DCResource have just posted their review of the 4 megapixel, 8.3 optical zoom Nikon Coolpix 4800.

“The 4800 isn’t going to win any awards for its focus speeds. Quite often it took 0.8 - 1.2 seconds for the camera to lock focus after pressing the shutter release halfway. The camera focuses better than average in low light but not as good as I was expecting from a camera that has an AF-assist lamp.

The CP4800 seems to have a problem with shutter lag, as well. It was noticeable at all times, even at faster shutter speed. This isn’t a great camera for action or pictures of the kids!”

Website: DCResource - Nikon Coolpix 4800 Review

There have already been numerous articles about cleaning the sensor inside a digial SLR. Now Thom Hogan has chipped in with his own personal guide for cleaning Nikon cameras with two relatively new commercial products:

“While Nikon Capture now has the ability to use a “dust reference” shot to remove dust from NEFs, this doesn’t help you much with JPEG images. The Capture Dust Off correction is done similar to cloning (i.e. copying neighboring data) but automatically. One problem is that this can sometimes obscure fine detail (cloud threads). Nor does the Capture dust reference photo idea work well in the kinds of environments I shoot in, where the dust accumulation on my CCD changes daily (I’d have to take several reference photos a day and then carefully track them, adding yet more complexity to my already complex workflow). Finally, Nikon Capture has an upper limit to the number of dust bunnies it can “erase,” and I’ve encountered plenty of situations where I could exceed those limits.”

Website: Thom Hogan - Cleaning your Sensor

Dell Press Release

The Dell Photo Printer 540 is a small, easy to use portable printer that delivers photo-lab quality 4x6 inch photos, and works with digital cameras, a variety of memory cards or with a PC. It’s ideal for the home, office or business user who wants “ready-to-frame” high quality photographs from a fast, compact printer.

The Dell Photo All-In-One Printer 942 delivers outstanding, borderless photo printing in sizes up to 8.5 x 11 inches and includes the convenience of regular print, copy, fax1 and scan capabilities packaged in a sleek, space-saving design.

Both of these new Dell printers deliver affordable color photo printing solutions with professional results. The 540 uses thermal dye transfer technology to produce beautiful photographs in less than 60 seconds. Each print has a glossy finish Clear Life CoatingTM that makes it durable, waterproof, smudge proof and long lasting.2 The 540 printer uses Dell Supplies Management SystemTM software to help make sure you never run out of Photo Print packs.3 The 942 system produces high quality printing at up to 19 pages per minute (ppm) in black and 14 ppm in color (actual print speed will vary with use), and offers low cost options for standard or high capacity cartridges. The 942 uses the Dell Ink Management SystemTM software to monitor print cartridges.

DigitalCameraInfo.com have reviewed the Fujifilm FinePix A330 Zoom, a digital camera that offers 3 million effective pixel resolution, 3x optical zoom and a sturdy but stylish body.

“The FinePix A330 is made with a fixed ISO speed of 100. This is puzzling as most automatic point-and-shoot cameras contain an ISO range regardless of user control options. The single setting substantially restricts shooting flexibility as the A330 user will either have to shoot exclusively under profuse lighting or will have to be married to the flash. The included stock flash will provide enough illumination to expose most subjects at short distances; however, all of the images will contain the harsh, strait-on glare of direct lighting, without opportunity for alteration.”

Website: DigitalCameraInfo.com - Fujifilm FinePix A330 Zoom Review

The Slovenian website Slo-Foto have published a review of the 4 megapixel Sony Cyber-shot DSC-L1 digital camera.

Website: Slo-Foto - Sony Cyber-shot DSC-L1 Review

Bags of Love, part of Contrado, is a photofinishing service that allows you to personalise all kinds of different products with your own photographs. At the time of writing this short review, Bags of Love can print your photos onto a large range of items. If you’ve ever used my favourite online print service Photobox, then you will be interested to know that their bags and canvas prints are actually supplied by Bags of Love. The service that Bags of Love provides is aimed at general consumers (both digital and film users) who are looking for more interesting ways to use their own photos.

Website: Bags of Love Review

The 38th PhotographyBLOG Portfolio has been submitted by Pranay Harsh.

“These pictures were taken during a trip to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens in September, 2004. Most of the subjects are orchids found throughout the gardens. All the pictures were taken with a Canon PowerShot A80.”

Website: Portfolios: Pranay Harsh

Steves Digicams have reviewed the 5 megapixel Canon PowerShot SD20 Digital ELPH.

“Even though it’s tiny, we were pleased with the SD20’s ergonomics. Controls are well placed and your thumb falls naturally over the 4-way controller, Menu and Set buttons. Its Print/Share button allows for fast and easy printing to a PictBridge comparable printer or transferring images and movies to your PC. The menu system is easy to use, and as with almost all of Canon’s cameras, we love the Function menu. It allows you to quickly change setting for image size/quality, white balance, ISO, etc. Its 1.5-inch LCD is the only viefinder on the camera. Thankfully it’s a high-quality display that works great outdoors in bight sunlight, and when shooting in low ambient lighting it “gains ups” well. “

Website: Steves Digicams - Canon PowerShot SD20 Digital ELPH Review

The Hungarian website Index Digicam have published their review of the 7 megapixel Canon PowerShot S70.

Website: Index Digicam - Canon PowerShot S70 Review

Fujifilm UK Press Release 14/10/04

Fujifilm today announced that its UK photographic business divisions will be restructured to meet the needs of the changing market, effective 1 November 2004.

With the retirement on 31 October of two of the Company’s long-serving Directors, Graham Rutherford and Tony Lawrence, who currently head up Fujifilm’s Professional and Photofinishing businesses respectively, Fujifilm’s UK photographic departments will be reorganised, with both the Professional and Consumer divisions, and the Photofinishing and Equipment divisions, consolidating to form new Strategic Business Units (SBUs).

All professional, digital, and conventional film and camera products will be managed from Fujifilm’s London office, while paper, minilabs, technical and service will be handled from its Bedford premises.

Consumer Products Director, Adrian Clarke, has been promoted to head up both the London and Bedford operations as Director, Photo Imaging Group, while David Honey takes up the new position of Group SBU Manager in charge of the consolidated Photofinishing Products SBU.

Akam.no have just reviewed the six colour, 4800 x 1200 dpi Canon PIXMA iP6000D printer, which uses FINE (Full-photolithography Inkjet Nozzle Engineering) technology with 2-picolitre Micro-Nozzles and has card slots for all popular brands of memory card.

Website: Akam.no - Canon PIXMA iP6000D Review

Corel/Jasc Press Release 14/10/04

Corel Corporation Acquires Jasc to Extend Graphics Software Portfolio

OTTAWA—(BUSINESS WIRE)—Oct. 14, 2004—Recognized, Trusted Provider Of Graphics, Office and Personal Productivity Software Acquires Leading Imaging Software Vendor  

Corel Corporation today acquired Jasc Software, Inc., the award-winning developer of the Paint Shop(TM) family of digital-photography and image- editing software. A critical milestone in Corel’s ongoing growth strategy, this acquisition follows four consecutive quarters of profitability and a successfully completed turnaround since Corel was taken private in August 2003. The acquisition further extends Corel’s position as a powerful force in the packaged software industry, providing exceptional office and personal productivity and graphics products. Corel will now serve a combined base of more than 60 million customers worldwide with an extended software portfolio that combines innovative photo-editing and graphics-creation, vector-illustration and technical-graphics applications along with Corel’s popular WordPerfect line of products. The acquisition is expected to officially close by the end of October 2004.

Corel corporate headquarters will remain in Ottawa, Canada. Corel will maintain the former Jasc facility in Minneapolis for the Paint Shop family operations. Amish Mehta will continue to serve as the Chief Executive Officer of Corel Corporation. Several members of the Jasc senior management team will join Corel.

Corel will sell Paint Shop(TM) Pro(R), Paint Shop(TM) Pro(R) Studio, and Paint Shop(TM) Photo Album(TM) as stand-alone products, and will continue to provide worldwide service and support to customers under the Corel brand. In addition, Corel will actively support new R&D initiatives for the Paint Shop family, ensuring that the next generation of Jasc products will continue to flourish.

I have now received the UK press release for the Olympus Easy Imaging System that was announced yesterday.

Olympus UK Press Release 13/10/04

Setting your life to music
The Olympus m:robe - a musical memory maker

Today Olympus announce their intention to redefine the world of personal imaging and musical entertainment with the revolutionary m:robe concept.

The Olympus m:robe MR-500i

Comprising of a 1.22 million pixel digital camera, an image viewer and a music player all in one the m:robe MR-500i combines the energy of music with the power of pictures to bring your photographs to life. With the m:robe it’s easy to weave together images and sounds to make the difference between a picture and a memory - amazing adventures and experiences can be recorded in photo albums and combined with the tracks that evoke the mood of the moment - letting you view the special moments of your life while you listen to your own personal soundtrack.

The m:robe looks great too.  An eye-catching clean and minimalist design together with a distinctive touch pad control ensure it will be the next ‘must have’ buy for the style conscious consumer. The m:robe MR-500i is planned for release in early 2005

I have now received the UK press release for the Olympus Easy Imaging System that was announced yesterday.

Olympus UK Press Release 13/10/04

Bringing the photo album to life

The Olympus Easy Imaging System - store and print digital images on the go

13 October 2004. Printing and archiving digital photos whilst on the go just got easier.  There?s no need to lug a laptop around any more or wait until you get home to print or share pictures.  Thanks to the Olympus Easy Imaging System it is easy to take, share and store great digital pictures anywhere.

The Olympus Easy Imaging System incorporates a digital camera, home printer, hard disk drive and in the future a DVD burner.  It is astonishingly simple.  Dock the components together and a comprehensive, but ultra-compact digital photography lab is ready to go. It?s easy to use too - both the camera and printer are PictBridge compatible, so prints can be instantly developed out without the need for a PC.

With compact dimensions, the Easy Imaging System can be used and transported virtually anywhere making it is the ideal home or travel accessory. A contemporary, aesthetic design means it would not look out of place in even the most stylish living rooms.

Steves Digicams have enthusiastically reviewed the 8 megapixel Canon EOS 20D DSLR.

“Canon’s engineers had a tall order when designing the replacement for the venerable 10D - improve on a camera about which we said in our April 2003 review, “If you’ve been waiting for a reasonably priced, high performance dSLR camera your wait is over, the Canon EOS 10D is here!” A year and a half later, those engineers can be satisfied with a job well-done, having developed the 20D with improvements on nearly every facet of its predecessor while retaining the same $1499 street price the 10D carried at the time of its introduction.”

Website: Steves Digicams - Canon EOS 20D Review

PC Magazine have just reviewed the new Epson Stylus Photo R320 photo printer.

“The Epson Stylus Photo R320 ($200 street) fills a gap in the Epson line between the R200 and the R800. Like both of those models, the R320 is a photo printer that can print on printable CDs and DVDs. Its performance is on a par with the R200’s for both business applications and photos, but on output quality it comes close to matching the R800, even beating it for text quality.”

Website: PC Magazine - Epson Stylus Photo R320 Review

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Bibble Labs have just released Bibble 4.0, professional image-manipulation software that provides the fastest, highest quality Raw workflow possible. Well, according to the makers anyway. There are 2 versions available, Pro ($129) and Lite($69), and support for Windows, OS X, and Linux. There’s also a trial version available if you want to “try before you buy”.

Website: Bibble Labs

eFotoGrafija attended the Sandisk press conference at Photokina, where perhaps surprisingly they “the most interesting data” out of all the conferences that they attended.

“Perhaps a different approach for those that don’t like figures… the “second” digital revolution will develop in three to four years compared to eight years it took digicams to become mainstream. All along you have to keep in mind the second revolution is going to be many times bigger than the first!

As I mentioned earlier, those that refuse to reconsider their priorities and accept the new trends will soon be forgotten. Many, photo labs included, should start making some changes in their business or at least start thinking about it seriously. Don’t get left out the second time around!”

Website: eFotoGrafija - Sandisk Press Conference

DPNow have an exclusive first look at the Lexmark P6520 All-in-One printer/scanner/copier, which is aimed at digital photographers rather than business users.

“Once again the good news is that, so far, the photo print quality from our sample P6250 has impressed us. We took an image from an Olympus C-60Z and printed it directly from a memory card onto an A4 sheet of Lexmark’s own premium quality glossy photo paper, using borderless printing mode.

The print had to be cropped a fair bit, but you can choose the area to be printed, both zooming and panning, using the printer’s preview screen. Printing time was just over seven minutes from the moment the paper was moved into position by the printer. That’s not fast - the fastest Canons can cover the same page in under two minutes and between four and six minutes is the norm for other printers, but the P6250’s performance is a huge leap forward compared to other Lexmarks I’ve tested. Lexmark claims a 6x4 photo can be printed in under 40 seconds.”

Website: DPNow - Lexmark P6520 Preview

The Norwegian website DigIT.no have published a review of the new Canon BubbleJet i9950 printer.

Website: DigIT.no - Canon BubbleJet i9950 Review