News entries for February, 2012

Whenever an icon falls on hard times, a measure of reflection is to be expected. Eastman Kodak's recent bankruptcy filing is no exception.

Over the last few weeks, the mainstream media has published a number of articles looking at Kodak's history in detail, and as the company works through its bankruptcy--most recently by extricating itself from a number of sponsorship...

Camera phones have consumed a big chunk of the compact camera market thanks to their convenience and built-in sharing capabilities, but for the most part, they lag behind even relatively basic dedicated cameras in terms of their feature set and image quality. A new application for iOS devices aims to swing the balance further in the camera phone's favor. (And it's also...

We've just posted our "Still Life" series test shots from a production-level Nikon D4 professional digital SLR, straight from the lab!

Compared to its predecessor, the D4 has a redesigned body and features a raft of updates throughout, bringing improvements both for photographers and videographers alike. Among these are a new 16.2 megapixel FX-format image sensor, 10...

Our lens review today on SLRgear.com is the kit lens in the Nikon 1 series of camera, the Nikon 1 10-30mm f/3.5-5.6 VR. In addition to being small and light, it comes in five fashionable colors: red, black, white, silver and pink. We've put the lens through its paces in our test lab: click here to read our full review of this lens.

Rounding out its announcements for the day, Sony has revealed four new designs aimed at fans of really compact digital cameras. They might all fit in your pocket, but beyond that they differ quite a bit, with each model being tailored to attract a different target customer.

The Sony DSC-TX66 is a camera for the fashion-conscious photographer who still wants plenty of...

Sony Electronics Inc. has today launched no less than five new long-zoom digital cameras, aiming to provide an appealing option no matter what your needs are. As well as anywhere from 16x to 30x zooms, most of the new models have backside-illuminated sensors and in-camera GPS, and one even includes WiFi connectivity.

For the entry-level photographer, the Sony DSC-H90 is...

There's something of a trend in the software world today, as newly-released software from Eastman Kodak Co., Nik Software Inc., and Adobe Systems Inc. ports existing products to new platforms.

Kodak has announced the debut of its Kodak Gallery app for Google's Android operating system. The Kodak Gallery was app previously available only on Apple's iOS devices, such as the...

If you've been waiting for Canon's EOS-1D X digital SLR since it was announced last October, you've probably learned a thing or two about patience, and it's time to put those lessons to good use. Canon Inc. has today announced a delivery delay for the EOS-1D X, which was originally planned to go on sale next month.

The delay has so far been announced in the UK and...

Last November, Czech Republic-based Zoner Software launched a major update to its Windows-only imaging application, Zoner Photo Studio. Although the program can be purchased for as little as $35 in the Home version, Zoner has now released a variant that lets new customers dip their toes in the water completely free of charge.

Zoner Photo Studio 14 Free drops quite a few...

Canon managed to pack more features into the PowerShot S100 while maintaining the same relative look and feel of their premium pocket digital camera. Higher resolution has lately come at a cost, but Canon raised both the resolution and still image quality while also raising video resolution. The result is a pocket camera that can shoot quality 1080p video while the camera...

There are two types of firmware update in this world. Some fix bugs in previous releases, bringing welcome relief to those of us who've encountered the problems they solve. That's good news, but the truly great firmware updates put a smile on your face by adding entirely new features. The latter is a rarity, and we think that's something of a shame.  New features added...

DxO Labs has updated its flagship Optics Pro imaging application to add support for the fixed-lens Canon G1 X, as well as several compact system camera models. 

In addition to the Canon PowerShot G1 X, newly supported cameras in DxO Optics Pro v7.2.1 include the Nikon J1, Nikon V1, Sony NEX-7, and Olympus E-P2. 

Simultaneously, DxO has also released a raft of new optics...

There's an elephant in the room, and it's high time we talked about it. Smartphone imaging has certainly come along in leaps and bounds in the last few years, and chances are that your phone can now capture high-definition video. Unfortunately, it's also likely that it does so in a way that degrades the video quality, or perhaps makes it challenging to get a decent...

Shooting with the Leica M9-P and 50mm f/1.4 Summilux-M lens taught us a lot about why people love Leica cameras. But we also learned why most people don't shoot Leica rangefinders, and it isn't just about the very high price tag. Shooting with any manual focus, aperture-priority camera is a little more challenging than most people are used to. Once we got back into the...

You've doubtless heard that old adage, "true beauty lies within". So, it would seem, has consumer electronics giant Samsung. It's apparently taken the saying to heart, introducing a new series of flash cards to the US market that court the fashion-conscious.

First offered in Asia back in late 2009, followed by a European launch last year, Samsung's SD and microSD cards...

LPA Design's PocketWizard Plus II transceiver has proven pretty popular with photographers wanting to remotely trigger cameras and lights from a significant distance, but the design is now rather long in the tooth, having been introduced in mid-2006. Today, the company has introduced a successor model that brings more features, yet manages to hit an even lower price point.

PK_Tether--the unofficial tethering solution for Pentax SLRs--has just been updated to a new version, we hear today.

Created by Polish programmer Tomasz Kos, and originally known as 'Pentax Kx Periodic Shooting', PK_Tether has been on the scene for a little over a year now.

As its earlier name suggests, PK_Tether was first created specifically with the Pentax K-x in...

Canon USA has today issued a brief statement to provide updated availability information for two super-telephoto lenses that were first announced a little over a year ago.

The Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM and EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM were both unveiled on February 7th, 2011, shortly before the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami struck Japan, causing widespread devastation. To...

New firmware and software just issued by Olympus Japan brings new features for the imaging software bundled with some of the company's cameras, as well as an improvement for one of its ZUIKO DIGITAL lenses.

Olympus Viewer 2 has--perhaps rather confusingly--just been updated to version 1.3 on both the Windows and Macintosh platforms. The list of changes is the same for...