News archive for May 2000

It's not often that us online types get a chance to take a swipe at our printed brothers, but in an amusing twist it appears that the excellent UK publication "WHAT DIGITAL CAMERA" published my April Fools joke about Canon's new CCD in their May edition as a real rumour (Page 9)... Better still not only did they publish it but obviously didn't visit the site the next day to read the retraction. Excellent.

Fooled you What Digital Camera? I think so.

I found an interesting summary of JPEG2000, advancements and current status over on EETimes, according to the author Junko Yoshida "The boom in Internet commerce, combined with the advent of higher-resolution digital cameras and ever beefier desktop computers, has led companies involved in a broad range of imaging technologies to anticipate a swift transition to JPEG2000-possibly within a couple of years, according to the experts. Backers expect JPEG2000 to become the accepted, universal file format for digital images, whether on the Web or from digital cameras, printers, faxes, remote sensors or wireless transmissions. "

We've just posted our latest review.. Canon's tiny Digital IXUS (also known as PowerShot S100 Digital ELPH and Digital IXY). "Open your wallet, take out a credit card.. No, I'm not going to ask you to order one just yet, that credit card is the same size as the front of the Digital IXUS. Small? You bet. This is truly the smallest digicam I've ever reviewed and weighs in as the smallest 1.92 mp digital camera on the market."

Imaging-Resource post reivew of Minolta's chunky, 2.7 megapixel, CCD-stitching, APS lens (Vectis) digital SLR. Here's what Dave had to say "Given its bulk, feature set and price, the RD 3000 clearly isn't a camera intended for the casual picture-snapper. On the other hand, its options for interchangeable lenses, excellent tonal range, and understated color handling make it well suited for professional use, particularly for portraiture or other situations where smooth skin tones, good shadow detail and low image noise are important. Full manual exposure control, a very clean user interface (thanks to all those buttons), and dual flash connections lend versatility that we think many serious users will appreciate"

FotoTime just released FotoAlbum version 1.11. FotoTime allows you to organizes and share your digital pictures. This new release has improved sorting capabilities, complete EXIF tag display, and an improved screen saver. FotoAlbum supports lossless JPEG rotation and the new Casio QV3000 uncompressed TIFF format. In addition, the FotoTime web site now provides unlimited storage.

As long as you don't mind ordering it, a downloadable update will be made available "some time in June".. No details are available of what they've fixed in 1.1.1, all the update page says is "Nikon Capture allows you to translate the "Raw" file format available from the D1 to provide the ultimate in picture quality by utilizing the power of your computers processor to use more complex equations during the conversion of raw files data to the more common TIFF and JPEG file format. "

We've been receiving reports over the last couple of days that the site has become slow and unusable. This news came as a bit of a shock as we've actually just cleaned up much of the backend database and procedures. Interestingly these complaints fell in line with the start of a new ad campaign with doubleclick which required javascript inserts.

UPDATE: Things are better, overwhelming response. Some words from our advertiser.

In a surprise announcement Canon have revealed a 10x zoom lens (35 mm - 350 mm) for digital cameras with lens-shift optical image stabilisation. "The lens's outstanding image performance and high 10x zoom ratio are made possible through the introduction of a new mechanical structure, which makes possible the precision movement of the correcting lens group, and a new optical design compatible with high resolving capability."

Nikon today announced the AF Nikkor 14mm f/2.8 ED lens which they're aiming at photojournalists using the Nikon D1. Because of the D1's focal length multiplier of 1.55x this lens works out at a nice wide 21.7 mm on the D1. There's also a gelatine filter holder at the rear of the lens.

Sony's new Digital Photo Printer (Dye Sub) can print 4" x 6" in a variety of finishes (Matte, Glossy, Textured). Each print takes 85 seconds. Print packs (including ink) priced at $14.95 for 25 prints. Resolution is 300dpi, producing 1162 x 1536 pixel prints. Priced at $389, available in June.

Thanks to Alan Dang from GadgetSquad for letting me know he's just posted a first-look of Sony's DSC-S70 3.34 mp digital camera. Alan says "We've been very impressed with the DSC-S70 so far, and we'll have our full in-depth review of the Sony DSC-S70 shortly. Until then, we've got a small gallery of images to whet your appetite. As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words! "

Steve Sanders has posted reviews of Fuji's FinePix 4700Z, Toshiba's M70 and Sony's cult-like FD-95 of which he says "The FD-95 has got a GREAT zoom lens! And a super battery. But once again Sony has used way too much compression on the images to make them fit on 1.44MB floppies. They touted that this camera and all other year 2000 Mavicas could use the MemoryStick and the MSAC-FD2 floppy adapter for lots more storage but ... there is no option for less-compressed images!"

Thanks to Bill Geary for noting this article on EE Times about Canon's CMOS Sensor, it's got a few more technical details than we covered in our preview. "Canon uses CMOS sensor to gain digicam edge"... Time will tell.

My good friends over at Impress PC Watch have just published another set of sample images from the FujiFilm S1 Pro Digital SLR. This time at different resolutions, compression settings and ISO's. And to please some people there are even comparison shots with Nikon's D1 taken of the same scene on the same day.

Tokyo, 13:00. As part of a worldwide announcement of new digital camera products Canon today revealed the details of the EOS-D30 Digital SLR. We first saw a glimpse of this camera back at PMA. Today Canon make the official announcement, reveal specifications, expected price and release dates. We've got that and a WHOLE lot more.

PREVIEW: I've had an exclusive hands-on with Canon's first "home grown" digital SLR priced to be affordable and probably a camera which marks a defining moment for digital photography.

Vital statistics: 3.11mp effective (2,160 x 1,440), Canon APS sized CMOS sensor, EF lens mount, 1.6x focal length multiplier, 12-bit RAW mode, 3+ fps up to 8 images, CF Type I / II, Lithium-Ion rechargeable battery (and optional battery pack), September 2000, Europe: 3000€ (US$3,500).

Another interesting article from EE Times: "We are converting some DRAM production lines [over] to flash memories," a Samsung executive said. "But it's still hard to meet the demands for NAND," the flash memory used mainly in MP3 players and digital cameras. Samsung said it expects sales in the flash memory sector to grow as high as $700 million this year.

In a move no doubt timed to coincide with Canon's announcement of the EOS-D30 yesterday, FujiFilm today announced the S1 Pro will be available (on sale) on July 8th at 375,000 YEN in Japan. That (at todays exchange rates) works out at around US$3,500 which is almost identical to the price stated by Canon US yesterday for the EOS-D30. (Although notably Canon Europe state a price of 3000 EUR; $2700 and Canon France 20,000 FFr; $2700).

Roll up, Roll up, get yer S1 Pro samples here, they're free ladies and gentlement... The Japanese Digital Camera webzine DCEX have published six sample images in a range of situations from FujiFilm's S1 Pro digital SLR. The camera features a 3.2 megapixel SuperCCD which (when combined with internal interpolation algorigthms) generates a 6 megapixel image. Each image is a 2.5MB JPEG (3,040 x 2,016).

Phil says: Bit soft at 1:1, but downsampled they're pretty sweet, you can't fault the colour balance or metering. A couple of the PC Watch samples show good dynamic range.

UPDATED!! PC Watch post EVEN MORE SAMPLES...

Read the official announcement below, I had an exclusive hands-on with this tiny, steel cased, power packed digicam and have summarised my impressions along with some exclusive photos of the camera.

UPDATED: Sample images available.

According to JEIDA (Japan Electronic Industry Development Association) Japanese shipments of digital camera almost doubled to 5.82 million over the past year. This number rose to 82% in the year to March, 31. By value shipments rose 72% from a year earlier to 255.88 billion Yen ($2.34 billion). These rises were attributed to new 2 and 3 megapixel models.