Rob Beschizza

Behold! RED camera accessories rendered in THE THIRD DIMENSION

It is unfair to accuse RED of pushing vaporware, as its technology is real and it rules. But its relentless teasing of product concepts hit the hype ceiling long ago, and maintaining the interest of those already convinced is the order of the day. Today's news is that some accessories made the omnidirectional leap from working prototype to 3D rendering. Meanwhile, intrigued amateurs drift back to affordable prosumer junk, while the "DSLR cams that also shoot HD" meme is already last year's dog and pony show, precisely 12 months old.

Rob Beschizza

How to shoot macro with a cellphone

This marvelous macro shot was taken, believe it or not, with a cellphone. To do likewise, you'll need the lens from an old DVD player and a piece of card. [Flickr via DIY Photography via MAKE and Gizmodo]

Rob Beschizza

New Xacti's in Japan

Akihabara News has the details.

Steven Leckart

Power On Self Test: Dead Format Device

[via walking on glass via fiction romance]

Rob Beschizza

Sony's WX1 shoots great in low-light

The New York Times' David Pogue reports that Sony's DSC-WX1 is the best bet if you want a point-and-shoot camera that shoots well in darkness.

Sony says that in its new Exmor R sensor, the circuitry layer has been moved to the bottom, so that less light is lost en route through the stack. Does any of this make any difference? It sure does. ... It's truly amazing; there hasn't been an advance in small cameras this important since image stabilization came along.

Of course, you still have to use Memory Sticks. DPReview has more analysis.

Photo: DigitalCamera.jp

Steven Leckart

Kodak Can't Decide What To Call Its Next Camera

When The Boston Globe reviewed Kodak's latest pocket handicam, the pub dissed the product's "dreadful" nomenclature. Surely, writer Hiawatha Bray wondered, Kodak can come up with something better than "Zi8."*

Nope!

Which is why they want YOU to name their next video camera.** From now until this coming Monday August 24, you can submit product names on Kodak's corporate blog OR via Twitter &mdash just @ reply Kodak CMO JeffreyHayzlett and hash tag your suggestion with #NameAKodak.

Winner gets a trip to CES 2010 to see the unveiling of the new camera***. 100 runner-ups get a free Kodak Zi8.

Thus far, I can't say the crowd-branding has delivered too many plausible or palatable names. Many of the straightforward entries sound gimmicky ("MILI. You'll sell a mili-on"), familiar ("Zen"), or too hodgepodge-y ("Camvantix"). My favorite non-serious entry is "The Zod," which was posted by a guy named Fabien. Kudos to you, Fabien.

Here's a few quick suggestions of my own:

*The Kodak ZiRule (cause its predecessor does, in fact, rule)
*The Kodak Zzzz (ironic!)
*The Kodak HDude (Jeff Bridges endorses, in character)
*The Kodak J-Allison (lampoon-y!)
*The Kodak Raul (non-sequitur-ial!)

Got any legit and/or hilarious suggestions?

*For the record, I agree the name isn't terrific, but it's certainly not as bad as TrekStor's iBeat blaxx MP3 player from a couple years back.

**As everyone knows, tapping the wisdom of the crowd is the latest and greatest go-to ad/market/content gimmick... or at least it was back in 2006 when Wired dubbed crowdsourcing the "future of corporate R&D."

***The cam pictured above is the Zi8. Kodak hasn't released any photos or details about the new cam. But, I'm guessing it won't look too dissimilar from the Zi8. I've love to be proven wrong! ;)

Rob Beschizza

Last Polaroid film kits head to Urban Outfitters

20th century institutions die not with a bang, but as fashion accessories for hip kids. [Dazed Digital]

Rob Beschizza

Ricoh CX2

Ricoh's CX2 point-and-shoot improves on its predecessor with 10.7x optical zoom and 5fps burst shooting. [Crunchgear]

Lisa Katayama

Factron Quattro case for iPhone 3GS is fancy and expensive

For the ultimate in iPhone 3GS protection and to take advantage of its camera function, you could get the Factron Quattro for iPhone SP, a case made from leather, carbon fiber, and stainless steel. The case is just under $200, and additional lenses like the fish-eye, wide angle, and macro zoom are about $15-50 each. I think this is only available in Japan though.

Product page (Thanks, Hitoshi!)

Rob Beschizza

Rumored Canon G11, angry at own mediocrity, flips out

Canon's rumored G11 looks an unexciting nudge on from the G10: the alleged specs detail a flip-out display, but no HD video and a middling 1/1.7″ CCD sensor. [Canon Rumors]

UPDATE: Announcement! Check out DPReview's coverage.

Steven Leckart

Review: River Rafting w/the GoPro HERO

I recently strapped the GoPro Wide camera to my head for a rafting trip down the Poudre (pronounced poo-daredur) in Colorado.

My expectations were high for the 5MP sensor, 170-degree lens, and waterproof casing. In short, I was mostly stoked with the results. After the jump, check out my full review...

Music:

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Steven Leckart

Kodak Zi8: "much to love, little to gripe about"

I reviewed the Kodak Zi8 for Wired and found it to be a solid little handicam. From my review:

Inside and out, the Zi8 is brimming with upgrades (1080p) and little touches (a legit microphone jack!) that set a new standard for this class of cheap cams. Significantly sexier, with a slimmer body than previous Kodak cams, the Zi8 comes with a re-tooled USB connector that's easier to use and harder to unleash unintentionally... Even cooler, the connector is an agile rubber cord, which allows you to plug in the camera without removing drives from other ports on your computer...

We shot side-by-side with Kodak's earlier iteration, the Zi6, in a variety of environments (indoors, the beach). In stark sunlight, natural low-light and indoors, the image quality of the Zi8 was consistently superior. Colors are richer and contrast is deep. The lens angle is also a tad wider. The sensor adjusts from dark to light much quicker and image stabilization is noticeably better.

Rob Beschizza

Sony shows off "simulated" Exmor low-light shots

Sony's WX1 and TX1 CyberShots will be unusually expensive for point-and-shoot cameras, thanks to new sensor technology. This pic explains what you'll get for your $400. Spot the small sprint!

Rob Beschizza

Panasonic Micro Four Thirds camera design pops up

Panasonic is rumored, thanks to this shot spotted at China's Xitek photography forum, to be making a micro Four Thirds camera. Point-and-shoot with interchangeable lenses: all the rage! From Gadget Lab:

It will have a 12.1 effective megapixels sensor, a three-inch, 460,000 dot screen, 720p video mode and dust removal. Size is 119mm x 71mm x 36.3mm, almost exactly the same as the Pen (120.6mm x 69.9mm x 36.4 mm). One odd thing to note is that little mini-USB shaped hole on the back, below the hotshoe? Is it for an optical add-on viewfinder? I sure hope not.

Yes, that's a Leica lens.

Panasonic Pen-Style Camera Pictures Leaked [Gadget Lab]

Rob Beschizza

Don't say cheese

Party-shot is a little accessory one mounts a camera on, which spins randomly so and can automatically zoom in to to shots of partygoers. [CrunchGear]

Rob Beschizza

Sony TX1 boasts better low-light shots

CrunchGear's Devin Coldeway explains why Sony's expensive new TX1 point-and-shoot might be better than the rest: new low-light technology.

sensors aren't just magic planes of photosensitive material. They've got circuits on all sides, wires and transistors all over the place, and incredibly, some of it is between the lens and the sensor. ... What Sony's done, apparently, is cleared out the junk between the lens and the sensor. ... Sony says the low-light performance is better, and they've actually done something to make it so, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt until we get some real testing done.

Enough to make you pay double? This baby is nearly $400.

Rob Beschizza

Sony Cybershot WX1

The WX1 uses a 1/2.4" Exmor-R sensor at 10 megapixels and has a 24-120mm f2.4 lens with optical image stabilization. 720p video and 10fps shooting entice, but it will lack exposure controls. Look for it in October for $350. [1001 Noisy Cameras]

Rob Beschizza

Review: Vivitar Vivicam 8025 and T328

Vivitar's ViviCam 8025 and T328 are budget point-and-shoot cameras that offer standard features and come in blister packs. They're not very good, but they are cheap and they are easy to use.

The T328 has 12 megapixel sensor, 3x optical zoom lens, face detection, anti-shake and 32 MB of internal memory. It's an inch thick, but much fatter at the control end. The 8025 has 8.1 megapixels, a slightly smaller display, and is much thinner and lighter.

Both have SD/SDHC card slots, flashes and come with USB cables and wallwart USB power adapters.

Pros:

• Picture quality OK for budget cameras
• Bright displays with simple menus
• Rechargeable lithium battery included

Cons:

• Plastic tat
• No auto-review of shots
• SD card in the 8025 hard to insert and remove

Though Vivitar's budget ViviCams get the job done, and have fast, simple menus, they're not the equal of stuff from Canon, Sony or Nikon, who all have basic models that are only slightly more expensive. No-one who already owns a camera should consider these models. That said, deals at discount stores make the lower-end 8025 a good gift for anyone who need something disposable and straightforward.

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Steven Leckart

Kodak's New HD Video Cam = Goodnight & Good Luck, Flip!

Kodak unveiled the Zi8, its latest pocket video cam (far right). The HD shooter features 1080p, 4x digital zoom, SD slot, and weighs just 3.9 oz.

Oh, and did we mention it costs $180.

As we've said before, Flip-maker Pure Digital is gonna have to work, hard, to compete.

[via Gizmodo]

Steven Leckart

Fujifilm Real3D Cam To Release in September

Gosh, it seems like it was only yesterday that I wondered outloud when we'd have Fujifilm's long-awaited, Real3D camera in our hands. A few weeks ago, we wrote that it'd be out in 2010. Well, we were wrong.

The point and shoot will be available here and in the U.S. come September 2009. While a price for the U.S. hasn't been confirmed, according to the Telegragh, the dual-lenser will likely retail for about £570 in the UK, so you know, do the math... OK, I'll tell you: That's ~$935, which is $300 more than Time's estimate. Ooof!

As we've explained previously, the camera uses two lenses to capture images that are combined to display either on one composite 3-D pic (below) or via a special 8-inch digi picture frame.

More details at Fujifilm, provided you read Japanese.

Or in Americanese at DPReview [link via Gizmodo].

Steven Leckart

Fujifilm's FinePix S200EXR: Like An SLR, Only Not

Fujfilm announced a handful of new shooters, including the S200EXR, a quasi-SLR with a 12 megapixel sensor, 14.3x optical zoom, and the capability of shooting 30fps video, as well as both RAW and JPEG.

The prosumer S200EXR is relatively lightweight (835g) and is said to boast 50% more battery life than comparable models in its arsenal, meaning you supposedly get 370 shots per battery charge.

Whenever I hear stats like that, I tend to picture a cramped room of gnomes, ashy butts dangling from their mouths, miserably pressing camera shutters and counting. And counting...

The S200EXR will be available in August for $600.

Whatever, just give me my 3D camera already. Please and thanks.

Steven Leckart

Moon Landing Pics: "Gee-Whiz" Afterthought

This is, perhaps, the most famous photo from the Apollo Moon landing. It was taken by Neil Armstrong, who shot most of the pics taken on the Lunar surface using a Hasselblad 500EL camera outfitted with a Zeiss Biogon f-5.6/60 mm lens and 70mm Kodak film that was "thin-based and thin emulsion double-perforated."

Called the Data Camera, the 500EL used on the Moon was modded with a special silver finish to boost the hardware's ability to withstand extreme thermal variations (the middle camera pictured here has the silver finish). The Data Camera also featured a glass Reseau plate, which produced a 5x5 grid of little crosses you can still see on the image. NASA used the markings to help account for film distortion and calculate the angular distance(s) between specific points in the image.

Pictured above is Buzz Aldrin, who appears in the bulk of the Moon landing pics. In fact, there's essentially only one photo of Armstrong taken while on the Moon, a blurry close-up of his reflection in Aldrin's visor.

Although a lot of brainpower went into creating the camera taken to the Moon, Aldrin says little planning went into the photography itself, which is why he became the unofficial star of the Moon.

From Aldrin's book Magnificent Desolation:

Neil shot most of the photos on the moon, having the camera attached to a fitting on his spacesuit much of the time while I was doing a variety of experiments. I didn't have such a camera holder on my suit, so it just made sense that Neil should handle the photography. He took some fantastic photographs, too, especially when one considers that there was no viewfinder on the intricate Hasselblad camera. We were basically "pointing and shooting." Imagine taking such historic photographs and not even being able to tell what image you were getting. Unlike the digital camera era of today, in 1969 we were shooting on film, typically looking through a small optical opening on the back of the camera that corresponded with what the camera's lens was "seeing." But with our large space helmets, such a viewfinder would have done little good anyhow. So, similar to cowboys shooting their sixguns from their hips, we aimed the camera in the direction of what we wanted to photograph, and squeezed the trigger. Given that ambiguity, it is even more of a credit to Neil that we brought back such stunning photographs from the moon.

if you look more carefully at the reflection in the gold visor on my helmet, you can see the Eagle with its landing pad, my shadow with the sun's halo effect, several of the experiments we had set up, and even Neil taking the picture. It is a truly astounding shot, and was the result of an entirely serendipitous moment on Neil's part. Later, pundits and others would wonder why most of the photographs on the moon were of me. It wasn't because I was the more photogenic of the two helmet-clad guys on the moon. Some even conjectured that it must have been a purposeful attempt on my part to shun Neil in the photos. That, of course, was ridiculous. We had our assigned tasks, and since Neil had the camera most of the time we were on the surface, it simply made sense that he would photograph our activities and the panoramas of the lunar landscape. And since I was the only other person there . . .

Ironically, the photography on the moon was one of those things that we had not laid out exactly prior to our launch. NASA's Public Affairs people didn't say, "Hey, you've got to take a lot of pictures of this or that." Everyone was interested in the science. So we did the science and the rest of it was sort of gee-whiz. We had not really planned a lot of the gee-whiz stuff that, in retrospect, proved quite important.

You can purchase a 16x20 print of the above pic and other Apollo-11 shots from Moonpans.com.

photo by Neil Armstrong/NASA via Boston Globe via Todd Lappin

Rob Beschizza

Archerfish, an expensive and high-tech security system

I set up a surveillance system for an employer once, and never wish to do so again: I hate fiber glass insulation, and it hates me. One of the coolest things about it, at the time, was the fact that it came with a webserver, so you could patch in and see what was going on.

Archerfish takes this approach to its brainstorm-session extreme, with alerts via SMS, email, "personal Archerfish portal" and various other net-aware extras. Its motion-detection system is fine-tunable, it can discern people from other objects, and it automatically organizes "events" it observes to make review fast and easy.

At $2,500 for a 2-camera, standard-def system, however, that commercial-grade villain-recognizing software doesn't come cheap -- especially considering that it also has a $20 monthly "service fee" to maintain access to the the web-based features.

Steven Leckart

iPhone: Flickr's 2nd Most Popular Camera, Sorta

Forget being the most popular camera phone on Flickr. The iPhone is now the 2nd most popular overall camera for Flickr users. In fact, it's the only phone listed in the top 5.

Yesterday, 5,489 users uploaded some 43,750 images that were shot via iPhone. For comparison, 6,287 users toting Canon's 10.1 megapixel EOS Digital Rebel XTi (the #1 camera), snapped 109,306 images during the same time period.

Impressive, however, it's worth noting the numbers appear to be inflated. We're on the third incarnation of the iPhone &mdash with improved optics, of course &mdash and yet Flickr seemingly lumps ALL iPhone images together.

Fair? Or should each model iPhone be counted separately, just as each and every Canon, Kodak and Casio model?

[via hey it's noah]

Rob Beschizza

New digicams and "near HD" camcorder from Samsung

Samsung's SL720 and SL502 are spec-bump 12.2 megapixel point and shoot cameras with 5x optical zoom, image stabilization and a new face recognition technology called "Perfect Portrait." The SL720 has a 28mm wide angle lens and can record 720p video, whereas the SL502 has a "standard" 35mm lens and records at 480 lines.

In addition to the U10 pocket camcorder, new full-size "near HD" options are also out soon. The K40 and K45 record at 480p, but include upscaling chips and HDMI outputs. They share 52x optical zoom lenses, image stabilization and time-lapse recording. The K40 has an SD card slot and will be out in August for $330, wheras the K45 has a 32GB SSD and costs $500.

Rob Beschizza

Samsung announces pocket HD camcorder

Samsung's HMX-U10 records 1080p H.264 video, shoots 10 megapixel stills, and will be out in September. It has a fixed focus lens, SDHC card slot, and 2" display. Given that Kodak's 720p Zi6 is now as cheap as $100 and has macro shooting, it needs something more than 1080p and one-touch YouTube uploads: video quality, especially in low-light conditions, will be the test.

Press Release (.doc) [Samsung]

Rob Beschizza

Make-your-own steadycam, now with a gimbal

The $14 steadycam is the easiest way to conquer handheld camcorder jitters, adding stabilizing counterweights and handles. But if you want something more like a real Steadicam, here's a how-to guide to making a ghetto gimbal mount, another key to smooth movements. The Steadicam people make a mini handheld rig just like it, but it's $800, and off-brand models still cost upwards of $400. [YB2 Normal]

Rob Beschizza

FujiFilm's 3D point and shoot coming in 2010

Fujifulm's forthcoming 3D point-and-shoot camera uses two lenses, spaced about as far apart as a pair of human eyes, to create its effect.

Named the FinePix Real3D, it simply takes two photos simultanously, which can then be presented together using either a special 3D picture frame, or prints that use an overlay acting as a 3D lens. More details at Time. [Via Gizmodo]

Joel Johnson

A couple of neat tools for making cheap camcorders produce awesome footage

There's nothing wrong with being a critic. We serve a purpose, perhaps even a necessary one, but we'd be bootless without the work of others.

I'm not entirely sure what I'm going to be working on now that I'm less-than-fully employed. But I'm leaning toward taking a creative sabbatical, enjoying the last couple of months of summer to absorb—and hopefully create—a little bit of culture.

I'm looking forward to decoupling myself from the internet and creating things that others can criticize.

One of the things I'm already working on is video. You always hear about how it's easier than ever to make professional-level video on the cheap—and that's as half-true now more than ever. The tools are certainly cheaper; the skills are just as expensive and precious as they ever were.

But man, what tools! For less than a thousand dollars, you can buy an inexpensive HD camcorder like my HV20 and a basic editing suite like Sony Vegas. Learning a few basic things about exposure, keeping the camera steady, color correction, and simple editing should only take a few days, especially when you can so inexpensively learn by doing. (I've been shocked at what a difference color correcting makes, and it applies just as easily to footage shot in HD as it does to simple VGA grabs from cellphones.)

Anyway, I'm excited, and I wanted to show you a couple of cool things that are somewhere past the basic DIY world, but not into the full-blown professional world—and the results they can bring.

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Rob Beschizza

D-Lux 4 is a "gateway drug"

CrunchGear's John Biggs reviews the D-Lux 4, a $700 point-and-shoot camera from Leica. That company's "stranglehold on the the hearts and minds of photographers everywhere" notwithstanding, it's nice.

The D-LUX 4 is a gateway drug and anyone who has used an M8 will attest that when you use Leica glass on a Leica body you get some amazing shots. That said, the D-LUX 4 is an excellent second point-and-shoot and is great for grabbing hard to frame shots that other point-and-shoots would completely destroy.

As he points out, if you just want a really good point and shoot, the practically identical and cheaper LX3K is a better bet. Both models are built by Panasonic; Leica adds custom firmware and a nice red dot.

Review: Leica D-LUX 4 [CrunchGear]