Sony Japan officially announce DSC-F505

Today was the day, after a week of marketing we're finally given all the stats on this peculiar looking, but technically very interesting digital camera. To be release in Japan 21st September @ MSRP 125,000 YEN (~US$1,100).

Sony CyberShot DSC-F505

Click here for a larger front view

From a design point of view Sony have really gone all out here, they've done away with any traditional camera look, taken in part it looks like the F55 with the D700 barrel attached, however there's now a new lens system from Carl Zeiss and a 2.1 megapixel CCD at the back of it. Uniquely they've opted for a pop-up flash mounted on the top of the lens. The main body of the camera can rotate in relation to the lens meaning that you've always go the LCD pointing directly toward you (50 degrees from below and up to 90 degrees from the top).

The big bright LCD is of the newer Hybrid type which use a reflective surface behind the LCD enabling you to turn off the backlight and use existing light (sunlight) to provide luminance. this is very important on the F505 as their is NO OPTICAL VIEWFINDER.

The lens system is a 38mm to 190mm equiv (F2.8 - F3.3), 5 x zoom made by Carl Zeiss.

The CCD used in the F505 is Sony's own 2.1 megapixel 1/2" Super HAD CCD which gives the camera a maximum resolution of 1600 x 1200

Program modes

• Six program Auto Exposure modes as well as Fully Automatic:
• Shutter Priority (you program shutter speed, camera adjusts aperture)
• Aperture Priority (you program aperture, camera adjusts shutter speed)
• Night View (long exposures without flash)
• Night View + (ditto)
• Scenery (Infinity lock focus)
• Depth of field focus mode (uses small apertures to achieve a deep depth of field)

Other features

• Magnesium Alloy Body
• One button White Balance adjustment
• Spot metering mode
• Macro mode (closest 8cm)
• Manual focus ring
• Exposure adjustment +/- 1.5EV
• Playback zoom up to 5X
• Long life NP-FS11 InfoLithium Battery
• MemoryStick for storage
• New Floppy disk MemoryStick adapter (max. 1.4MB at a time???)
• AV output
• Image effects: Negative art, Sepia, Black and White, Solarize

Full Specifications

• Lens: 38mm - 190mm equiv. (F2.8 - F3.3)
• Focus distance: 80cm, 8cm in macro (@ wide angle)
• Lens rotation: -50 to +90 degrees
• Filter size: 52mm
• CCD: 1/2" 2.11 Megapixel Interlaced (1600 x 1200 , 1024 x 768, 640 x 480)
• Focus: High speed "scanning" and Manual Focus ring
• Shutter speed: [NTSC: 1/8s - 1/725s (12 stages) [PAL: 1/6s - 1/600s (12 stages)]
• Exposure compensation +/- 1.5EV
• White balance: Auto, Indoor, Outdoor, One push hold
• Program AE modes: Shutter priority, Aperture priority, Night view, Night view+, Scenery, Depth of field)
• Metering: Center Weighted or Spot
• Flash recommended distances: 0.3m - 2.5m
• Storage medium: MemoryStick (4MB included)
• Format: DCF & DPOF
• Picture modes: Picture, E-mail, Voice memo
• Picture quality modes: Standard, Fine
• MPEG mode: MPEG 1, 160 x 112 or 320 x 240, Five / Ten / Fifteen seconds
• LCD: 2" TFT 122,980 pixels, Hybrid
• Built-in microphone and speaker
• I/O: Serial, USB, Video
• Power supply: DC3.6V (battery), DC4.2V (AC adapter)
• Battery: NP-FS11/FS10 (FS11: about 60 minutes recording life)
• Dimensions: 107.2 x 62.2 x 135.9 mm
• Weight: 475g with battery
• Optional: MSAC-PC2 MemoryStick->PCMCIA adapter, MSAC-FD1A MemoryStick->Floppy adapter (max 1.4MB file), MSAC-PR1 parallel port Memory Stick reader (in Japan the serial and USB connectors are separate too, can't yet confirm if this will be the case worldwide).

Sample Images

For sample images see Sony's DSC-F505 sample images page. From what I've seen of the sample images they seem very good, sharp, clear and well balanced. The night shot of the tower in Tokyo is very impressive with only a slight amount of chromatic abberation at the very brightly lit section near the base, the shot of a chrome motorcycle fuel tank shows little or no chromatic abberations.

UPDATED: PC Watch have just posted some more samples from the camera.

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