Professional photographer Alain Briot has started a diary report about the Canon EOS 300D digital SLR, over at Digital Outback Review. There’s not too much content there at the moment, but it will be very interesting to see what a pro photographer makes of a consumer DSLR.

“Second, I want to show how the 300D compares to medium and large format film cameras in terms of image quality and ease of use. In this analysis I will also discuss Raw converters such as Photoshop Raw and Capture One. I will also discuss the digital techniques I used to achieve the best possible results from my 300D photographs. Examples will be provided as illustrations.”

Website: Digital Outback Photo - Alain’s Canon 300D Journey

With PMA 2004 looming on the horizon (only 3 weeks to go!), professional photographer and long-time Nikon user Thom Hogan has made a bunch of predictions for what will and won’t be revealed at the biggest photography trade show of the year (found via Digicamera.net):

“Every year I try to guess what’s in store for us Nikon-mount users at PMA based upon my reading of the patents, back channel rumors, etc. Since the pre-PMA DIMA starts in two weeks and that’s usually the point where initial press releases start flying, I need to get this out before the announcements, just in case I’m right ;~). Just so everyone knows, I’ve been mostly wrong in the past. But it’s a fun game that everyone can play, and I don’t mind wiping up the humble pie that hits the floor…”

Website: Thom Hogan’s PMA Predictions

There’s a fairly interesting article on the BBC website about how digital cameras help you improve as a photographer. It repeats a lot of the usual arguments in favour of digital, but does so in a well-written and succint way. One thing that the article raises that I’d never really thought about is the concept of composing from a distance:

“All but the cheapest digital cameras allow you to compose the shot by looking at an LCD screen, rather than through a conventional viewfinder. This gives a completely flat image - just as the finished picture does, and should aid composition.

“Digital makes you stand back and study the thing in 2-D rather than the 3-D you get through a normal cameras,” says John Henshall, one of the first professionals to embrace digital.”

Obviously this doesn’t apply to all the DSLR owners out there, due to the lack of any LCD screen for composition purposes, so we will have to carry on looking in good old-fasioned 3D :-)

Website: Why digital cameras = better photographers

Casio have released a new firmware version for the EX-Z4 digital camera. Version 1.02 improves white balance performance and fixes a problem that occurs in the Voice Recoding Mode when memory becomes full.

Website: Casio EX-Z4 Firmware Update

The Norwegian website Akamera.no have posted their review of the 8-megapixel Sony Cybershot DSC-F828 digital compact camera.

Website: Akamera.no - Sony DSC-F828 Review

The German website PhotoWorld.de have posted their review of the Rollei dt4000 digital compact camera. The Rollei dt4000 is a powerful, compact 4-megapixels model with a stylish metal body. The new Rollei has a 3x optical and 4x digital zoom, and also offers photographers the option to record movie clips and voice commentaries.

Website: PhotoWorld.de - Rollei dt4000 Review

Olympus Europe Press Release 08/01/04

A truly small and beautiful 35mm compact zoom
The weatherproof Olympus ?[mju:]-III 80

Hamburg, 8 January 2004 ? Constant evolution. That is the key to the phenomenal success of the Olympus ?[mju:] ? the world?s bestselling camera series. The latest addition to the range, the ?[mju:]-III 80, adds its own special stamp to the series? winning formula of high quality photo technology, a compact form and style. Its redesigned flash combines the advantages of a reduced size with excellent flash coverage. This camera can be brought along to any party, family gathering or holiday. Even when surprised by a spring shower or caught by a splash of water at the seaside, you can carry on shooting ? the weatherproof body will keep out the moisture. As with all ?[mju:] models, this one ensures great results with the minimum of fuss. It has a 3-Way Light Metering AE System for optimum exposure. The Multi-Wide Autofocus System plus a Camera Shake Indicator also help deliver perfect pictures. For the perfect gift, the ?[mju:]-III 80 is available in a kit* with everything needed to start shooting straight away.

This news has been around for a couple of days but I completely missed it :-) There’s a brand new, top-of-the-range A4 Canon printer on the way. It hasn’t been officially announced by Canon yet, but the Canon Bubble Jet i990 printer has its very own webpage on the Canon Europe website. It features the new 7-ink ChromaPLUS photo system, which Canon claims will “Bring enhanced depth and warmth to all your photo prints with Canon’s exclusive 7-ink ChromaPLUS photo system. An additional red ink greatly expands the colour spectrum, giving images more intensity. This enables the printer to achieve a colour range comparable to positive film.” The i990 also has a new high-density print head with a mere 5,376 nozzles.

Website: Canon i990 Details

This is a reminder that the January competition is now running - there are currently over 30 entries so far. The theme for the January 2004 Competition is simply “Reflections” - submit one photograph that you think best interprets the theme.

This is a monthly photography competition with a specific theme and prizes for the top 3 photos. The winning entries will be decided by a panel of judges. You just have to submit one photograph to the Competition Gallery that best interprets January’s theme, which is “Reflections”.

Please make sure that you read the Monthly Competition Rules before submitting your entry. The competition is worldwide and open to everyone.

You can now start submitting entries to the January Compeitition here:
January 2004 Competition

The winner of the 9th PhotographyBLOG Photo of the Week contest is medvidek with the entry “fire 1”. There are no prizes as such for this contest, but the winning photo is displayed on the PhotographyBLOG homepage for a week, and the winner can display the Photo of the Week logo on their website if they wish.

The 10th Photo of the Week contest is now open. This is a weekly photography challenge where you decide who the winner is by voting for your favourite photos. It’s an open contest with no set theme and you can enter as many photos as you like.

Professional photographer Clint Thayer has just reviewed the AF-S Zoom-Nikkor ED 12-24mm f/4G IF DX lens, which promises to give Nikon DSLR owners a true wide-angle lens, albeit at a cost of $1,000 or so.

“Performance on a wide angle zoom usually boils down to three things: sharpness, light falloff, and distortion. So without making you wait for it, I’ll just say this is one heck of a sharp lens with modest falloff and distortion.”

Website: Thom Hogan - Nikkor 12-24mm f4 AF-S DX Lens Review

The Hungarian website Index Digicam have published their review of the new X’s Drive Pro portable storage device (so new that I don’t have a picture of it yet…).

Website: Index Digicam - X’s Drive Pro Review

DPReview have reviewed the Fuji FinePix S7000, which is the successor to the popular FinePix S602 model. The S7000 uses Fuji’s 4th Generation Super CCD HR with 6.3 Million Effective Pixels output and 12.3 million recorded pixels. It costs around $799.99 and is available now.

“The S7000 is in a fairly unique position, it is the only prosumer digital camera with a six megapixel sensor. Indeed, until the announcement of Sony’s eight megapixel DSC-F828 it was the highest resolution prosumer digital camera. Test results versus the Sony were mixed, our studio comparison shots showed better performance from the F828, however the S7000’s 12 MP mode matched the F828 on the resolution chart.”

Website: DPReview - Fuji FinePix S7000 Review

Website: Read my review of the Fuji FinePix S7000

Mike Johnston’s weekly column looks at the rather specialized topic of how photos are laid out in magazines, with part of them often being lost in the page gutter.

“Or take color film. You give a man color film, and sooner or later you will catch him out in the garden taking pictures of flowers. This seems inevitable. He just can’t resist. He’s got this colorful film, y’see, and he spies this colorful flower, and…well, not being a chimp, he does realize that there are enough flower pictures in the world already, and that the one he’s about to take isn’t going to be of any use to anybody. But he can’t help himself. It’s too great a temptation to resist. He succumbs to the weakness. (I’m partially kidding here. Flower photographers, forgive me.)”

Website: Sunday Morning Photographer: Lost in the Gutter

This must be the first time that I’ve ever linked to the website Space.com :-) They have a very interesting article that should prove once and for all that megapixels are not the be all and end all of image quality. Apparently NASA’s Spirit Rover is using a digital camera with a CCD that has a mere 1 megapixel resolution. There’s a technical explanation of how it all works if you’re interested…

“The technology used to make Spirit’s Panoramic Camera, or Pancam, is essentially the same as what goes into a Casio or Pentax digital camera.

But the Pancam’s lenses—there are two, which provides stereo imaging capability—are crafted more finely than anything you’d probably want to plunk down a Visa for. And the light-capturing chunk of silicon, called a charged coupled device, or CCD, was manufactured with no tolerance for the minor flaws that are inherent in mass-produced consumer cameras.”

Website: Space.com - Digital Secrets: How Spirit Makes Great Photos

Michael Reichmann’s latest article over at the Luminous Landscape website revisits his controversial review of the Sony DSC-F828 digital camera:

“This is where the cognitive dissonance comes in. Digicams are for snapshots, beginners and hobbyists. DSLRs are for serious photographers. Well, maybe that’s been the case till now, but the game is changing. It could be that there are other models currently available (early 2004) that might fall into the same camp as the Sony F828. I don’t know, as I haven’t tested them all. But that’s not the point. The real issue is that we are about to enter a new era where the line between interchangeable lens DSLRs and fixed lens digicams starts to blur, and where measurable parameters like pixel count and sensor size are becoming increasingly of lesser importance than how suitable the device is for its intended task. And the things that determine suitability can’t always be quantified.”

Website: Luminous Landscape - Why The Sony F828 Produces Consumer Angst

The Slovenian website e-Fotografija have posted a review of the Nikkor AF-S VR 70 - 200mm f/2,8G IF-ED lens, with lots of pictures of the lens and samples showing how it performs at slow shutter speeds.

Website: e-Fotografija - Nikkor AF-S VR 70 - 200mm f/2,8G IF-ED Review

Website: Slovenian Translator

Aiwa, best known for its home stereo systems, has announced its very first digital camera. The 2.1 megapixel AZ-C7 is going after the fashionable, quirky part of the market, with a round camera body and proprietary 32MB Pavit USB flash drive as storage. It has a 42mm fixed lens and a 1.5” LCD screen. The AZ-C7 ships in May 2004 - no news yet about the price (found via Gizmodo).

Website: PCWorld - Aiwa AZ-C7

The UK-based digital photography website DP-Now have completed their interactive review of the 5-megapixel Olympus E-1 digital SLR camera.

“Regulars to dp-now may recall this article started off as an interactive preview of the Olympus E-1 based on hands-on time with late pre-production cameras provided by Olympus Europe. Since then I have been provided with a production sample and I have now updated this article to full review status.

This is a slightly unusual article in that the subject of the review is not just a new camera but a new system and system philosphy, so there are several pages that cover more general aspects of the E-system.”

Website: DP-Now - Olympus E-1 Review

ByteSector.com has posted new reviews of the Olympus C-740 Ultra-Zoom digital camera, which offers an optical 10x zoom lens.

“The 10X optical zoom works great when combined with the 3.2 Megapixels. Although 3.2 is not the best quality available on the market, it is decent and provides good pictures. Pictures printed at 12? x 18? or close to that range won?t be the best in sharpness and quality at when taken with a 3.2 megapixel camera though. Pictures taken with the c-740 come out great with and without the 10X zoom.”

Website: ByteSector.com - Olympus C-740 Ultra Zoom Review