News archive for October 2013

The first consumer point-and-shoots didn't have art effect modes or face detection smile-shutters. They looked like the Kodak 1, a leather-encased box with a key to wind the film, a shutter release and not much else. Introduced to the public in 1888, each Kodak 1 contained a roll of film with 100 exposures. The National Media Museum owns a collection of prints from these first consumer 'compacts.' Click through to take a look at a set of these early snapshots.

What's in your camera bag? A camera (hopefully) and maybe a lens or two, but that's probably not everything that you need. In this article we'll be looking at ten items that deserve a place in every photographer's kit bag, whatever sort of photography you enjoy doing. Click through for the list.

We've been fans of Aaron Johnson's comic strip 'What the Duck' for years. 'WTD' is one of the best satirical comic strips in the world, and it's published here every week, as well as being included in our weekly newsletter. Barbed, topical and always amusing, we hope you enjoy WTD as much as we do. 

Our friends and collaborators over at DxOMark have recently been looking into how lenses score on specific cameras, and the latest model they've examined is Nikon's 24 MP APS-C flagship, the D7100. The article looks at no fewer than 126 lenses, and gauges the advantage of the D7100's higher pixel count and lack of a low-pass filter compared to the 16MP D7000. As a bonus, there's also an assessment of how the imaging performance of Nikon SLRs has improved over the last decade. Click through for the link.   

PDN PhotoPlus Expo celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. The annual conference and tradeshow, held at the Javits Center in New York, will feature a lineup of more than 130 presenters taking part in keynotes, seminars and panel discussions with topics ranging from creative techniques to making a living as a photographer. The show takes place October 24-26th, and registration is open to the public. Click through to read more.

We've been shooting with the Olympus PEN E-P5 for some months now and have just completed our review. The arrival of the E-M1 may have grabbed the limelight in recent weeks but the latest PEN deserves its share of the attention. Although it continues the classic PEN look, it shares most of its specifications with the E-M5, which should make it pretty special - but what's it like to use? Read our review to find out.

The camera on Apple's iPhones are well-known for their excellent photo quality. The new iPhone 5s features a larger sensor, faster lens, and new 'True Tone' flash. Head on over to connect.dpreview.com to see if the improvements have made the iPhone 5s a top choice for mobile photographers.

Cyber attackers breached Adobe's security recently, compromising data on 2.9 million customers. Data accessed includes 'customer names, encrypted credit or debit card numbers, expiration dates, and other information relating to customer orders,' according to a company blog post. The attack exposes a weakness in the company's new Creative Cloud subscription model, which omits the 'bits-in-a-box' distribution method in favor of faster access to software updates through a monthly subscription. Click through for more. 

Ricoh has released firmware v2.03 for its GR enthusiast compact. The list of updated features includes support for Raw file transfer via Eye-Fi card, the ability to use 1/2500 sec shutter speed with maximum aperture and a 47mm-equivalent crop mode. Also new is a 'Maximum Aperture Priority' setting available in Program and Manual exposure modes. Click through for a link to download the latest firmware version.

Another contender has entered the relatively small ring of Raw converters that can work with Fujifilm's X-Trans sensors: Photo Ninja. The latest version of this already-capable image editor has added 'preliminary' support for X-Trans Raw, and early results seem promising. To see how this $129 software performs, click through to see side-by-side comparisons.

Nikon's new Coolpix P7800 arrived in our Seattle office a few days ago and we've been doing our best to get as many sample images as possible on it, despite the unpredictable autumn weather. We've managed to create a small gallery of samples, taken in a range of different conditions to show off what the camera can do. There's more on the way, but for now, check out our gallery of pictures from Nikon's newest zoom compact flagship. 

GoPro has revealed two revised and improved action cameras, as the updated Hero 3+ line. The tiny yet rugged cameras are smaller than their popular predecessors yet still pack some impressive specs. See what's changed in the new Hero 3+ Black Edition and Hero 3+ Silver Edition today on connect.dpreview.com.

DxO Labs has released version 8.3.2 of its Optics Pro RAW conversion and image correction software, adding support for the Canon EOS 70D and the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-RX1R. It also adds 448 extra camera/lens combinations to the library of optics correction modules. Click through for the full press release, including download links.

Just a quick update on a couple of new forums we've added over the weekend. The first is Feedback and Suggestions, a place for your questions, feedback and suggestions for the DPReview team (both technical and editorial). We hope this will be a more efficient and more effective method than the feedback form / email system we had previously, and will ensure we don't miss bugs, suggestions and feedback that until now has been spread over dozens of forums. The second new forum is Photographic Science and Technology: a home for those wishing to discuss  advanced technical matters related to imaging science outside the brand-specific forums. It's also intended to be the place for less technically-minded readers to pose questions of our community's smartest eggheads.

Leica has announced the Elmarit-S 45 mm f/2.8 ASPH lens for its medium format S system. With an angle of view equivalent to a 35mm lens on full frame, it offers a classic moderate wide-angle field of view. Like several of the other S lenses it'll be available in two versions, either with or without an in-lens 'Central Shutter' (that allows flash sync at shutter speeds up to 1/1000 sec). At the same time, Leica is offering firmware updates for its S, S2 and S2-P cameras to give 'optimum functionality' with the lens. The Elmarit-S 45 mm f/2.8 ASPH will be in dealers this month at a price of £4650, or £5500 for the CS model.

We all know that smartphones are being equipped with better and better cameras, but few of us would ever consider using one for 'serious' photography except in an emergency. Nokia's 'conversations' blog is featuring an interesting project by its own 'camera expert', Ari Partinen and colleague Marko Saari, who wanted to see whether the new Nokia Lumia 1020, which features a 41 megapixel 'PureView' sensor, could hold its own in a studio fashion shoot. The results might surprise you.