News entries for January, 2012

Panasonic has apparently heard that old adage, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it", because last year's darned-near-bulletproof TS3 digital camera has today been refreshed with the Lumix TS4, and at first glance it's hard to spot the differences.

The Panasonic TS4 is near-identical to its predecessor externally, save for a small red detail in the handgrip, and a...

Panasonic Corp. has today announced the Lumix TS20, a replacement for its 2010-model Lumix TS10 camera with a variety of changes including a new, more water-resistant body.

The Panasonic TS20 can be used at depths of up to 16 feet, a full six feet deeper than its predecessor. It also has a slightly higher-resolution 16 megapixel image sensor, and a wider 4x optical zoom...

Panasonic Corp. has today revealed two new ZS-series digital cameras, including one that it says sets a world record.

According to the company, the Panasonic ZS20 is the world's slimmest digital camera with a 20x optical zoom lens. At 1.3 inches thick, you won't be slipping it in a shirt pocket, but it's plenty slim enough to make an attractive travel-zoom camera,...

Canon Inc. today released its financial results for the 2011 financial year, which showed a slip in sales and before-tax profits over the prior year.

The company reported growing demand for single-lens reflex cameras globally in 2011, but demand for compact cameras was said to have been sluggish in all but emerging markets. Inkjet printer sales were flat, with growth in...

Just when you thought the megapixel war was over, Sony has kicked things up a notch. The company has today introduced its first eighteen megapixel compact camera, as well as a pair of sixteen megapixel ultracompacts.

The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX200V is the real attention-getter of the group, although the step forwards from sixteen to eighteen megapixels is actually fairly...

There are quite a few things we liked about the $249.99 Envy 110. It's not just the most beautiful all-in-one device we've seen but it has brains, too. The menu system, accessed via a large touch screen, is well thought out and the Envy can communicate with some intelligence as well, accessing the Web for content, printing from an iPad and even printing documents emailed...

It's with great sadness that we observe the death of a true industry leader, Michihiro Yamaki, founder and CEO of Sigma Corporation. Mr. Yamaki almost single-handedly created the third-party lens business as we know it today. Starting from very modest beginnings, building and selling a rear-element teleconverter, he built what's today the leading manufacturer of third-party...

For years, pundits and industry leaders alike have predicted the end of the optical viewfinder, but enthusiast and pro photographers have stubbornly clung to them for their benefits over electronic viewfinders. Today, a new microdisplay from French company MicroOLED S.A.S. promises to take a big step towards erasing those advantages.

MicroOLED's latest microdisplay model...

Fujifilm Holdings Corp. and Sony Corp. are among the companies considering investing in cash-strapped Olympus Corp., according to reports from the Wall Street Journal and Nikkei (the latter being cited by press agency Reuters).

It's been a difficult few months for Olympus, which admitted to accounting irregularities last November. It's stock price fell more than 80% to as...

A little over three years ago, Olympus and Panasonic announced their Micro Four Thirds standard, and in the process launched what's since become a compact system camera revolution. Today their standard received another shot in the arm, with the addition of three more companies to the Micro Four Thirds group.

The new arrivals include well-known third-party optics...

Most photos are portraits, according to conventional wisdom, but most cameras are designed to be used in landscape orientation. In fact, one of the hardest things for a beginning to remember is to turn the camera 90 degrees to frame a better portrait.

Pentax is riding to the rescue with its VS20. The VS stands for Vertical Shooting (we think). With a second shutter...

DxO Labs continues the rapid evolution of DxO Optics Pro with the image editing software's second point release since November.

New in this release are:

• Support for the Panasonic Lumix G1, G2, GF3, Canon PowerShot S100

• Version 6 project database migration

• Version 6 and 7 projects merge

• Various enhancements of the crop tool

• Feature for fixing image...

Although it looks very similar to its previous PEN-series flagships externally, the Olympus E-P3 includes several significant changes.

Key among these is a new brand-new autofocus system, branded 'Frequency Acceleration Sensor Technology', or FAST for short. Olympus showed supreme confidence in choosing the name, and it wasn't misplaced: the E-P3's AF performance actually...

Two well-known brands in the medium-format photography market have been merged to create a new, worldwide entity: Mamiya Leaf.

Both Mamiya Digital Imaging and Leaf Imaging Ltd. have been part-owned by Denmark's Phase One A/S since mid-2009. They've cooperated with each other for some time, with Mamiya producing camera bodies and optics, while Leaf supplied digital backs.

Ever felt your photos needed just a little kick in the lighting department, to add some dramatic effect? A new plugin on the way from Topaz Labs aims to make it easier to attain...

The Topaz Star Effects plugin creates lighting effects such as you might have achieved with accessory filters, back in the film days. A variety of star types are offered, including traditional,...

A friend pointed me to this article; a nice story of what it was like in the good old days of Kodak, told by the son of a "Kodak Man."

Like people, most companies have a life history, from infancy through robust middle age, and finally to decline and death. When the time finally comes for me to shuffle off this mortal coil, I hope people will celebrate my life, not wring...

Camera phones are ubiquitous these days, but many have yet to match the image quality even of very affordable compact cameras. New sensor technology from Sony Corp. aims to improve the situation.

Compared to existing backside illuminated CMOS image sensors, the newly-announced design moves more peripheral circuitry beneath the active pixels, replacing the supporting...

Despite its good image quality, the Nikon P7100's predecessor was a little too cumbersome to use for some. Thankfully Nikon fixes most of those issues with the P7100, making a digital camera that's not just pleasant to shoot, but whose images are worth talking about. Click here for our Nikon P7100 review and get the whole story!

Australian microphone manufacturer RØDE has launched two new microphones that aim to improve on-camera audio recording. The RØDE VideoMic HD and Stereo VideoMic Pro are compatible with DSLRs, system cameras and camcorders featuring a 3.5mm microphone input.

The Stereo VideoMic Pro combines features from two earlier models, the VideoMic Pro and Stereo VideoMic. Based...