| Apple soliciting RAW photos to assist in improving Aperture |
| In an effort to improve the RAW conversion quality provided by Aperture (and other applications that rely on the same operating system code for those conversions), Apple issued a call for RAW files from professional photographers earlier this month. The earlier request was made to a select group of working shooters and others; now, Apple has given the green light to make the option of submitting files open to anyone seriously interested in helping the company spruce up its RAW file processing. |
January 31, 2006 | FULL STORY  |
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| Twenty questions about Zeiss ZF/ZS |
| Shortly after the announcement earlier this month by Carl Zeiss of new Nikon F-mount ZF and screw-mount ZS lens lines, we sent a series of questions to Kornelius Mueller, Marketing Manager in the German company's Camera Lens Division. In his response, Mueller describes how ZF lenses will operate on a Nikon camera, acknowledges the desire among Canon shooters especially for crispy-sharp wide angles, discusses the decision to contract Cosina in Japan to manufacture ZF/ZS lenses and more. |
| January 31, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Photo Mechanic 4.4.1 due out February 1 |
| After an extended public beta period, the official release of Camera Bits Photo Mechanic 4.4.1 for Mac and Windows is due out tomorrow. |
| January 31, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| X-Rite announces intent to purchase GretagMacbeth |
| X-Rite this morning has announced an agreement with Amazys Holding AG, the parent company of GretagMacbeth, that will see X-Rite take control of Amazys and, ultimately, the GretagMacbeth product line. While X-Rite and GretagMacbeth are expected to act as separate entities for the time being, with no short-term impact on the products and services of each company, a press release from X-Rite makes it clear that the two will effectively become one sometime after various regulatory hurdles are cleared in late spring 2006. |
| January 31, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Canon expands digital SLR focusing screen options |
| Canon is in the process of expanding the range of accessory focusing screens available for its line of 1-series digital SLR cameras and the EOS 5D. The new screens are based on the standard screens for each model, but incorporate a crop line or mask to aid in shooting to a fixed aspect ratio. |
| January 30, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Sportsshooter.com posts issue 87 of newsletter |
| SPORTSSHOOTER.COM has posted issue #87 of its newsletter with advice on preparing to cover the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy and a story on combining philanthropy with good business. |
| January 30, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Olympus announces E-330, a DSLR with live LCD preview |
| Olympus has announced the E-330, an entry-to-mid level interchangeable-lens digital SLR that offers full-time live image preview on its tilting 2.5-inch LCD. The full-time LCD preview is generated by a small secondary CCD located in the camera's optical viewfinder mechanism. There is also a second, more limited preview mode where the camera generates the preview image with its main image sensor, a 7.38 million image pixel NMOS chip. The E-330 uses the Olympus E-system (Four-Thirds format) lensmount. |
| January 26, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Shutterbug reviews Epson R2400, 4800 |
| The online version of SHUTTERBUG magazine has recently posted reviews of the Epson Stylus Photo R2400, and the Epson Stylus Pro 4800 inkjet printers, which both use the Ultrachrome K3 pigment inks that Epson introduced last year. |
| January 25, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| January 2006 issue of The Digital Journalist posted |
| The January 2006 issue of THE DIGITAL JOURNALIST has been published with articles, dispatches, and photo galleries on celebrity portraiture, elections in Bolivia and Iraq, and tech tips from Canon USA's Chuck Westfall. |
| January 25, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Apple abandons plan to charge US$49 for Aperture Universal Binary crossgrade |
| Apple has abandoned their plan to charge current Aperture owners a fee to obtain the Universal Binary version of the application. Earlier this month, the company had said it would be US$49 to "crossgrade" from the PowerPC version of the program - which will not run on Macs with Intel processors - to the Universal Binary version, which is compatible with both PowerPC Mac and Intel Mac architectures. |
| January 24, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Beneath the waves with the Nikon D2X |
| There's no way to be sure, but Alex Mustard could well have been the first person to jump in the ocean with a Nikon D2X. The results of his initial dives with Nikon's flagship digital SLR made Mustard very happy, and in the months since he first bought the camera (he collected it from his dealer on February 25 of last year, after picking up the underwater housing the day before), Mustard has experimented with its features and capabilities in over 150 dives in the Red Sea, off the Cayman Islands, Maldives and Indonesia. This feature article looks at his experiences beneath the waves with the D2X. |
| January 22, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Imaging Resource takes first look at Nikon D200 |
| IMAGING RESOURCE has published a fairly detailed first look at the Nikon D200, including an examination of what publisher Dave Etchells calls the "corduroy effect" and others refer to as "banding". |
| January 20, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Camera Raw 3.3 plug-in for Photoshop CS2 released |
| The beta period for version 3.3 of the Camera Raw plug-in for Photoshop CS2 has now ended, and the official release has been posted on Adobe's download servers. Support for the processing of RAW files from 17 new cameras has been added since v3.2, including the Canon EOS 5D, EOS-1D Mark II N and EOS 20Da, as well as the Nikon D200. |
| January 19, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Konica Minolta shutters photo operations |
| Konica Minolta today has announced their intention to stop the manufacture of film and digital cameras, as well colour film and paper, by March 31, 2006. |
| January 19, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| ExtremeTech: Optimizing Photoshop CS2 Performance |
| EXTREMETECH has published a collection of tips for making Photoshop CS2 run faster in an article entitled "Optimizing Photoshop CS2 Performance". |
| January 18, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Luminous Landscape reviews PrintFix Pro printer profiler |
| LUMINOUS LANDSCAPE has reviewed the ColorVision PrintFix Pro RGB inkjet printer profiling system, a package comprising a spectrocolorimeter and profiling software that retails for US$549 in the U.S. |
| January 18, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Ninety percent of pro pictures to be shot digitally by 2010, says study |
| Research and consulting firm InfoTrends has released a study which indicates that by 2010, 90% of all pictures shot professionally in North America will be captured with a digital camera, up from an estimated 70% today. The study also notes that there are over 131,000 professional photographers in North America, and that they spend nearly US$800 million a year on "cameras, lenses, printers, ink and media, software, and other accessories." |
| January 18, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Zeiss officially introduces lenses for Nikon F-mount |
| Zeiss has officially pulled back the curtains on a new series of lenses for Nikon film and digital SLR cameras. As revealed when news of the Zeiss "ZF" line leaked in mid-December 2005, the first two F-mount manual-focus lenses are a Planar 50mm f/1.4 and Planar 85mm f/1.4, with more to come later this year. The German company has also announced Zeiss ZS, lenses that are identical to the new ZF models except for the mount, which is the older M-42 screw type. The company envisions this as a way for Canon users to take advantage of the new lenses, since "there are M-42 adapters available for any SLR bayonet mounts, including Canon EOS and FD" notes the latest issue of Zeiss' Camera Lens News newsletter. |
| January 17, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Lexar announces 133X Pro Series CompactFlash and SD |
| Lexar today has unveiled its next generation of Pro Series CompactFlash and Secure Digital (SD) cards. Both card formats are promised to deliver a minimum sustained write speed of 133X using Lexar's standard test procedure, support the speediest data transfer methods of the CompactFlash v3.0 and SD v1.1 specifications and include performance optimizations for popular camera models from Canon, Nikon and others. The full 133X CompactFlash and SD lines are slated to ship from Lexar within about 3 weeks from today, say John Omvik, Lexar's Director of Professional Product Marketing. UPDATE, JANUARY 19: We've now added to this article the results of initial testing of Lexar 133X CompactFlash and SD. |
| January 17, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| New beta of Adobe Lightroom now available |
| Lightroom Beta 1.1, a new build of Adobe's work-in-progress pro imaging application slated for official release later in 2006, is now available for download from the Adobe Labs web site. |
| January 16, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| GretagMacbeth, Pantone team up to develop affordable monitor calibration |
| GretagMacbeth and Pantone have jointly unveiled two new entry-level products for monitor calibration. Called Pantone huey and Pantone Eye-One Display LT, both are designed to be simpler to use and less expensive than GretagMacbeth's US$249 Eye-One Display 2. |
| January 16, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Fujifilm USA now offering S3 Pro buffer upgrade |
| Fujfilm USA is now offering the S3 Pro buffer upgrade that was previously announced in Europe. The upgrade more than doubles the continuous shooting buffer depth of the S3 Pro. It costs US$379.95 and is performed in Edison, New Jersey. |
| January 16, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Think Tank Photo adds Airport Security roller to lineup |
| Think Tank Photo is now shipping Airport Security, a rolling photo equipment bag designed to carry a 400mm f/2.8-size supertelephoto lens, several digital SLR camera bodies plus smaller lenses and accessories. Its 22" x 14" x 9" (56cm x 35.5cm x 23cm) outer dimensions, including wheels, means it meets the typical carry-on size limits of major U.S. airlines, while the Airport Security's minimalist exterior design means it also looks like it's within typical carry-on size limits. And to keep a thief from wheeling away the bag and its contents, Airport Security incorporates locks on the main zippers as well as a wire cable that can be tethered to an immovable object. |
| January 16, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Camera Bits posts new Photo Mechanic 4.4.1 beta |
| Camera Bits has posted a new beta release of Photo Mechanic 4.4.1 for Windows and Mac. |
| January 15, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Impressions of the MacBook Pro and iWeb |
| We spent some time this week poking and prodding the new MacBook Pro laptop Apple unveiled at MacWorld Conference and Expo 2006. Here are some first impressions of the Intel Core Duo-based computer, as well as a word or two about iWeb, the new web site management software Apple also introduced at the annual event for Mac users in San Francisco. |
| January 13, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Sports Illustrated posts slideshow of images from 2005 |
| The web site of Sports Illustrated has posted a slideshow of 12 memorable photos from 2005. |
| January 12, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Nikon to further reduce film camera and accessories production |
| Nikon U.K. has published a press release announcing that Nikon Corporation (Japan) has decided to cease manufacturing most 35mm film SLR bodies (the F6 will continue), large-format lenses, enlarging lenses, and manual focus 35mm lenses. Nikon will concentrate its resources on digital cameras and associated accessories. |
| January 11, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| ACDSee Pro now shipping |
| ACD Systems has begun shipping ACDSee Pro for Windows, a photo browser and photo management application designed for the working photographer that includes RAW file processing and the ability to add and edit IPTC metadata. |
| January 10, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Apple announces first Macs with Intel processors |
| During his keynote address this morning at MacWorld Conference and Expo 2006 in San Francisco, Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the first Macs to incorporate a processor from Intel: the iMac (shipping today) and a new laptop called the MacBook Pro (shipping in February 2006). He also announced that Aperture would ship as an Intel-optimized Universal Binary application in March 2006. |
| January 10, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Apple keynote underway at MacWorld Expo 2006 |
| Apple CEO Steve Jobs is busy this morning introducing new iPod and Mac products during his keynote speech that kicks of MacWorld Conference and Expo 2006 in San Francisco. Though there is no Web video feed of the keynote available, several Mac news sites are providing live coverage of the event, including MacNN and MacWorld. At about the midpoint in his presentation, Jobs has already announced that Mac OS X 10.4.4 will be released today (which we expect will resolve certain RAW file import problems with Aperture). Plus, he has shown updated versions of iPhoto, iDVD and iMovie, as well as a new application called iWeb, all of which are part of iLife '06. Before Jobs leaves the stage he's expected to unveil one or more Mac models sporting processors from Intel under the hood. |
| January 10, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| OWC now shipping 160GB mobile hard drive |
| Other World Computing (OWC) has commenced shipment of a 160GB, 5400-rpm model in its Mercury-on-the-Go line of portable USB/FireWire hard drives. The high-capacity 2.5 inch drive is in the same enclosure design we've used in various incarnations since the fall of 2001. The combination of this enclosure and, more importantly, circuit boards that feature components from Oxford Semiconductor, have delivered rock-solid reliability and impressive speed with both Mac and Windows systems. |
| January 10, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Adobe announces Lightroom for professional photographers |
| Adobe has announced the commencement of a public beta program for Lightroom, a new application aimed at professional photographers that the company is developing and expects to ship in the fall of 2006. Meant to offer "a complete digital photography workflow," says an Adobe press release, Lightroom Beta 1 is available only as a download for Mac, though the product will eventually ship for both Windows and Mac. |
| January 8, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Production of LiPoly version of Digital Camera Battery about to commence |
| Digital Camera Battery is about to flip the switch on production of a high-capacity Lithium Polymer (LiPoly) version of their portable power source for driving cameras, flashes and other DC-powered devices. The new model, however, is shaping up to be more than just the existing Digital Camera Battery with different chemistry under the hood. The Florida-based company has redesigned the pack to be modular, to give more feedback on charge status and to enable linking multiple batteries together for increased run-time. And, by utilizing LiPoly cells, Digital Camera Battery has been able to about double the capacity of existing models in its current NiMH-based lineup without increasing the size or weight. |
| January 6, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Gefen, Belkin introduce wireless USB hubs |
| Gefen and Belkin this week have announced wireless USB products that could potentially provide a powerful new way for photographers to link USB digital cameras, card readers and other devices to a computer over a wireless link. Both the Gefen Wireless USB Extender and Belkin CableFree USB Hub consist of a four-port USB 2.0 hub/transmitter and a companion receiver unit that connects to a computer. Though expected to be relatively expensive initially, these devices represent an interesting alternative to dedicated Wi-Fi transmitters from Canon and Nikon. |
| January 5, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Hasselblad warns of incompatibility with Adobe Bridge |
| Hasselblad has sent a warning to registered users of its digital backs that Adobe Bridge on the Mac will in some cases corrupt the header information inside the company's proprietary RAW 3f (.fff) file format. |
| January 3, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Third beta of Photo Mechanic 4.4.1 now available for download |
| Camera Bits has posted the third release of Photo Mechanic 4.4.1 for Windows and Mac since the company commenced a public beta program for the upcoming update back in December. |
| January 3, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Photographers usher in 2006 with panorama photos |
| The web site panoramas.dk currently features 360-degree QuickTime VR panoramas from New Year's Eve, taken in 16 different cities as revellers ushered in 2006. Leading off the collection of immersive pictures by 18 different photographers is a stunning panorama by Jook Leung, created in New York's Times Square at midnight. |
| January 3, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Fuji Europe announces S3 Pro buffer upgrade |
| Fuji Photo Film Europe has announced a 256MB buffer memory upgrade for the S3 Pro. The upgrade raises the camera's continuous shooting buffer depth, in wide dynamic range mode, to 8 RAW images (from 3, pre-upgrade) or 16 JPEGs (from 6, pre-upgrade). The cost is 390 euro, and it's done in Dusseldorf, Germany. |
| January 3, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Epson P-4000 firmware updated |
| Epson recently released v04.51 of the firmware for the P-4000 Multimedia Storage Viewer. |
| January 2, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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| Bibble 4.5 released |
| Bibble Labs has updated its RAW workflow software, Bibble, to v4.5. New features include support for the Nikon D200 (including tethered operation) and "dramatic" improvements to color from Canon .CR2 files. Bibble 4.5 is available in Pro and Lite versions for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux. |
| January 2, 2006 | FULL STORY |
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