Meike have unveiled the manual-focus MK-85mm f/2.8 Macro lens for Canon, Fujifilm, Micro Four Thirds, Nikon and Sony cameras. Weighing in at 500 grams, the Meike MK-85mm f/2.8 Macro lens offers a maximum reproduction ratio of 1:1.5 and a minimum focus distance of 25cm, and also doubles as a medium telephoto prime. The optical formula comprises 11 elements in 8 groups, with nano-technology multi-layer coating. The suggested retail price is $299.99.

The FEP European Professional Photographer of the Year Awards 2018 competition is now open for entries. Open to all professional photographers who are registered and resident in a European country, the FEP European Professional Photographer of the Year Awards offer nine main categories including Commercial, Fashion, Illustration/DigitalArt, Landscape, Portrait, Reportage/Photojournalism, Sports, Wildlife and Wedding. A special section is also open for European young photographers, assistants and photographic students up to 30 years of age. The submission deadline is 7th January 2018.

Hasselblad have just unveiled the new X1D Field Kit, which offers excellent value with an all-encompassing package tailored for photographers who are seeking both robust protection and easily transportable equipment. The package includes the Hasselblad X1D-50c camera body, 3 XCD lenses (30mm, 45mm, and 90mm), 2 camera batteries, a cleaning cloth, a LensPen, a dust blower, a shoulder strap, a wrist strap, a USB cable and a Pelican carrying case. The X1D Field Kit retails at £13, 250 / €14,900 / $17,495 excluding VAT and is now available to pre-order. Shipping is expected to commence on 20th September.

Huawei has joined forces with youth culture magazine, Dazed, to create a photography initiative that is designed to unlock the potential of future talent. ‘Reveal the Real You’; is a community-led photo project that will see three collaborators awarded a £10,000 bursary to donate to the community cause of their choice. Andrew Garrihy; Huawei Europe, CMO said: “The photography capabilities on our phones allow anyone to take thought provoking images. Putting that power in people’s hands, has given everyone a platform to tell their story and help others understand more about their passions and beliefs through images. Reveal the Real You is simply an extension of what people do every day. We want to give inspired, committed people the opportunity to make a difference in their local community; give them a platform to get their voice heard and make things they never thought possible happen.” People interested in entering simply need to share a few sentences on their chosen community and 3 – 5 relevant images from their photography portfolio and as Reveal the Real You gathers momentum it will culminate in a shortlist of twenty photographers being given Huawei P10 smartphones to document their stories. For more information, visit the website below.

The broncolor Litepipe P is an innovative and highly variable light shaper. The five components can be assembled in less than a minute, without the use of any tools. The centrepiece of the construction is the tube-shaped diffuser, which delivers a homogeneous light and can be rolled up for transport. The two counter-reflectors included (textile covers with alu reflex coating; 1 narrow, 1 wider) can be used flexibly – the visible light-section can be changed steplessly, whilst the Litepipe P can also act as a natural ambient light when the counter-reflectors are not used.

The first UK walk-in service centre for Sony professional camera users is now officially open at Fixation HQ (250 Kennington Lane, London SE11 5RD). Plans for the pioneering Sony PRO Support Service centre were announced in June at a special joint presentation by Yosuke Aoki, Sony Europe Digital Imaging Vice President and David Garratt, CEO at Wex Group (Fixation’s parent company) - with a planned a target opening date of September 1st. “We are delighted to announce we have met that deadline pledge. This is a truly groundbreaking partnership with Sony - and a very important development for Fixation,” David Garratt said. “Now the growing numbers of Sony professional camera shooters can simply drop their kit off at Fixation for service and support rather than having to despatch it to the Sony plant in Wales.”

Matthias Harsch has been appointed Chief Executive Officer of Leica Camera. A Leica Board Member, Harsch has been responsible for Sales, Retail and Marketing & Corporate Communications since April 2017. Prior to being named CEO of Leica Camera, Harsch led a successful turnaround as the CEO of LOEWE AG, spent a number of years at the helm of the Bizerba Group as a director and served as a partner at Candidus Management Consulting.

The 2017 World Press Photo Exhibition returns to Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall for the 21st year from 3–20 November 2017. The free exhibition brings together 152 winning photographs from the annual World Press Photo Awards, showcasing some of the most powerful, emotional and often disturbing press images of the year. This year’s winners were drawn from a bank of 80,408 images taken by 5,034 photographers from 125 countries. The subjects of the images on display are widely varied including documentation from rallies protesting police brutality, reports from war-torn terrains and striking images selected from nature and sports editorial.

Western Digital have launched My Cloud Home, billed as "a new personal cloud storage solution that empowers consumers to take control of their often-scattered digital content." With the My Cloud Home solution, consumers can easily aggregate all of their photos, videos and files from their smart phones, computers, USB storage, cloud and social media accounts in one central place. Additionally, , there is a dual-drive personal cloud option. The My Cloud Home Duo solution provides all the functionality of My Cloud Home, plus a dual-drive configuration set to Mirror Mode (RAID 1) to automatically duplicate content onto a second drive for extra peace of mind. The My Cloud Home solution has a Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price (MSRP) in the U.K. of £159.99 2TB, £199.99 4TB, £249.99 6TB and £319.99 8TB. My Cloud Home Duo has a MSRP in the U.K. of £319.99 4TB, £389.99 8TB, £539.99 12TB, and £659.99 16TB. Attendees of the annual IFA 2017 Consumer Electronics Unlimited show in Berlin, September 1-6, can visit the WD booth #112 in Hall 17 of the Berlin ExpoCenter for a demo.

DJI have intorduced a new Obsidian version of their Phantom 4 Pro drone. For professionals who demand excellence while capturing images and video for a commercial client or documenting a wedding, the Phantom 4 Pro Obsidian has a large 1” CMOS sensor and a 4K 60fps recording capability. In addition, the Phantom 4 Pro Obsidian offers H.265 video compression, which substantially improves video quality at a maximum bit-rate of 100mbps. The DJI Phantom 4 Pro Obsidian will retail for 1,589 GBP (1,699 EUR) and will be available later this month.

DJI have unveiled their new Mavic Pro Platinum drone. Taking all of the advanced features of the Mavic Pro, the DJI Mavic Pro Platinum offers a significantly reduced flying noise (4 decibels within one metre) and an 11% improvement in battery life for a flight time of 30 minutes per charge. The increased flight time and quieter operation has been achieved by integrating new electronic speed controllers and freshly designed propellers which are also compatible with the current Mavic Pro. Furthermore, pilots of the DJI Mavic Pro Platinum benefit from a portable, powerful and easy-to-use camera drone that features a 4K stabilised camera, 4.3 mile (7km) range, innovative FlightAutonomy technology to sense obstacles up to 49ft (15m) away and a range of intelligent flight modes. With a retail price of 1,119 GBP (1,299 EUR), the Mavic Pro Platinum is now available for pre-order and will begin shipping later this month.

Ricoh today launched the new Ricoh Theta V spherical camera, which supports features that include 360° 4K video capture, immersive spatial audio recording, and high-speed image transfer. Successor to the Theta S, the Ricoh Theta V uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and runs on an open-source Android operating system. The camera can shoot 4K 360° video smoothly at 30 frames per second at a resolution of 3840x1920 pixels, records high-quality sound compatible with 360° spatial audio, and offers both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Low Energy connectivity. Available from the end of September, the Ricoh Theta V carries a recommended retail price of £399.99.

JK Imaging, the worldwide licensee for Kodak Pixpro Digital Cameras and Devices, today announced the worldwide availability of its new VR camera, the 4KVR360, which is also known as the ORBIT360 in the US. The 4KVR360 adopts a minimalist approach to an all-in-one 360° VR camera, with two 4K fixed focus lenses housed on either side of the futuristic camera body. The lenses are designed to work in tandem, to capture full 360° 4K Video and easily upload 360° content to Facebook and YouTube via the camera’s Smart Device App. “The decision to continue expanding our award winning 360° VR camera line up with the new Kodak Pixpro 4KVR360 was a natural progression,” said Mariame Cisse, Marketing Director for JK Imaging Ltd., Europe. “We are committed to the interactive 360° video format and want to give yet another option to consumers when it comes to choosing a quality 360° VR camera based on their specific needs.” The 4KVR360 will feature a 20-megapixel CMOS sensor and use a Micro SD card (up to 128GB) to record 360° content. The 4KVR360 camera will incorporate Wi-Fi, NFC and Bluetooth connectivity compatibility for Smart device APPs to control and view the camera remotely. Kodak Pixpro’s 4KVR360 camera is available now in the UK via Currys, priced at £419.99.

Sony today announced a new type of camera called the RX0. The ultra-compact, water-, crush- and shockproof Sony RX0 houses a 1"-type stacked 15.3-megapixel Exmore RS CMOS sensor and features a Zeiss Tessar T* 24mm (eq.) f/4 lens to deliver high-resolution raw and JPEG images and 4K videos. For still photography, you can use shutter speeds of up to 1/32,000th of a second and shoot at up to 16fps. For videographers who want to incorporate super slow-motion footage, the RX0 offers the opportunity to shoot at up to 1000 frames per second. For production flexibility, you can use 4K clean HDMI output to record uncompressed video to an external recorder. Sony’s wireless radio commander, the FA-WRC1M can be used to trigger up to fifteen RX0s. A wireless multi-camera shooting solution capable of connecting further RX0 units when an access point is used is currently being developed and will be released in January 2018 via a firmware update. To maximise the potential of RX0, a host of new accessories to support new ways of shooting have also been launched. These include the VCT-CGR1 Cage for increased system flexibility, the MPK-HSR1 Housing, enabling the RX0 to be taken down to depths of up to 100 metres underwater, the CPT-R1 Cable Protector, VF-SPR1 Spare Lens Protector, VFA-305R1 Filter Adapter Kit which includes a filter adapter, lens hood and MC protector,NP-BJ1 Rechargeable Battery Pack and ACC-TRDCJ Accessory Kit. The RX0 will start to ship in Europe in October 2017, priced at approximately €850.

Western Digital today announced their 400GB SanDisk Ultra microSDXC UHS-I memory card the World’s highest-capacity microSD card for use in mobile devices. “Mobile devices have become the epicentre of our lives, and consumers are now accustomed to using their smartphones for anything from entertainment to business. We are collecting and sharing massive amounts of data on smartphones, drones, tablets, PCs, laptops and more.  We anticipate that storage needs will only continue to grow as people continue to expect more sophisticated features on their devices and desire higher quality content,” says Jeff Janukowicz, research vice president, IDC. “We estimate mobile device users worldwide will install over 150 billion applications alone this year, which require a ton of memory on all of our favourite devices.” Featuringt transfer speeds of up to 100MB/s, the 400GB SanDisk Ultra microSDXC UHS-I card and will be available at a UK MSRP of £224.99.

Today, LG officially announced their new V30 smartphone, which features two rear camera modules. One of them boasts a 16-megapixel sensor coupled to an all-glass f/1.6 lens with a diagonal angle of view of 71° (roughly equivalent to a 30mm lens on a 35mm camera), whilst the other has a 13-megapixel imager mated to an f/1.9 UWA lens with a 120° angle of view. LG’s first F1.6 lens is also the largest aperture among existing smartphone cameras, delivering 25 percent more light to the sensor compared to an F1.8 lens. The glass lens also delivers greater light-collecting ability than a plastic lens as well as better colour reproduction. The main camera is supported by Optical Image Stabilization (OIS), Electronic Image Stabilization (EIS) and Hybrid Auto Focus that combines both Laser Detection Auto Focus and Phase Detection Auto Focus. The LG V30 also offers a 6" OLED displey with an aspect ratio of 2:1 and a resolution of 2880x1440 pixels. Visitors to IFA 2017 are encouraged to stop by LG’s booth in Hall 18 of Messe Berlin to see the LG V30 for themselves.