide shows using ProShow software. The book covers the basics of design, the fundamentals of ProShow production techniques, and advanced tools to achieve professional results. Written by James Karney, The Official Photodex Guide to ProShow contains over 300 pages, a bonus CD and a helpful index. The Official Photodex Guide to ProShow costs $34.95 and is available now.

Bogen is running a free, introductory lighting webinar titled “How to Overcome 5 Common Problems When Shooting Outdoors.” This introductory online course on the basics of lighting will be held from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. EDT on June 6, 2008. Participants will have the ability to ask questions and interact one-on-one with each speaker, and can also be selected to win one of three prizes, totaling over $400.

TrustedReviews have reviewed the Olympus FE-340, a new entry-level digital compact camera offering 8 megapixels and a 4x zoom lens (28-112mm).

“The Olympus FE-340 may be very cheap, but it lacks a number of features that would be considered standard on most other cameras, such as continuous shooting, colour adjustment and image stabilisation. The build quality is good, and the LCD monitor is outstanding, but the styling is awkward and ungainly and the handling could be better. Low-light performance is below average, but the camera is redeemed somewhat by good image quality. Still, there are much better and more capable cameras available for not much more money.”

Website: TrustedReviews - Olympus FE-340 Review

The 16 lucky winners of our fantastic May 2008 Newsletter contest have been randomly selected from the PhotographyBLOG Newsletter subscriber list.

Carol Macvicar wins a Big Yophoto Photobook

S A, Robert Neish, Mark Brincat, Philip Jon, Helena Watson, Debbie Carpenter, Gaye McBroom, Maurizio Sindoni, Richard Pullan, Nancy Messier, Girard Ceferino Dulay, Andjelko Vrbanic, Robert Longford, Tomasz Majewski and David Brown each win a copy of Blubox 4

The winners of the May 2008 PhotographyBLOG Competition have been selected. The theme for May was “Birds” - you can view all of the entries in this gallery. Here are the 5 winners:

1st Place
Tail wind by desertpea

Prize: 1 copy of Powerretouche Full Pro Pack
Kindly donated by Powerretouche.
http://powerretouche.com

Today we bring you the World’s first online review of the Samsung NV24HD, a new digital compact camera that certainly has a lot to offer. Samsung’s first High Definition (HD) camera can record 720p resolution video at 30fps and can connect to a HDTV via HDMI. The 10 megapixel NV24HD has an ultra-wide, 24-86.5mm lens and an innovative 2.5” OLED screen. Priced at £249 / $350, can the Samsung NV24HD replace your current digital still and video cameras? Gavin Stoker took a closer look…

Website: Samsung NV24HD Review

The new Epson Stylus Pro 9900 and Stylus Pro 7900 large-format printers feature a brand new 10 colour, UltraChrome HDR (High Dynamic Range) pigment ink system. The Epson 9900 (44 inch) and Epson 7900 (24 inch) printers incorporate orange and green ink cartrdiges to considerably expand the colour gamut. Matte black is also included on-board and can be auto-switched with photo black. Also on offer is an optional integrated spectrophotometer with mounting device using the latest X-rite technology, putting the Epson 9900 and 7900 in direct competition with HP’s Z-series printers. The Epson Stylus Pro 7900 and Stylus Pro 9900 will be available in Australia from late spring and the UK in November, prices to be announced.

Phocus 1.0 from Hasselblad is a new generation of raw processor and camera control software. The aim of Phocus is to achieve absolute image perfection from the world’s largest raw image files. Phocus 1.0 for Mac is available now for download for registered users. A Phocus version for Windows is expected in Q3 of 2008.

Colour Confidence are offering the complete i1 XT bundle for only £995/€1495, a saving of 45%. With i1 XT, you can do RGB & CMYK printer profiling, monitor, digital projector profiling, scanner and digital camera profiling, edit profiles, make spot colour readings and measure ambient lighting. There’s also up to 30% off the i1 Photo, Photo SG and Proof.

The theme for the 8th Ricoh Photo Contest is “Precious Things, Precious Moment”. Running from May 30th 2008 to August 29th 2008, the Ricoh contest is open to any photos taken with a Ricoh compact digital camera. A total of 50 photos will be chosen as winners from among the photos submitted, including a grand prize winner. In addition, this year a “2009 Ricoh Photo Calendar” will also be created using 13 photographs selected from among the winners.

The new SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick PRO-HG Duo card offers read and write speeds of 30MB per second. Available worldwide in June in 4GB and 8GB capacities, the Sandisk Memory Stick PRO-HG Duo is aimed at professional photographers and advanced amateurs who use Sony DSLR cameras. “The SanDisk Extreme III Memory Stick PRO-HG Duo continues our tradition of delivering best-in-class performance in the SanDisk Extreme product line,” said Susan Park, director of consumer product marketing for SanDisk’s performance cards. “Our customers know SanDisk Extreme cards not only deliver cutting-edge read and write speeds, but are designed for durability – even under harsh conditions.”

Get a free travel book when you buy a Samsung NV camera, plus the chance to win a holiday. That’s what Samsung are offering UK residents (excluding Northern Ireleand) until 30th August 2008. As well as being able to claim 1 of 20 free travel guide books, you can also win one of four holidays to New York, Barcelona, Paris, or Rome. Proof of purchase must be submitted by 30th September 2008.