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Re: Just posted: Apple iPad 2: Tool or Toy?

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photo_rb said:
The screen glare is easily fixed with a $10 matte overlay.
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Sure, but then the screen looks like crap. You can also correct for all of the design shortcomings by buying this gizmo or that. But then you go from $600 tablet to a backpack full of gizmos that approaches a kilobuck.

--

Modern cyberspace is a deadly festering swamp, teeming with dangerous programs such as 'viruses', 'worms', 'Trojan horses' and 'licensed Microsoft software' that can take over your computer and render it useless. -- Dave Barry
 
Choice said:
Choice said:
Conversely, why would any serious photographer choose that thinkpad over a 15" or 17" screen laptop?
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Gee, I don't know, but maybe because he's already carrying loads of photo gear and doesn't want to add the 17" monstrosity that weighs 12 lbs and has 45 mins of battery life. A small but powerful laptop that can get 5-6 hours is a reasonable compromise. Especially since most photographers are dexterous enough to swap batteries (no matter what Steve Jobs thinks).
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Unless you fancy having a go yourself!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnjtvMCndcw

Any company that can't design a product that allows easy access to the battery (ala not taking it apart) is seriously lacking in the design department.

Of course some might say it's a cash cow to get users to send their Apple stuff back at a cost for replacement batteries.

I won't touch Apple products because of this.

And looking at that video you can see how little is in the actual unit I'd say quite a nice profit margin on these.
 
xperimental said:
Why should any serious photographer choose iPad over this?

http://www.techspot.com/news/42710-lenovo-readies-thinkpad-x220-with-sandy-bridge-ips-panel.html
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That's simple. Battery life. You see, ipad battery tops out 10 hrs (12 max). The Thinkpad with 9 cell unit can go 15 hrs. Since batteries are swappable, that can be doubled or even tripled. When is this serious photographer going to get any sleep?

With quad core hyper-threaded CPU and 8 GB of RAM, he may spend all his time working in photoshop and not even bother with angry birds. The Rovio IPO would have to be canceled and the fragile ipad app industry would collapse wreaking devastation throughout all of world's economies and then where would we all be?

--

Modern cyberspace is a deadly festering swamp, teeming with dangerous programs such as 'viruses', 'worms', 'Trojan horses' and 'licensed Microsoft software' that can take over your computer and render it useless. -- Dave Barry
 
Outdoorphotgrapher hyped it up as a must have, but I see that a conventional laptop is way more useful to a photog. No point regurgitating all the pluses and minuses. Personally, I prefer to see things on 1920 (long way) screen even though I make no practice of editing in the field. Not being able to plug in CF/SD card...well, Mr Jobs you lost me immediately...and I no longer care if it could start my vehicle in the morning.

Although I don't have a cell phone (WHAT? I hear), it desn't mean that I don't embrace the technology. It's quite simple, I get what I need...and I have an extra thick firewall, in regard to the "latest and greatest". My pov.

Leswick
 
If he only knows 12lb laptops with 45 min battery life, it's time for him to switch to a Mac.
Choice said:
Choice said:
Conversely, why would any serious photographer choose that thinkpad over a 15" or 17" screen laptop?
Click to expand...
Gee, I don't know, but maybe because he's already carrying loads of photo gear and doesn't want to add the 17" monstrosity that weighs 12 lbs and has 45 mins of battery life. A small but powerful laptop that can get 5-6 hours is a reasonable compromise. Especially since most photographers are dexterous enough to swap batteries (no matter what Steve Jobs thinks).

--

Modern cyberspace is a deadly festering swamp, teeming with dangerous programs such as 'viruses', 'worms', 'Trojan horses' and 'licensed Microsoft software' that can take over your computer and render it useless. -- Dave Barry
Click to expand...
 
Barry Fitzgerald said:
Mark B. said:
I personally know pro photographers that would disagree with you. Post your reply above on the Pro Forum and see how many agree with you.
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Do I care?

The range of chest bangers over on the pro forum is unrivalled

And I don't shoot Canon either but most would say they are the best brand to use something wrong with not following what others say or do?
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I shoot Canon and I would also disagree with that statement. What's more important is the skill level of the photographer - not the name on the front of the camera. If Canon was the best why isn't every pro using it?

Nobody is saying that every pro should use an iPad. What I'm saying is don't be so close minded to say that just because you personally can't see the value, don't expand that to every photographer and say none should use it.
Member said:
Member said:
I don't have one, nor do I make a significant amount of money from photography. But I can see how it could be used in certain situations. It's obviously not meant as a laptop replacement; rather it is a supplement.
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Problem is for the price it simply does not add up you really would be better served with a laptop. I prefer print for presentation myself no ipad will ever rival a real print
for displaying work to clients. Guess that's the old fashioned view..so be it!
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Again, you're trying to compare it to a laptop which it's not. Ultra portability, instant start up & shut down, and ease of use are the strengths.

You're entitled to your opinion, but don't force it on everybody else. In your own words, "something wrong with not following what others say or do?"

Mark
 
OK, I read a lot of the posts and I am still unclear as to why I "need" this thing.

Work with my images?

I use a desktop machine for beating them into submission, not some electro -etch-a -sketch that I may wish to use in an airport.

Moreover, why on earth would I want to be retouching outside my studio anyway? I don't want to work 24/7 or act like some poseur in an airport.

I am a professional. People come to my studio or visit my website to view my images. I do not meet people in Starbucks like a Craig's lister.

As for apps, I have yet to see any that are compelling. Many are cute but seldom rise beyond novelty.

In the end, once everyone is over the WOW factor it will be a ho-hum fashion accessory that everyone seems to own.
 
Actually it doesn't. I didn't notice a quality difference when I put the overlay on and no one else notices. Also I use my iPad in a lot of situations where it the screen can easily get scratched so it fulfills two functions.
Choice said:
Choice said:
The screen glare is easily fixed with a $10 matte overlay.
Click to expand...
Sure, but then the screen looks like crap. You can also correct for all of the design shortcomings by buying this gizmo or that. But then you go from $600 tablet to a backpack full of gizmos that approaches a kilobuck.
Click to expand...
 
People have the impression that if the iPad doesn't fully replace a high powered laptop or desktop workstation, then it's just a toy. Well, the problem with that kind of thinking is that most, if not all, of us iPad owners already have powerful laptop and desktop workstations to do the "serious work" and heavy lifting of which you speak. Where the iPad comes in as to fill the slot between our laptop/desktop workstations, and...say...my cell phone.

For example, I already have a Windows desktop workstation, a 17" Windows laptop, a 13" Windows laptop, and a 4.3" Android phone. And yet with all these devices, I still find the iPad to be an extremely valuable tool!







So in spite of having all these other devices, how is the iPad still a valuable tool?

Well, for one thing, it has a gorgeous 24-bit near-studio-monitor quality screen that is wows anyone who looks at it, and that's valuable for when I show my images to potential clients. If you have any doubts on the quality of the iPad's screen, read here (links to various tests and reviews within):

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1014&message=37978697

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1014&message=37986184

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1014&message=38003132

Plus, it's a fraction of the weight of my laptops, has 10 hour battery life that blows away my laptops, and even when I do need to plug it in, the charger is barely larger than the charger for my cell phone! All this makes portability and freedom a major value-point of the iPad. When I leave the house to meet a client or go about town, all I need is my cell phone and my iPad.

As for storage capacity, sure I would love it if the iPad had a terabyte of storage. But I only have the 32GB iPad (first gen), and I've loaded it full of hundreds of images, including dozens of full-color PDF books and magazines (it's an excellent full-color magazine-sized PDF/book/magazine reader), a few movies (it's an excellent movie viewer as well), lots of apps (lots of very useful apps), and I still have room to spare. No, you can't bring every RAW file you've shot in the last few weeks, but why would you want to? If I want to work on my RAW files, I'll use my workstations.

As for its value to the professional photographer, I suggest you watch and hear what other well established photographers are saying about the iPad. This is fashion and celebrity photographer Challenge Roddie, talking about how valuable the iPad has been for him:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23Ud66j47eA&feature=related (jump to 2:30 to get to the meat of what he's talking about)

And here's the perspective of an iPad skeptic, commercial & editorial photographer Sara Rossignol:

http://www.piewacketblog.com/journal/2010/6/8/the-ipad-according-to-pie.html

Of course, there are some people who will scream that because the iPad can't do everything that their laptop or desktop PC's can do, it's just a toy. But conversely, there are things that my iPad can do that can't be done on my laptop and desktop PC. Each tool has its place. When you open a toolbox full of tools , you find that there are a wide variety of tools that do different things well. There's no one tool that can do everything well. That's how I see my Windows PCs, my iPad, and my Android phone. Each is a tool , and each has its own inherent value . Yes, they have overlap in what they can do. But they also have their own strengths.
Unum sed Leonem said:
Obviously, a toy.
Let me explain:
  • 132 PPI pixel density.
  • Starts at 16 GB storage.
  • Does not work with a Wacom pen (or similar); is capacitative-input only!
  • Undefined display profile; shows colours very differently than a (calibrated) desktop.
Let me clarify for the uninitiated. The following is required for it to be seriously considered for proper work:
  • Must be minimum of 300 PPI or more pixel density.
  • 16 GB! That's quite the joke! 128 GB at the very, very minimum at this point! In two-three years, 500 GB minimum would do. Not 16!
  • Capacitative touchscreen technology is in most respects excellent! But for serious work it will never suffice. A dual-input (capacitative touch and Wacom pen) would suffice very well for photographers' needs - both professional and personal. Nothing less will.
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xperimental said:
Why should any serious photographer choose iPad over this?

http://www.techspot.com/news/42710-lenovo-readies-thinkpad-x220-with-sandy-bridge-ips-panel.html
Click to expand...
Why can't a serious photographer get both? A laptop has its advantages, and an iPad has its advantages.

For example, I have a 17" Windows laptop, a 13" Windows laptop, and an iPad (all of which can be seen below). Each has value to me. But I can definitely tell you this: when I am out and about, or meeting with clients, or on a shoot, the only thing I take with me is my iPad...not my laptops.





Also, the thing about these smaller laptops with their widescreens is that while images may look nice in landscape orientation, images look way too small when they are portrait orientation images! With an iPad, you can turn it to portrait orientation, which means portraits can be viewed with a vertical height of 8 inches, which is much taller than what you're going to get with that Thinkpad. That makes a big difference when you're meeting with clients.

 
whitebird said:
In addition to a reported "leak" of the LED back light around edges of the screen, there have also been some comments concerning black level and contrast in comparison to first revision (and some other tablets as well). The screens are also very glossy, and can be a problem in some light.

Display quality, color rendition, contrast, and reflectivity would all certainly would impact the device's usefulness as a photographer's tool. Perhaps that could be an addendum to the article?
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I'm sure you've heard of the photographic and print guru, Ctein? He's fellow contributing editor to Photo Techniques Magazine. Writer of such highly regarded books as "Post Exposure" and "Digital Restoration." Double degree from Caltech. Written over 250 articles and manuals on photographic topics. The man has been around a long time, has enormous experience, and is very well respected.

"Part fine-art photographer and part computer wizard." — Photo District News

"Ctein is an exceptionally fine printer — one of the last of the true old-fashioned photographic craftsmen. And the guy has a mind like an encyclopaedia." — Mike Johnston , Editor, PHOTO Techniques





Needless to say, he's a very well regarded person, very knowledgeable, and very demanding when it comes to the equipment and monitor screens he works with. Very demanding. Here's what Ctein had to say about the iPad's screen:

"The day they came out, in early April, my friend Mark Richards bought one. He showed it to me that weekend. I pulled up some difficult-to-render photographs from my website and pixel-peeped like mad. The iPad had a near-studio-quality display . (Truth is I've seen studio displays that were worse; I'm just very fussy.) The iPad held gamma well with changing viewing angle, and if it wasn't running full 24-bit color with no dithering, it was faking it well enough that I couldn't tell."

After careful consideration and testing, he eventually bought one, and here's what he had to say:

"iPad color out of the box is acceptable. Not as good as a studio monitor, but close enough for serious work, and much, much better than anything I could get in a portable device before. I can use it for making serious refinements to a photograph, which was, after all, the point."

And...

"There went a grand, but what did that get me? A portable dual-display rig with a studio-quality display that's touch sensitive, so I can brush directly on the photo I'm working on. Definitely worth it to me."





Read the full article here:

http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2010/07/why-i-needed-an-ipad.html

There's also Anandtech's test:

"We also measured and were able to get color gamut volumes and uncalibrated Delta-E performance as well. However, we're not entirely convinced that these numbers are sound. The remote desktop software common to the iPad and iPhone 3GS we used offered 24 bit color depth at maximum, and the test results for both the iPhone 3GS and iPad turned out very similar. We're talking down to 0.01 Delta-E in some cases. For that reason, we're excluding the data we've obtained for color tracking until we're positive the numbers are right. Of course, the iPad itself remains 24-bit color, same as in previous versions of iPhone OS.

...Whatever the numbers say, the display is beautiful in use and blows away most others."

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3640/apples-ipad-the-anandtech-review/7

And there's Displaymates test:
http://www.displaymate.com/iPad_2_ShootOut.htm

As for the glossy screen, I put a semi-matte screen protector on it which greatly diminishes finger smudges and all but eliminates glossy reflection. But even without the screen protector, the gloss screen and smudges were never really an issue when directly viewing the iPad screen. I found it was only distracting when in very bright environments, or when the iPad was turned off. The funny thing is that I could be using the iPad for an hour with no problems, then only when I turned the iPad off did I then realize "wow, look at all those smudges!" Haha.
 
Barry Fitzgerald said:
Any company that can't design a product that allows easy access to the battery (ala not taking it apart) is seriously lacking in the design department.
Click to expand...
I guess that applies to the Motorola Xoom, too. No user replaceable battery either. You have to take it apart:

http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Motorola-Xoom-Teardown/4989/1
Member said:
Of course some might say it's a cash cow to get users to send their Apple stuff back at a cost for replacement batteries.
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For $99, you get your iPad replaced.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/13/dead-ipad-battery-never-mind-replacing-it-apple-just-sends-ano/

Most laptop replacement batteries alone will cost about that much anyways! At least that much! For example, a replacement battery for a 10" Dell Inspiron Mini netbook costs $149!
Member said:
I won't touch Apple products because of this.
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Sounds like a good deal to me.
 
JulesJ said:
On an iPad? Tell me how.
Jules
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You can use the Skyfire browser for iPad, but I use iSwifter. It works better. Basically, the Flash site gets rendered on iSwifter's servers and gets sent to your iPad. So the processing is done on their end, not yours.
 
T3 said:
Barry Fitzgerald said:
Any company that can't design a product that allows easy access to the battery (ala not taking it apart) is seriously lacking in the design department.
Click to expand...
I guess that applies to the Motorola Xoom, too. No user replaceable battery either. You have to take it apart:

http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Motorola-Xoom-Teardown/4989/1
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Oh, and did I mention the Samsung Galaxy Tab doesn't have a user accessible battery either (at least not without a teardown)?

http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/02/samsung-galaxy-tab-undressed-reveals-massive-battery-video/
 
The thing is, there's tablet computers, and the modern day ARM based phone-esque tablets. And you'll have to really consider your needs when going with a ARM based tablet to be sure you're willing to sacrifice all that computing power, software-support, calibration and connectivity just for half a kilo in weight, less than one centimeter in thickness and a couple of hours of battery life.
T3 said:
Why can't a serious photographer get both? A laptop has its advantages, and an iPad has its advantages.

For example, I have a 17" Windows laptop, a 13" Windows laptop, and an iPad (all of which can be seen below). Each has value to me. But I can definitely tell you this: when I am out and about, or meeting with clients, or on a shoot, the only thing I take with me is my iPad...not my laptops.

Also, the thing about these smaller laptops with their widescreens is that while images may look nice in landscape orientation, images look way too small when they are portrait orientation images! With an iPad, you can turn it to portrait orientation, which means portraits can be viewed with a vertical height of 8 inches, which is much taller than what you're going to get with that Thinkpad. That makes a big difference when you're meeting with clients.
Click to expand...
 
Jon Rty said:
The thing is, there's tablet computers, and the modern day ARM based phone-esque tablets. And you'll have to really consider your needs when going with a ARM based tablet to be sure you're willing to sacrifice all that computing power, software-support, calibration and connectivity just for half a kilo in weight, less than one centimeter in thickness and a couple of hours of battery life.
Click to expand...
I think the problem is that people keep thinking a lightweight, lighter-powered tablet like an iPad needs to compete with the power of a tablet computer. I don't need the iPad to do any heavy processing and heavy lifting. That's what I have my laptops and workstations for. What I need from my iPad is to have a beautiful screen, beautiful interface, gobs of battery life, be lightweight and slim enough for me to take everywhere, and for people (ie, my clients) to enjoy using it. Everything else besides that is just gravy. So by having a powerhouse computer and a slim, lightweight, battery-goes-forever device like an iPad, I can have the best of both worlds.

It's like people who wonder if they should get a 35mm lens or an 85mm lens. Get both! They serve two different purposes. Sure, they both happen to be lenses that focus images, but besides that they are quite different and fit different tasks. The same goes for a high-powered computer vs a light-weight tablet. Have both, and get the benefits of both. It's not a matter of "sacrificing". When I am out and about with my iPad, I don't see any "sacrificing". I value it for what it does well. And I use it as such.
 
This is obviously a heated topic, and it's no surprise that people want this to work- the iPad indeed has the potential to be the perfect photographer's field tool. It may actually come together soon, but it's really not there yet. I've been trying to use the iPad as a review and selection tool for almost a year, and while it's possible in some cases, the lack of stability and coherence among software and hardware is still the biggest obstacle. Too many hacks are necessary, and they don't always work. Many areas need to be refined, simplified and clarified by apple and the camera manufacturers before the iPad can be used as a serious tool. Hopefully they will realize there are thousands of users who view it as a tool and not a toy.

Personally, I don't need the iPad to be a raw processor. I think the muscle won't be there for several more generations. I do however want a simple and reliable viewer that can be tethered directly to a dslr wired or wirelessly, that can capture raw files, store them, and display a quick full res jpeg, whether that be one generated by the camera or by an app on the iPad, and then allow export via ftp, email, etc. That would solve 90% of my field problems. I think this is totally possible with today's hardware, iPad 1 or 2. It's just a matter of apple opening the cck up for third party access, and the camera manufacturers allowing direct ptp communication during capture mode so that photos can be transferred following each shot in real time.

I don't have time to mess with eyefi hacks, or wait for the built-in photos app to import and then import again into a third party app that may or may not crash and may or may not try to do way too much with a 25mb file beyond it's capabilities. I'll save the post processing for a more powerful machine. First things first. The iPad is a great tethered shooting tool, as long as we can lose the peripheral laptop/desktop. What's the point of a portable tablet when you need a less portable computer to make it function? Come on already- the decision between tool and toy lies within apple, canon, nikon and adobes hands. Or maybe someone younger with vision can figure out a way to show up the old boys and really do what needs to be done.

Crossing fingers.
 
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