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Updated: 1 hour 22 min ago

CES 2024: AI is inescapable

Fri, 01/12/2024 - 06:00
Images: Samsung

In the past few years, there has been no shortage of "AI" tech, shaking up the conventional wisdom in all corners of the photography world.

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Adobe has taken its "Firefly" generative AI out of beta and wrapped it into Creative Cloud, Google's Magic Eraser is making it practically trivial to remove people or objects from photos with the touch of a finger, AI-powered plugins are very close to undermining the whole idea of a watermark.

If you had any doubt that this trend would continue, CES 2024 should put it to rest. As the show closes on Friday, we've seen an absolute avalanche of AI products, features, promises, and prognostication, with companies like Samsung, Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm all placing the buzzword front and center in their press conferences.

Image: Intel

But at the center of the swirling AI hype storm is the ever-present question: What exactly are these companies talking about? If CES 2024 has provided any answer, it's: "No one particular thing."

Far from machines or computers or apps that can think for themselves or approximate human intelligence or creativity, 'AI' has lately and increasingly referred to the products of "machine learning," where computers are 'trained' on a set of data produced by actual humans and 'learn' to produce an equivalent unthinkingly, uncritically and to varying degrees of success.

What do companies mean when they say 'AI'? If CES 2024 has an answer, it's: 'No one particular thing.'"

In practice, 'AI' serves a few very specific purposes for the companies that use it as a technology and a buzzword. It's a useful shorthand to refer to the automation of complex or labor-intensive tasks. It's an excuse to add software features to products that might not have had them and to make those features relatively opaque, proprietary, and subscription- or cloud-dependent. Not least of all, it's a way for marketing teams to slap some sheen on otherwise uninteresting or superfluous functionality. A little extra jazz for when the specs don't tell a good enough story on their own.

You can see all of the above at play in some of the goofier AI reveals of this year's CES. Look no further than the AI grill that ostensibly learns from your ratings of its performance, or BMW's ChatGPT-powered companion, or the free TV with a chatbot for a remote (and also lots of ads), or Samsung's AI home assistant robot "Ballie," which has been coming soon since 2020.

The "Perfecta" AI grill

Image: Seergrills

Though AI is sometimes a gimmick, it is, of course, not only a gimmick, as CES has proven as well. Were it not serious, the actors' trade union SAG-AFTRA would not be making deals about future AI voice actors. Getty would not be partnering with NVIDIA to bring AI-generated imagery into the iStock fold instead of keeping it out. If AI did not promise a solution to real and deeply felt problems, the AI companion that promises to use all your annoying apps for you wouldn't have sold out the same day it was announced.

So what can CES 2024 tell us? What you probably already know and/or dread: The AI onslaught will not stop. This means more devices with janky features that change unpredictably with software updates. It means more services that demand the right to feed your work into the machine, typically articulated in fine print, far down in the terms and conditions that they're depending on you not to read. And, hopefully, it means less time doing boring, rote, unrewarding tasks.

"When AI makes obvious sense, it doesn't need to announce itself. It just takes over."

It's reasonable to see the tradeoffs here and want to opt out, but it's clear that the bet from big tech is to find the killer application that's too good to refuse. There is, of course, a theoretical tipping point, just like the pivot at which cameras tipped from film to digital, and mirrored to mirrorless when the objective advantages became too good to ignore.

Will AI tech get there? In some ways, it already has. The most obviously advantageous applications are already slipping into quiet dominance. Adobe's built-in AI Denoise is well-poised to replace third-party tools for all but the most decerning users. AI-based translation and transcription already reign supreme at lower price points and for personal use.

When AI makes obvious sense, it doesn't need to announce itself. It just takes over. But everywhere else? Well, get ready to keep hearing about it.

Categories: Photo News

Hopes, dreams and speculations for 2024: Shaminder’s wild ideas about the year ahead

Thu, 01/11/2024 - 06:00
What will we see in 2024?

The possibilities of a new year can inspire us to (re)ignite passions, set new goals or send the mind raveling in wild flights of fancy. In the grand scheme, the heavens do not notice that a rock has hurtled through the cosmos to retrace its steps once more, but on that rock, we humans take notice every January.

It’s customary to celebrate in one of three ways. It used to be four, but we no longer have checkbooks (as late as the mid-00s, it was still common in North America to write paper checks to pay for groceries or the electric bill, and we often wrote the wrong date for weeks at the start of a new year).

You can take the tried and true action of making a New Year's resolution or the equally tried and true action of loudly rejecting resolutions.

You can choose to sign up for a gym membership that you’ll use a handful of times and then try to cancel for six months.

Or, you can play the prediction game. That's the route I'm choosing today. We can't see into the future, but why not try anyway? Here are my predictions (best guesses) for 2024.

A brief diversion before we get started. These predictions are meant as a little fun with tongue firmly in cheek. Some serious, some not-so-serious, some wishes and dreams, but on some level, I'm aiming to be plausible and based on some truth. In other words, if I'm right, it's "I told you so," and if I'm wrong, "just kidding." Enjoy!

Global Shutter will be the buzzword of the year

I think this one is a no-brainer. There won't be any escaping 'global shutter' in 2024. With Sony's anticipated February release of the a9 III, there's a lot of hoopla about global shutter finally coming to a still photography camera.

We've already seen a wave of think pieces on how revolutionary this camera will be. YouTube is saturated with thumbnails, declaring it a 'game changer.'

I was recently surprised to hear from dozens of photojournalists wondering if they should preorder the a9 III ASAP. Surprising, because these same photojournalists have yet to make the switch to mirrorless systems, and yet here they are asking if this is THE camera that would convince them to leave DSLR behind finally.

Global shutter is nifty for doing away with rolling shutter and making flash sync a near afterthought, but it is not without its compromises. In our testing, we found that a9 III image quality takes a hit, particularly at higher ISO settings. It still makes sense for sports shooters, but its use of global shutter isn't the 'game changer' and future for every type of photography. (Not just yet anyway, maybe version 2 down the road?)

Still, that won't stop flame wars and talking points about global shutter this year.

More video features in cameras

Contrary to popular belief, camera video features don't necessarily make a still photography camera more expensive. Rather, video feature improvements overlap with ways to improve still camera features. The performance gains and R&D costs are shared across stills and video, and one way or another, we're paying for them.

What do I mean? Let's look at sensor readout speeds and processors. Faster sensors and processors help video reduce rolling shutter, but they also improve autofocus and enable features such as subject recognition for stills. There are benefits for still photography as well as video, and the development costs don't necessarily increase costs for still photographers since they're already baked into the sensor development.

In other words, the costs are shared and any advancement in sensor speed for stills benefits video, and vice versa. More to the point, the costs are incurred even if you're only trying to do it just for stills. They're intrinsically linked, and taking one away doesn't make the other cheaper. So, let's embrace video and reap the benefits when it comes to photography features.

32-bit float audio will be hinted at in at least one camera

Audio has long been a neglected side of the video equation in cameras. Video editing dogma has foretold that viewers will forgive bad pictures but not bad sounds. For instance, who doesn't know someone who refused to watch Tenet due to sound issues?

From my experience, our cameras haven't always kept this in mind when thinking about how to implement audio. Monitoring sound quality isn't possible on most entry and mid-tier cameras, and it's often not until you get into more expensive cameras that you are graced with a headphone socket.

Without a way to monitor directly, we risk improperly setting gain levels to where we miss sounds that are too low or risk clipping sounds that are too high. Some cameras (mostly those targeted at vlogging) have recognized this and implemented clever auto mic modes, and while the results are better, they too run the risk of clipping, and the overall sound quality pales compared to properly monitored audio captured off-camera.

I think this is where 32-bit float audio may help. Unlike 16-bit (what our CDs use) or 24-bit audio (what most professionals use), 32-bit float audio uses scientific notation to capture a much wider range of distinct levels of sound. To better understand what this means, let's look at what each format is capable of: 16-bit files can capture a dynamic range of 96.3 decibels, 24-bit files top out at 144.5 decibels and 32-bit float goes up to 1,528 decibels.

This means 32-bit float files can capture a wider range of loud sounds before clipping, which means on a video shoot, bad sound can be one less thing to worry about. That's particularly helpful for solo productions where you're already consumed with lighting, framing, direction, camera operation and often racing against time. Who doesn't want one less thing to worry about, and why not let that be a thing that's crucial to the final result?

A quick caveat: 32-bit float audio is not a magic bullet. You still have to be in the ballpark on your initial capture settings, but that ballpark is now an astronomically larger field so it is easier not to mess it up.

I don't think we'll see it show up in a camera in 2024, but I have a feeling one manufacturer (I'm betting Blackmagic Design) will announce plans to implement 32-bit float in an upcoming camera.

AI will bring into question the very nature of photos

What is a photograph? Is a photograph a document, art or something else entirely? Do photographs have to be real, or is the word 'photos' just another way to refer to all visuals that can pass for photorealism? The word photo means 'light,' so do photons need to be involved somewhere?

These weren't very hard questions a few years ago, but in 2024, we'll be asking ourselves some version of these questions constantly.

In the wake of AI, and before that, computational photography, our understanding of what defines a 'photo' has become a mishmash of qualifiers and footnotes.

We may say that, in essence, a photo is a natural light captured and preserved as a visual representation of a moment in time. But then, what of the photos coming from our smartphones? Our phones do not capture a single moment the same way our still cameras do, but rather as a burst of images that is computationally combined into an amalgamation of no actual moment in time. Is this still a photograph? Does it matter that a smartphone has taken 16 images and combined elements of each to make one image? Does a photo always have to be truthful?

We can now easily apply an artificial shallow depth of field, denoise, shift selective color, apply skin filters, remove or insert objects and people, and run automated AI adjustments. Are these still 'photos' in the classic definition, a definition referenced by social media ("pictures of it didn't happen") and through history as proof that something happened?

And then there is AI image-making. Prompt these tools with some text, and they computationally produce an image. Sure, it puts extra fingers on people's hands or does odd things with backgrounds, but it's improving fast, and with a little QA, you can produce work good enough to trick global contests into awarding you a prize.

The journalism and documentary world has been grappling with these issues for years, World Press Photo at one point tried to define a 'photo' as something created by 'lens-based still photography,' a topic they revisited in 2023 to clarify that generative AI tools are also not eligible under their definition of photography.

In 2024, we'll be wrestling with these questions, and we'll come up with many definitions for what makes a 'photo' a photo.

Fake images and deep fake video will be everywhere

Hand in hand with the AI question, there will be the 'truth' question. 2024 is an election year in the US, meaning we'll see a ton of misinformation globally, with visuals offered as the 'proof' of their validity.

We've already seen early signs of official political campaigns using AI imagery and trying to portray them as real. There are also individuals seeding AI-generated audio and video clips on social media in an attempt to cast public figures in a false light.

In years past, we have seen outlandishly fake images of JFK Jr. meeting with Barack Obama or seen people get creative with fun clips of actors recast in older films, but in 2024, we'll see faked images weaponized like never before. Having a strong sense of media literacy and a conviction that faked images are harmful will be our main defense, if we care.

To give us the tools to verify and practice media literacy, expect to see more cameras implement C2PA and CAI authentication standards in 2024 (C2PA is the technical side focused on setting standards, and CAI is the educational side focused on identifying features to develop, open-source tools and fostering community about content authenticity.)

These are two parts of an industry-wide adoption of cryptographic metadata, which will produce a secure record of an image file's provenance and edit history. Tools to track the source and edits of images will be used chiefly by media organizations and archivists, but the tools will be freely available to the public for anyone to verify images independently. I'm personally excited to see this coming to market in 2024, as it's one more way to empower people to sort fact from fiction in a world filled with misinformation.

Canon might ruffle some feathers

If you're releasing a camera targeted at sports and documentary journalists, there's no better time than the summer Olympics. Not only do you have a global event to rally around, but you're also hitting publishers during a year when newsrooms have allocated budgets toward acquiring new equipment they may need to cover the games.

The lead-up to the summer games will spread rumors that Canon will finally announce the long-speculated EOS R1. I'm personally not so sure, I have a feeling we may see Canon announce the R3 Mark II ahead of the Olympics instead. This will cause the DPReview forums to ignite, with one faction demanding an R1, another embracing the R3 Mark 2, and the rest declaring that <insert your brand> is far superior and only <insert your favorite insult here> like Canon.

Canon should release a 'retro' camera

I think this is the year. Canon, having seen the writing on the walls, could finally give consumers what they've long been demanding – a retro-inspired camera. I don't have any insider knowledge or definitive reason to think this, but it seems that after the success Fujifilm and Nikon have had with retro-inspired cameras, it's time for Canon to get their own slice of the pie. And unlike Sony, the other major player to hold out on joining the trend, Canon actually has vintage gear to revisit for inspiration.

To me, the best candidate for a modern take is the Canon AE-1 35mm film camera. The AE-1 still fetches a respectable sum on eBay, and it's pretty handsome to look at. This is a key design principle for a retro cam, as it has to be as much fun to use as it is to be seen using. Its classic lines, the tight layout of buttons, and the all-important silver trim check all the boxes for a 'retro' camera.

To be fair, Canon, which sold nearly 50% of all cameras in 2023 industry-wide, doesn't really need a niche product like this when they're already dominating the mainstream. But there's something to be said for marque halo products that create emotional ties to a brand, while also showing off that they're one of the enduring heritage brands of photography. It doesn't matter if everyone will buy one, it matters that they're talking about you and may opt for a lower-priced entry camera even if they can't afford the shiny status symbol product.

Pentax film camera gets a little closer

Speaking of film cameras, in 2024, I think we'll see Ricoh release another update on its Pentax film camera project. It will indeed be cool. Some will guffaw at the over-emphasis on the film advance lever (while secretly wanting to try it). And we'll wonder why Ricoh still hasn't announced a release date. Ultimately, I think we'll find as the year ends that 2025 is the year it'll finally arrive.

X is not gonna give it to ya

This isn't core camera gear, but it is about how we consume photography and how we expose younger people to their definition of photography. Like it or not, social media plays an outsized role in the type of images we as a culture value and seek to create.

If you've been following the Twitter to X transition at home, you know that the company continues to fiddle with schemes to monetize its platform. I think in 2024, we'll see an attempt from X to try and charge people to upload photos. The preceding 48 hours will see a quick outcry from the 17 people who pay for Twitter Blue Premium, causing X's CEO to start a public poll and quickly reverse course. It's not a sexy prediction, but like I said up top, it's plausible, and that's why it's here.

I'm obviously being a little dramatic here. Twitter/X has not historically been a big player among photo platforms; it plays an outsized role among journalists and the sharing of photojournalism news images (this is the world I come from and definitely why it's on my mind).

Outside of an initial wave (TwitPic before Hipstamatic and Instagram arrived on the scene), Twitter/X has never caught on with creators. Still, I think it's worth paying attention to the platforms' flailing attempts to generate income in 2024, as it might point to where other players in the social media space will eventually try to generate revenue from users.

Apple's near-sighted vision

The onslaught has begun; we now know that Apple Vision Pro headsets will hit store shelves in Feburary. In the day leading up to release day, expect a campaign to frothily whip the public into a frenzy of techno-lust and desire for the virtual reality/mixed reality/3D camera/spatial computing device. On the eve of release day, everyone will be queued online from bed, with visions of digital sugar plums in their head. Come morning, filled with wonder, we will be encumbered under a weight to 'think different,' and ask the biggest question, "What do you do with this?"

When the Vision Pro arrives, no one will be sure what to do with it. Without a large user base, who is there to see the cool and innovative things people are making? There are some excellent experiential journalism and documentary projects and some innovative video games, but these have been around for years, serving the same limited user base established by other brands over the years.

I think in the end, Apple is going to face the same challenge HTC, Meta, Sony, Samsung, Google and others have faced – VR/MR is a solution looking for a problem and only makes sense as a niche entertainment product for people willing to pay a premium for it.

Naming lens will become a trend

Naming things that historically haven't been named (tropical storms come to mind) has been a trend driven by the hashtag. Attaching a # to your moniker is one way to help others organize and find you on social media. Nikon seems to have recognized the benefits of a named lens when it followed up the Noct with the Plena in 2023. (Although for the record, I think we can give the Noct a pass as it was a nod to the original Noct released in 1977.)

There were a lot of very novel and interesting lenses in 2023, but the special name helped the Plena stand out from the crowd. Seeing this success, I expect other manufacturers to start assigning special monikers as well. It makes too much marketing and SEO sense not to, and it's low-hanging fruit to get any advantage in the marketplace.

Even more vlogging cameras

I think this might be one of the most obvious 'predictions' I have for the year ahead. In 2024, expect more vlogging cameras, maybe even some updates to relatively recent models.

These cameras do well with entry-level and social media creators and can be a stepping stone from smartphones to mid-range cameras. They aren't the most fancy cameras, but vlogging cameras do what they promise, and I think they will continue to sell enough to justify yet more vlogging cameras in 2025. (Although I would like to see them beef up their manual controls and not be so touchscreen-dependent for every adjustment.)

Generation Alpha is coming to drink your milkshake

The coming year will see a large shift in how media is created and consumed and who it is targeted for. Generation Alpha, the lazily named generation after Gen Z, is hitting their teens in 2024, and that means pop culture and marketing will shift toward what gets this group excited, sharing and buying. For photography, this will influence how our photos and videos will look for the next decade.

We'll start to see Gen Alpha first take over social media from Gen Z and with it, usher in a wave of late-2000s inspired high key flash portraits, digicam noise, artificial film grain filters, poppy color, prism photography, and raw style of video editing reminiscent of the French New Wave. The photo composition du jour will be all about absurdism and odd juxtapositions. (Or maybe I'm wrong? What do you think?)

Many new trends are coming – things will look 'cruddy' or wow us with creativity, and personally I'm excited to see what happens.

What's your take?

And there you have it. A fever dream of hopes, dreams and delirium. How many do you agree with? Where have I fallen off my rocker? What are your personal wild predictions for 2024? Let me know in the comments; I'd love to hear it!

Categories: Photo News

Nikon Zf added to studio scene

Wed, 01/10/2024 - 07:00

As part of completing our Nikon Zf review, we've run the camera through our standard test scene, to see how it performs.

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As usual, this means it can now be selected from within other reviews, so you can compare it to the cameras of your choosing.

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The Zf is based around a 24MP full-frame BSI CMOS sensor which has to crop in to a 1.5x crop to deliver its highest-speed 4K/60p video footage. Those are very familiar specs, shared with the existing Z6 II and the likes of Panasonic's S5 models, so it probably shouldn't come as unexpected that the Zf's image quality holds no great surprises.

It captures a good amount of detail and, with its dual conversion gain sensor, the performance both at moderately high$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5844--1455016584").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5844); }); }) and very high ISO$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5845-279875647").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5845); }); }) is very good.

Nikon's default JPEG sharpening is very large radius, so it appears to be capturing less detail$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5846-345180885").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5846); }); }) than its peers (even though we know from the Raws$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5847--315668740").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5847); }); }) that this isn't the case). Color exhibits standard Nikon response$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5848--1838968747").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5848); }); }) with lots of punch and saturation. Yellows are vibrant with no green or orange tint but the pink closest to a generic caucasian skintone is notably brighter and more pink than either the Sony or Canon renderings.

The Zf's noise reduction at high ISO$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5850--2076747484").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5850); }); }) smooths away noise pretty well but takes a lot of the fine detail$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5849--698116929").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5849); }); }) with it. Up against the likes of Sony, which applies context-sensitive noise reduction, the Nikon's output can seem a little soft in low light.

Buy now:

$1997 at B&H Photo $1997 kit at Adorama $1997 at Amazon
Categories: Photo News

DPReview Reader's Choice Awards 2023: Product of the Year

Tue, 01/09/2024 - 07:00
Product of the Year 2023: the results

The final round of voting has closed, and it's time to reveal the winner of our annual Reader's Choice Awards! Beginning in December, DPReview readers picked their favorite cameras, zoom lenses and prime lenses released in 2023. The winners of the first round of voting were then pitted against each other for the title of Product of the Year. Take a look and see which products came out on top.

Honorable mention: Sony FE 20-70mm F4 G

The Sony FE 20-70mm F4 G may not have won our Reader's Choice survey for Best Zoom Lens of 2023, but when put up against the best of the best, it surged forward into the third place position in this year's survey, earning it an honorable mention. It's easy to see the attraction of this lens: those extra four millimeters at the wide end make it much more versatile than a standard 24-70mm zoom, and its compact size makes it a great walkaround lens for applications ranging from landscape to travel.

Of course, those extra millimeters only matter if image quality is up to snuff, and the 20-70mm F4 G delivers where it counts. It's very sharp wide open, produces pleasing bokeh, and does a good job of controlling flare. Even videographers have reason to consider this lens: it's possible to combine Sony's Active SteadyShot and breathing compensation features and still maintain a roughly 24mm field of view. Between its zoom range, size, performance and price, it's easy to understand why so many readers voted for the Sony FE 20mm F4 G.

Buy now:

$1098 at B&H $1098 at Adorama $1098 at Amazon Honorable mentinon: Nikon Zf

Readers have been clamoring for years for a new full-frame retro camera from Nikon. How do we know? Because every time we covered a retro camera from another company, we could always depend on the Nikon faithful to jump into the comments thread and ask when Nikon would deliver one.

Well, they finally went and did it with the Nikon Zf, and apparently, it is what you wanted because it received the second-highest vote count in our Reader's Choice Product of the Year survey. The Zf's design is an homage to Nikon's FM2 and F3 SLRs from the early 1980s, but despite looking like an aged film camera, it ticks off all the essential boxes on a modern enthusiast camera's spec sheet. It would be a solid choice from a price/performance perspective, but that's not what makes this camera special. Instead, it's the nostalgia factor: the experience of using it, the joy of carrying it around your neck, or even just holding it and admiring it for what it is. The fact that it's incredibly competitive in its class is a bonus. Nikon users have waited a long time for this camera, but it turns out the wait was worth it.

Buy now:

$1997 at B&H Photo $1997 kit at Adorama $1997 at Amazon Winner: Nikon Z8

The winner of our 2023 Reader's Choice Product of the Year award goes to the Nikon Z8, which ran away with 53.8% of the total vote to win by an overwhelming margin. It probably shouldn't surprise us: in 2021, the Z8's big brother, the Z9, won the same award by similarly impressive numbers. The only problem? The Z9's large, dual grip body and $5500 price point made it impractical for most enthusiasts. Well, Nikon solved that problem with the Z8.

Make no mistake – the Z8 is a product built to meet the needs of pro users, and it can do just about anything the Z9 can, but at a price more within reach of dedicated enthusiasts. It offers the same 46MP Stacked CMOS sensor, high-speed burst rates, pre-burst options and video specs found on the Z9, but in a smaller body that's more sensible for many photographers. In many ways, the Z8 is the spiritual successor to the Nikon D850, one of the greatest – if not the greatest – DSLR ever made, yet it outperforms the D850 in almost every way. We have little doubt that the Z8 will be considered a classic, and it's easy to understand why our readers chose it as their Product of the Year.

As always, thanks to everyone who voted in our polls. We appreciate your participation and couldn't do any of this without you!

Buy now:

$3696 at Amazon $3696 at B&H $3696 at Adorama
Categories: Photo News

Panasonic Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro sample gallery

Tue, 01/09/2024 - 06:00

Panasonic's Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro is a full-frame L-mount lens that's designed to be compact and lightweight, coming in at 82mm (3.2") long and 74mm (2.9") in diameter and tipping the scales at 298g (10.5 oz). Hands-on, we can confirm it is very tidy and light.

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The Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro's primary goal is to be a versatile portraiture and medium telephoto lens as well as a compact macro, and it has a minimum focusing distance of 0.204m (8.03″). We took the lens out for some street portraits and macro shots of everyday objects, and you'll find a range of frames to inspect in the gallery.

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View our Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro sample gallery

Note: Please do not reproduce any of these images on a website or any newsletter/magazine without prior permission (see our copyright page). We make the originals available for private users to download to their own machines for personal examination or printing (in conjunction with this review); we do so in good faith, so please don't abuse it.

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Categories: Photo News

Panasonic announces Lumix S 100mm F2.8 macro lens, ultra compact and more than just a macro

Mon, 01/08/2024 - 10:45
Image: Panasonic

In conjunction with CES 2024, Panasonic has announced the Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro lens for full-frame L-mount cameras. Panasonic calls it "the world’s smallest and lightest medium-telephoto fixed focal length macro lens." However, as important as its size and weight is versatility: Panasonic tells us its goal was to produce a macro that can also handle portraiture and medium telephoto shooting with vanishingly few drawbacks.

Buy now:

$998 at B&H Photo $998 at Adorama

The 100mm F2.8 Macro is the same size as the other lenses in Panasonic's line of F1.8 L-mount prime lenses, though it breaks the mold with its smaller F2.8 aperture. At 298g (10.5 oz), it's also the second lightest in the suite, completing a span of lenses ranging from 18mm to 100mm, which differ by no more than 60g, within the margin of error for many gimbals and drones. It's 82mm (3.2") long and 74mm (2.9") in diameter.

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According to Panasonic, this makes it the world's smallest and lightest macro lens in its class, with a few caveats applied: smallest and lightest among autofocus-capable, full-frame lenses with a 1:1 magnification ratio and focal length of at least 90mm.

Part of the small size is owing to Panasonic's new 'Dual Phase linear motor', which it claims has allowed it to shrink the motor size by half while retaining the thrust of a motor twice the size. This allows the 100mm F2.8 to move its two independent focus groups smoothly, letting photographers focus on subjects near and far quickly and with optically corrected focus breathing. Additionally, Panasonic tells us the lens incorporates a newly designed aperture mechanism with a thinner profile and smaller physical diameter.

Image: Panasonic

Optically, the lens comprises 13 elements in 11 groups, including three aspherical, two UED, and one ED elements, and uses an internal focusing design. It has a minimum focus distance of 20.4cm (8"), includes a 67mm filter thread, and is designed to render identical colors to match the other lenses in its series. One nuanced touch: Panasonic says it replaced the white paint typically used for lens markings around the front element with a dark gray variety to ensure that those markings don't reflect off objects in macro photos.

Other features include a new sensor for the focus-by-wire system that provides six times more resolution for moving between focus steps, a focus limiter with the ability to program your own focus-limiting range in software, and dust- and splash-resistant construction.

We have the 100mm F2.8 Macro on hand and are putting it through its paces to test out Panasonic's performance claims, but purely in terms of form factor, this 100mm F2.8 has a unique appeal, especially for anyone interested in being able to swap lenses of various focal lengths in and out of a stabilization setup without having to bother with constant recalibration.

The Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro will be available later this month with an MSRP of $1,000.

Panasonic Announces its Newest S Series Lens at CES 2024

The LUMIX S-E100 is the world’s smallest and lightest* medium-telephoto fixed focal length macro lens

Las Vegas, NV (January 8, 2024) – Panasonic is pleased to introduce the brand new LUMIX S 100mm F2.8 MACRO (S-E100) lens based on the L-Mount system standard. Compact and lightweight to match the camera body, the S-E100 lens joins the LUMIX S Series lineup which is designed to address the demand for accessible yet professional grade photography gear.

With a new optical design and a newly developed Dual Phase linear motor, the S-E100 is the world’s smallest and lightest medium-telephoto fixed focal length macro lens, weighing approximately 298 grams. It boasts high resolution, stunning bokeh unique to macro lenses, excellent depth in expression, and fast focusing in a chassis matched to our existing F/1.8 series of lenses. At the same time, its compact nature ensures excellent mobility outdoors and in other shooting locations.

In addition to close proximity photography, the S-E100 also produces impressive portraits and images unique to medium-telephoto lenses, with support for fast autofocusing and bright F/2.8 aperture. Following increased demand for video capabilities, the S-E100 produces high-quality video content through silent operation with optically corrected focus breathing. This is due to the newly developed linear focus motor and micro-step aperture control. These features allow for smooth exposure change and the ability to choose between linear or nonlinear focus ring settings.

By providing cutting edge, improved performance and mobility for camera enthusiasts and professionals, LUMIX aims to create a new digital mirrorless camera market.

Main Features
  1. The World’s Smallest and Lightest* Medium-Telephoto Fixed Focal Length Macro Lens
    • A more compact structure thanks to an optical design, featuring a new Double Focus System, three aspherical lenses and a newly developed Dual Phase Linear Motor with a new actuator.
    • Suitable for use in a wide range of situations due to its excellent mobility, whether it’s close proximity photography, natural photos and portraits, or faster paced action, unique to medium telephoto lenses.
  2. High Resolution and Outstanding Photographic Performance
    • Boasts high resolution and elaborate photographic performance in every area, from the center of the image to its edges.
    • Captures every detail of the subject while creating bokeh unique to medium-telephoto macro lenses.
  3. Optimal Video Functionality for Video Production
    • Offers silent operation thanks to a newly developed Dual Phase Linear Motor.
    • Suppresses focus breathing, in which the angle of view changes, caused by movements in the focus position.
  4. Fast Autofocus performance for expanded capabilities
    • • Newly developed Dual Phase Linear Autofocus motor enables speed and precision for faster action tracking in both Photo and Video uses.
    • Ultra-High precision manual focus sensor allows for unparalleled manual focus precision, even when working at 1:1 macro.
  5. Unified Design and rendering
    • Designed to match our exiting F/1.8 series of lenses, the S-E100 allows photographers and videographers to maintain a unified experience from 18mm – 100mm with matched size, filter threads, and similar weight.
    • Image renders has been tuned within this series of lenses to produce unified color regardless of which lens is used.

The LUMIX S-E100 lens will be available at valued channel partners at the end of January 2024 for $999.99 MSRP.

* As of January 9, 2024. Among interchangeable lenses for AF compatible full-frame mirrorless cameras, and macro lenses with a magnification ratio of 1:1 with a focal length of 90mm or more.

Panasonic Lumix S 100mm F2.8 Macro specifications Principal specificationsLens typePrime lensMax Format size35mm FFFocal length100 mmImage stabilizationNoLens mountL-MountApertureMaximum apertureF2.8Minimum apertureF22Aperture ringNoNumber of diaphragm blades9OpticsElements13Groups11Special elements / coatings3 ASPH, 2 UED, 1 EDFocusMinimum focus0.20 m (8.03″)Maximum magnification1×AutofocusYesMotor typeLinear MotorFull time manualNoFocus methodInternalDistance scaleNoDoF scaleNoFocus distance limiterYesPhysicalWeight298 g (0.66 lb)Diameter74 mm (2.91″)Length82 mm (3.23″)SealingYesColourBlackFilter thread67 mm
Categories: Photo News

Sony a9 III review in progress

Mon, 01/08/2024 - 07:00
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Product photos: Richard Butler

The Sony a9 III is the company's latest high-speed pro sports camera. It features a Stacked CMOS sensor capable of shooting at 120 fps and able to read all its pixels out simultaneously: the long hoped-for 'global' shutter.

Key features
  • 24MP global shutter Stacked CMOS sensor
  • High speed shooting up to 120 fps
  • Pre-burst capture of up to 1 sec before the shutter is fully pressed
  • Shutter speeds up to 1/80,000 with flash sync across the full range
  • 9.44M dot (2048 x 1536px) OLED viewfinder with 0.9x magnification
  • 2.0M dot rear LCD with tilting cradle on a fully articulated hinge

The a9 III will be available in early 2024 at a recommended price of $6500. This is a $2000 increase over the previous iteration from 2019. A matching VG-C5 battery grip that provides space for two batteries is available for an additional $398.

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$5998 at Amazon $5998 at B&H $5998 at Adorama Index: What's new Global shutter sensor

The big news with the a9 III is the move to a sensor that offers a global electronic shutter: reading out all its pixels simultaneously so that there's no lag or rolling shutter effect. Such sensors have existed before (some CCD chips, for instance), but this is the first one to use a full-frame sensor in a modern mirrorless camera to deliver the full potential benefits.

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The sensor delivers the camera's two main selling points: the global shutter, which extends what the camera can offer in three specific areas, and sheer speed. As well as having no motion distortion from its capture, the a9 III is able to shoot at up to 120 frames per second.

Its fast readout also allows incredibly high speed capture, with shutter speeds that extend to 1/80,000 sec. The global readout also means it can sync with flashes all the way up to its maximum shutter speed (though the power of the flash will be reduced at the very shortest exposures and may require the timing of the flash trigger signal to be fine-tuned so that the exposure syncs with the brightest point of the flash output).

There are downsides to the sensor, though: the global shutter design works by using what is effectively a second photodiode within each pixel to act as a buffer: holding the charge generated by the exposure so it can all be read out at the same time. This reduces the effective size of the photodiode used to capture the image, reducing the amount of charge each pixel can hold before it becomes full.

This reduced capacity for charge means the pixel becomes saturated sooner, so it can tolerate less light before clipping. In turn, this means it needs to be given less exposure, which is reflected in the base ISO of 250, 1.3EV higher than typical. Giving a sensor less light instantly reduces the image quality, because light itself is noisy, and this noise is more visible, the less light you capture.

120fps shooting The new C5 button on the front of the camera is set, by default, to activate the speed boost function for temporary access to 120 fps shooting.

The super-fast sensor readout allows the a9 III to deliver a faster shooting rate than we've ever seen from a sensor this large. Whereas the previous generation of Stacked CMOS sensors with progressive readout would shoot at up to 30 frames per second, the a9 III quadruples this to 120. Sony has published a list of its lenses that can operate at this full speed.

It's a reasonable question to consider how often even the most demanding sports photographers will need to shoot at 120 frames per second, and how much more sorting and selecting work will be created by generating so many additional files.

You can lower the burst rate to whatever makes the most sense for your specific subject, but there's also an option to temporarily jump back to a faster rate when you hold a button down, meaning you could shoot at, say, 30 fps in the buildup to what you expect to be the critical moment, then press a custom button to give a faster, more concentrated burst around the moment of interest itself.

Like the other recent high-end Sonys, the a9 III has a pair of CFexpress Type A and UHS-II SD card slots set one within the other, providing compatibility with both the widely available SD format or the faster CFexpress format. Both are still significantly slower than the CFe Type B cards adopted by most other manufacturers.

Interestingly, the a9 III continues to use Sony's preferred CFexpress Type A cards, which have half the read/write channels of the larger Type B format. This means the a9 III has to depend that bit more heavily on its internal buffer. It has the capacity to shoot 196 uncompressed 14-bit Raw files in a burst, allowing 1.6 seconds of capture at its fastest rate. This is nearly 10GB of data, which gives some idea of the size of the camera's buffer but also of how quickly you'd fill up your cards if you shot at full tilt in Raw.

Pre-capture

The a9 III becomes the first Sony to have a pre-capture feature: starting to buffer images when you half-press the shutter button or hold the AF-On button, then retaining up to one second's worth of images when you fully press the shutter. You can reduce the time period to as little as 1/200 sec if you're really confident in your ability to anticipate the crucial moment, but the pre-buffer time isn't affected by your choice of shooting rate.

Dedicated 'AI' processor

The a9 III gains the 'AI' processor that Sony first introduced in the a7R V. This does not add any 'intelligence' or learning in and of itself, but is designed to process the complex subject algorithms created by machine learning for functions such as subject recognition. This should boost the camera's subject recognition performance compared to previous generations of cameras, such as the a1, making the tracking more responsive and more robust.

8EV image stabilization The a9 III gets the flexible tilt-and-hinge cradle we previously saw on the a7R V. It can be manipulated into all sorts of positions, for wherever you're shooting from.

The a9 III also gains the latest image stabilization processing algorithms, helping it deliver performance that's rated at up to 8.0EV of correction, using the CIPA standard methodology. This is an appreciable increase over the 5.5EV offered by previous generations of cameras. Unlike Canon's system, this doesn't depend on synchronized use of in-body and in-lens IS mechanisms, so users should see an increase in correction performance over a wide range of lenses, though the peak correction may not be so well maintained quite so well at extremely long and short focal lengths.

C2PA authentication

Although not present at launch, Sony says it plans to add C2PA authentication to the a9 III. This is a cryptographic metadata standard developed by a range of software makers, camera makers and large media organizations that will provide a secure record of the file's provenance and edit history, allowing media organizations to know that the images they are receiving can be traced back to a specific camera and haven't been inappropriately manipulated.

How it compares

With its high shooting speed and pro-friendly features, the a9 III's closest competitors are the pro sports bodies from Canon and Nikon, as well as Sony's own a1. This is an exclusive group, not only in the sense of commanding a significant price but also in that they have professional support networks established to ensure working pros have the most possible 'up' time. While other cameras promise fast shooting and capable autofocus, these are the models that the most demanding professionals rely on.

Sony a9 III Sony a1 Canon EOS R3 Nikon Z9 MSRP $6500 $6500 $6000 $5500 Pixel count 24MP 50MP 24MP 46MP Sensor type Stacked CMOS
(Global shutter) Stacked CMOS Stacked CMOS Stacked CMOS Max burst rate 120fps 30fps 30 fps
196 fps** (AE/AF fixed) 30fps (JPEG)
20fps (Raw)
120fps (11MP JPEG) Pre-capture? Up to 1 sec – – JPEG only IS rating (CIPA) Up to 8.0 EV Up to 5.5EV Up to 8.0 EV Up to 6.0EV Base ISO 250 100 100 64 Max ISO 51200 102400 204800 102400 Max shutter speed 1/80,000 1/32,000
1/8000 mech 1/64,000***
1/8000 mech 1/32,000 Flash sync 1/80,000 1/400 1/250 EFCS
1/200 Mech
1/180 Elec 1/250 Viewfinder
res / size / eyepoint 9.44M dots
0.9x
25mm 9.44M dots
0.9x
25mm 5.76M dots
0.76x
23mm 3.69M dots
0.8x
23mm Refresh rate Std: 120 fps
High: 240 fps Std: 60 fps
High: 120 fps
H+: 240 fps* Power save: 60 fps
Smooth: 120 fps Std: 60 fps
High: 120 fps Rear screen 2.0M dots fully articulated on tilt cradle 1.44M dots fully articulated 4.15M dots fully articulating 2.1M dots, two-way tilt Max video res 4K up to 120p MOV 8K/30 UHD MOV 6K/60 DCI Raw
4K/120 DCI/UHD MOV 8K/60 Raw
8K/30 DCI MOV Media 2x CFexpress Type A / UHS II SD 2x CFexpress Type A / UHS II SD 1 CFe Type B
1 UHS II SDq 2x CFe Type B / XQD USB 10Gbps 10Gbps 10Gbps 5Gbps CIPA Battery life (LCD / EVF) 530 / 400 530 / 430 860 / 620 740 / 700 Weight 702g 737g 822g 1340g Dimensions 136 x 97 x 83 mm 129 x 97 x 81 mm 150 x 143 x 87 mm 149 x 150 x 91 mm

**Viewfinder res and display size are reduced
**AF and AE locked, in bursts of up to 50 images.
***Whole stop increments only between 1/16,000 and 1/64,000

The a9 III stands out, even from the other manufacturer's pro-grade cameras, in offering 120 fps shooting as a standard mode, with full AF and Raw capture, whereas Canon's R3 locks AF and AE at the first exposure (rarely ideal for the kinds of action shooting that require high speed bursts) and the Nikon outputs significantly reduced resolution JPEGs.

Like the EOS R3, the a9 III opts for speed over resolution, meaning it can't deliver the 8K footage that the a1 and Z9 can. Also, any users hoping for Raw video will need to buy an external recorder, rather than being able to capture this in-camera, as you can on the Canon and Nikon.

The biggest apparent shortcoming is the relatively low battery life of the a9 III, as it's a single grip camera and hence lacks the space for the larger batteries included in the Canon and Nikon. Adding the BG-C5 battery grip adds space for a second battery, as well as providing duplicate portrait orientation controls.

Body and handling

Although the company's a7, a9 and a1 models all look similar, each generation has seen the control layout reworked and details such as the handgrip tweaked. The a9 III sees a larger than typical re-working of Sony's ergonomics.

The grip is a little deeper, with a more prominent dent for the forefinger to rest in, but more significantly, the shutter button is placed on a surface that angles forward rather than sitting in the same plane as the camera's top plate. This means you don't have to rotate your hand or stretch your finger quite so far to reach the shutter. In turn, the custom buttons on the camera's top plate have been extended upwards so that they're still accessible from this less stretched position.

It's a relatively small adjustment but enough that you'll notice it after several hours of shooting. Given the a9 III's target audience, it's hard not to make assumptions that this change has been made in response to Sony's tie-up with the Associated Press, giving the company more feedback from a large pool of working pros.

Beyond this, the body is pretty familiar from the previous generation of cameras, with most of the control points and custom buttons existing in the same places. The main exception to this is that the a9 III gains a fifth custom button, on its front panel. By default, this is used for the 'speed boost' function, but this can be modified.

The a9 III has the same 9.44M dot (2048 x 1536px) OLED viewfinder that first appeared in the Sony a7R V. The optics in front of the panel give an impressive 0.9x magnification, meaning it's very large to look at, and the fast sensor means its full resolution is used even when refreshing at 120fps. There's a 240fps mode if you need an even more frequent update of what's going on in the scene, but this runs at a reduced resolution. The viewfinder shows no blackout at all when shooting images.

The rear screen is a 2M dot panel that's arranged on a tilting cradle that is itself hinged at the side, providing a wide range of movement and adjustment.

The a9 III uses the same NP-FZ100 battery as all the most recent full-frame cameras have. It's a well-sized 16.4Wh unit that powers the camera to a rating of 530 shots per charge, using the rear LCD according to CIPA standard tests. This drops to 400 shots per charge if you use the viewfinder. These are strong numbers compared to most cameras but some way behind those of its pro sports peers, which typically have a twin-grip body with space for a much larger battery.

Battery life can be increased significantly through the addition of the optional VG-C5 vertical grip. This adds the space for a second FZ100 and more than doubles the battery life, as Sony has developed a system for treating the two batteries as a single large power source.

It's also worth noting that the CIPA standard tests are even less reflective of the behavior of pro sports cameras than they are elsewhere. Bursts of images use much less power than the individual shot shoot-and-review process that standard testing assumes. As such, a rating of 400 shots per charge for a camera that shoots at 120 frames per second should not be taken to mean that the battery will only last for 3.3 seconds of holding the shutter down. This is nowhere close to being true.

Image quality

Our test scene is designed to simulate a variety of textures, colors and detail types you'll encounter in the real world. It also has two illumination modes to see the effect of different lighting conditions.

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We've looked at the a9 III's image quality and have found that its performance is up to a stop behind those of contemporary full-frame cameras. Essentially the halving of the photodiode size halves the amount of light the sensor can tolerate. This raises the base ISO, limiting the maximum image quality the camera can deliver (ie: comparing base ISO to base ISO).

The added complexity of the sensor's design also means that it isn't able to offer a second low-noise readout path as has become common in dual conversion gain sensors that dominate the market. This sees up to a stop noise penalty, relative to its full-frame peers.

All of that said, a lot of sports shooting doesn't necessarily happen at ISO 100, so being limited to ISO 250 or higher needn't be a major issue. Likewise, even a one-stop increase in noise at high ISO isn't likely to be a deal-breaking difference, especially if the a9 III's global shutter and incredibly rapid burst rates mean that it can get a shot that its rivals simply miss.

So, while the a9 III's sensor tech may not make as much sense in other cameras, for the high-speed users it's designed for, these aren't necessarily a significant drawback.

Initial impressions Only time in the hands of a large number of pro photographers will test how much value 120 fps capture with no risk of banding is, but historically faster has proven to be better, even when the current level of performance has let people get results.

We now have a full production spec a9 III but want to put it through its paces at some sporting events before drawing any firm conclusions about its overall performance, so these comments should still considered be initial impressions.

The arrival of global shutter is a significant advance for the industry, and provides a recognizable benefit in specific circumstances, specifically: high-speed flash sync, avoidance of banding with high-frequency displays and zero rolling shutter distortion for movies and very fast movement. However this capability comes at a cost, with the a9 III not being able to match the best image quality of its rivals.

The question is: do the camera's strengths outweigh this cost for the types of shooting it's designed for? The a9 III is a specialized camera designed for very specific types of shooting, not an all-rounder that might be used for landscape work, just as often as wildlife and sports. As a sports camera, speed is of the essence, and working at elevated ISOs is the norm. Likewise, the need for very broad dynamic range to be exploited during Raw processing isn't likely to be a priority for many of its users.

The provision of a LAN socket and full-sized HDMI port show that Sony wants the camera to fit readily into professional workflows, and the camera will ultimately succeed or fail on that basis.

This isn't to make excuses, just to put it in context. The a9 III offers capabilities for high speed capture far beyond those of its rivals, but at the cost of being a less flexible camera. Which may prove to be an acceptable, or even entirely reasonable, trade-off for sports pros, if it transpires that the ability to shoot at 120 fps around the critical moment, or to avoid any distracting ad-board flicker prove suitably valuable.

These caveats mean that the a9 III's advances need to be seen in context: global shutter probably shouldn't be assumed to be the future toward which all cameras are heading. For now the trade-offs mean it only makes sense for some photographers: those for which it's designed. And those trade-offs would have more significant impact in smaller sensors, so we're not suddenly dreaming of APS-C or Four Thirds sensors that utilize this particular technology.

Judged for what it is, though, the a9 III looks to be a very powerful addition to the market, with a lot of handling and workflow changes that will make it ideal for pro sports use. This is what we'll be testing over the coming weeks. However, that doesn't make it the camera by which all others should be judged.

Buy Now:

$5998 at Amazon $5998 at B&H $5998 at Adorama Pre-production sample gallery

Please do not reproduce any of these images on a website or any newsletter/magazine without prior permission (see our copyright page). We make the originals available for private users to download to their own machines for personal examination or printing (in conjunction with this review); we do so in good faith, so please don't abuse it.

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Categories: Photo News

The Crucial Camera News From CES 2024 (So Far)

Sun, 01/07/2024 - 16:55
The Crucial Camera News From CES 2024 (So Far) Image: CTA

The Consumer Electronics Tradeshow of 2024 is kicking off, and while we don't expect any huge camera announcements this year, there are plenty of other bits and bobs of interest to the photographically inclined. Here on Sunday night, the first pre-show activities have begun, followed by a hurricane of press conferences on Monday and the show floor itself on Tuesday.

We're not on the ground in Vegas this year, but we are keeping close watch from afar to collect just the juicy photography-related news and round it up for you.

Here are the most important announcements, awards and releases (so far). We'll be updating this post as announcements roll out throughout the show, which runs until Friday, January 12th.

This post will be updated live throughout CES 2024. Check back for the latest announcements.

Canon MS-500 Interchangeable Lens Camera Image: Canon

Single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) technology is a photon-counting technique that's been in development for decades. Canon's prototypes of SPAD sensors, based around its 3.2MP chip, are some of the highest resolution examples and have accomplished impressive party tricks like capturing the movement of light as it travels through smoke. Now, with the MS-500, Canon has wrapped a Type 1 (13.2 x 9.9mm) SPAD sensor in a body that's actually up for sale, capable of capturing images of objects in color during the dead of night at distances of a mile and beyond. Its applications in hobbyist photography are scant, and its $21,000 price tag makes it clear this is for industrial and commercial purposes. But packaging this tech into a product that's actually for sale has earned it a CES 2024 Innovation Award.

Leica BLK2GO Pulse Handheld Laser Scanner Image: Leica

Leica Geosystems, which spun off from Leica's camera business in the 1990s, specializes in a different way of capturing reality through the travel of light: laser rangefinding. The company's BLK2GO PULSE, winner of a 2024 CES Innovation Award, puts a two-sensor, solid-state LiDAR array (designed in partnership with Sony), into a handheld body that can capture instant, colored point-cloud scans of a location in concert with the device's RGB cameras. Capable of capturing snapshots in a 10-meter range with a 2cm margin for error, the BLK2GO PULSE is definitely priced for commercial enterprises. Unless you've got $38,400 to burn, and something to use it for.

Boréas Solid-State Piezo Haptic Buttons Image: Boréas

Anything with points of friction is a potential point of failure, whether on a smartphone or a camera body. And while Apple has long replaced its Home buttons and trackpads with unmoving touch surfaces that only simulate a click, its 'Taptic Engine' still contains moving springs. Boréas' piezoelectric buttons have earned a CES Innovation award by taking the principle further, simulating a physical response, but with no points of internal friction or wear. Combined with the advent of electronic shutters, this tech brings us closer to cameras with no moving parts to break down – eventually.

Categories: Photo News

Understanding your camera, our best reads for learning what's happening inside that light box

Sat, 01/06/2024 - 06:00
Start your journey into learning the ins and outs of cameras by taking a deep dive into some of our best technical explainers.

We're about a week into 2024, and if you made any proclamations to refresh or improve your photo skills, we're here to help you with those photo/video resolutions.

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Whether you're learning how to use a camera for the first time, or you're an old hat seeking to brush up, or even if you're a person who loves to troll other people's work but never share your own (you know who you are), we have a little something for everyone.

Over the years, we've chronicled the rise of digital photography and written our fair share of technical breakdowns, tutorials and how-tos. In honor of a new year, we thought it might be a good time to corral up our best reads for learning, and here they are, everything to help you get the most of your cameras.

These articles are focused on what's going on under the hood. If you understand where noise is coming from, how the different types of shutter work and what ISO does (and doesn't) mean, everything else should be less of a mystery.

Understanding shutter settings

As you're setting up your camera, you may see settings for mechanical and electronic shutters. With the shift to mirrorless, many cameras today will let you choose which type of shutter to use. A few cameras may limit you to only e-shutter. One type of shutter isn't better than the other, they each have their strengths and weaknesses, which means knowing which one to use in each situation will be crucial to give you the best shooting results.

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

What about global shutter?

Understanding camera ISO

At its most basic, a camera is a box that captures light controlled by an aperture and a shutter speed setting. But there's a third option that affects the final image: ISO. With the former two, these are things that are easier to grasp since you can more easily see them: aperture blades in a lens going from wide to narrow as you increase the f-stop or images having more or less motion blur as you change shutter settings.

With ISO, we often understand it's related to the sensor's sensitivity to light, a definition we carry over from the film days, but it's not quite that simple. It turns out ISO is a slippery thing. It's not necessarily amplification or gain. Understanding what it is (and isn't), can help you understand what your camera's doing, and when you might want to overrule it.

Start off with a primer: What is ISO?

Where ISO gets complex

Understanding noise

Related to ISO, you'll often hear folks talk about high ISO noise, but this can lead to a misunderstanding of where that noise is coming from. In most photography, it's the shutter speed and aperture settings that dictate most of the noise in your image, because the speckled 'grain' you're seeing in your photos is caused by the way light itself behaves.

Read our primer to learn how to understand and mitigate noise in your photography.

Shedding light on the sources of noise

Understanding dynamic range

Dynamic range is one of those things that is hard to explain but easy to spot. Seeing a picture of trees, we can point and say that DR is the brightness that your camera can capture, from the brightest (where the information 'clips') to the darkest usable tone. But looking at what's happening to the 'signal' of light as it enters the camera, hits the sensor, and runs through the processor, it starts to paint a more nuanced picture.

DR can be a good indicator of how flexible the Raw files coming out of your camera are, but it doesn't tell you much more than that.

DR is also something photographers seem to love to argue about, but it's best to brush up so you're armed and ready for the next flame war. We take a quick look at why DR numbers are only a small part of the story in a three-part series.

DR part 1: More than a number

DR part 2: How number can mislead

DR part 3: Why you need DR

Understanding bit depth

Raw bit depth is often discussed as a measurement of how many colors a camera is capable of capturing. This isn't really true. Raw bit depth plays more of a role in how much dynamic range a file can maintain, not the number of colors you get to capture. As a result more, if your camera can't capture more than 12 stops of DR, shooting in 14-bit Raw won't capture more detail, it'll just capture more noise.

Get the low down on bit depth

Understanding 'equivalence' and exposure

Photography is all about light, and understanding how much light you're capturing can help you understand why your images are noisy and what you might do about that.

The standard exposure model intentionally disguises the role played by film size or sensor format, so that you can use the 'same' settings on whatever camera you're using. Taking a whole-image perspective can help you understand why different formats offer different ranges of capability and where those ranges overlap.

It's most useful when deciding which format you want to adopt, but it can also help you understand the many circumstances in which one format can match another; if you don't tie your hands by trying to use the same settings.

Breaking down equivalence and light

Understanding color

After you've taken your photos or videos, you may want to dive into color correction or color grading. To get the most out of your image editing, you'll ideally want to have a properly calibrated monitor. It stands to reason, if your monitor is too blue, then you'll end up editing all your photos too blue.

Read our Intro to Color Calibration series by starting with "Color measurement basics and how colorimeters work." Then, once you have the basics down, move on to part two of the series, "How monitor calibration actually works."

Read "Intro to color, part 1"Read "Intro to color, part 2"

Understanding HDR

As HDR displays start to become more prominent in computers and TVs, we are finally getting the benefits of 'true' HDR photography as it was meant to be seen, as a more naturalistic wide range of brightness rather than the high-contrast candy-colored processing we've come to think of when someone says HDR.

Support for HDR editing was added to Adobe Camera Raw and Lightroom last year, so it's a good time to brush up on how it works and why it matters for our future displays.

Getting started with HDR editing

HDR displays explained

Understanding Raw video

Most photographers have a good sense for the additional flexibility that Raw stills offer over trying to edit JPEGs. So it's easy to fall into the trap of assuming that Raw video will offer the same benefits. This isn't necessarily the case.

Software doesn't necessarily support all the common formats, and that support can be patchy and partial. There are also some well-established workflows for shooting 10-bit Log footage that offer much higher levels of flexibility than 8-bit JPEGs, meaning there's less of a gain to be had for capturing the larger Raw files. There are benefits to be had, but you have to work for them. Here's why Raw video may not be the gamechanger you might expect:

Why Raw video isn't the gamechanger you might expect

BONUS: A trip through sensor history

It's fun to look at old tech and see how far the sensors at the heart of our cameras have come. If you're curious about what came before the camera you're currently using, look back at the history of camera sensors with us. It's a fun start to a journey into ongoing learning, just be careful about g.a.s.

Tech timeline: Milestones in sensors

BONUS: What is a Bayer filter and what does it mean?

Underpinning most of our cameras through the history of digital photography has been the Bayer Color Filter Array. A system developed by Kodak's Bryce Bayer over 40 years ago, it's a design that captures color information by capturing red, green and blue information through an interspersed mosaic-style array. It's a genuinely brilliant piece of design and highly effective. These filters are far from perfect (we get into the limits in the article below) but they've earned their place in digital photography history and are still used today by some cameras.

How Bayer's baby changed the world

BONUS: Understanding the DPReview studio test scene

If you find yourself wanting to learn more about cameras, you can take a look at one way we elevate cameras. Take a look behind at our studio scene tool. There's a lot of stuff on this scene and none of it arrived by accident. Every inch tells a different story about camera performance and aids us in comparing multiple cameras across the years. Are you curious how an older version of your camera performed compared to your current one? Want to see how it stacks up to the competition? You can do this and more with our tool, but only if you learn how to read it.

An introduction to our studio test scene

A DPReview history of the test scene

Categories: Photo News

Sony a9 III: Global shutter comes with an image quality cost

Thu, 01/04/2024 - 07:00

We've just had the chance to put a production Sony a9 III through our studio scene. The question we most wanted to answer was: is there any image quality cost to adopting a global shutter sensor? The short answer is: yes.

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Global shutter sensors have been available and used in industrial settings for some time now, but haven't made their way across to photography because the more complex design meant their image quality wasn't a match for the best progressive-scan CMOS designs. Sony said the a9 III's Stacked CMOS design overcame any compromise in ISO or dynamic range. This doesn't appear to be the case.

Buy Now:

$5998 at Amazon $5998 at B&H $5998 at Adorama

However, in the context of a professional sports photography, the compromises that have been made may well make sense, in return for the sheer speed of capture the a9 III is capable of, both in terms of burst rate and its fast, distortion-free shutter.

$(document).ready(function() { ImageComparisonWidget({"containerId":"reviewImageComparisonWidget-27854775","widgetId":898,"initialStateId":5837}) })

The most immediate difference in capability is that the a9 III has a base ISO of 250. This means that you can't give it as much light as its peers with base ISOs of 100 or lower. This is not necessarily an issue for sports photography, where maintaining a high shutter speed is much more important than the need to optimize image quality by staying at a low ISO.

Has the studio scene changed?

The a9 III is one of the first cameras we've shot since setting up our studio scene at our new location. Our a7CR images raised concerns about how consistent the results are between the new installation and our previous setup. In response to these concerns, we re-shot the Sony a7R V (whose higher resolution viewfinder makes it much easier to fine-focus than the a7CR) and checked the Raw values against the photos taken in the old studio.

With some slight adjustment of the lights, we reduced the existing 0.08EV discrepancy down to 0.02EV difference for the grey patches we use for noise assessment. We wanted to make sure that both we and our audience could have complete faith in the consistency of the test scene before testing the a9 III.

The files shot on Jan 2nd 2024 and the original versions, as featured in the comparison tool, shot on Nov 11 2022, can be downloaded here.

What might be of more concern to sports shooters is that the high ISO performance appears to be as much as one stop noisier$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5838-917692873").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5838); }); }) than its full-frame rivals, especially as you reach its highest ISO settings$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5839-2086734876").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5839); }); }). There's a noticeable softness to the 'grain' pattern in the a9 III's images too, which we suspect is the result of noise reduction being applied in the Raws.

This is in line with what we expected. Essentially the a9 III's sensor works by having two photodiodes at each pixel: one to capture the light, initially, and the second to act as a holding buffer, that allows all the pixels to be read-out simultaneously. This design effectively halves each pixel's capacity for light, which explains the elevated base ISO and the decreased noise performance, which brings it closer into line with the performance of APS-C cameras. In addition, the complexity of the design means we don't get the dual conversion gain circuitry that helps improve high ISO performance on other recent cameras.

How does the a9 III's dynamic range compare?

Just as staying at low ISOs is rarely critical for sports, nor is maximizing dynamic range for a discipline that generally shoots JPEGs for immediate delivery, with no time to exploit extra DR during careful processing as, for instance, landscape shooters might.

The sensor's reduced capacity for light has an impact on dynamic range, since the entire image becomes noisier, but we should be careful not to double-count this by interpreting it as a separate dynamic range cost. At its launch, Sony told us the a9 III has dynamic range comparable with previous models, and our measurements show that it is comparable with cameras when operating at ISO 250. Notably most other cameras can operate at lower ISOs than this, and hence have a higher maximum dynamic range than the a9 III.

When compared, the Sony a9 II, if anything, shows more noise if shot at its ISO 200 setting when brightened, than the a9 III. The a9 III's smaller photodiodes mean there's more photon shot noise in the ISO 6400 shots (simply because the Mk III captured less light), but if you try brightening the low ISO files there doesn't appear to be an additional (electronic) read noise cost. It's the same story if you try to reduce exposure at base ISO and brighten: the a9 III is a little behind the a9 II because its base ISO is higher, but there's not a big difference in additional noise if you compare similar exposures (where photon shot noise would be similar so differences caused by read noise would become apparent).

Summary

Examining the a9 III's images shows everything that you'd expect from it having a reduced capacity for light. The higher base ISO isn't inherently a problem for sports shooters, so it's simply a question of whether the noise penalty is worthwhile for all the things that super-fast 120fps shooting and global shutter bring. That's something we'll consider in more depth in our final review.

But what does this trade-off mean beyond the pro sports market? Our tests show that this sensor's performance comes with an image quality hit that might make less sense for general photography. Furthermore, this cost of up to a stop of image quality in return for added performance is likely to make global shutter less appealing in the smaller APS-C and Four Thirds formats, which don't have the luxury of so much IQ to give up.

Overall, the a9 III still looks promising, for its intended purpose, but it shouldn't be assumed to herald the future of cameras as a whole.

Buy Now:

$5998 at Amazon $5998 at B&H $5998 at Adorama
Categories: Photo News

Sony a9 III: Global shutter comes with an image quality cost

Thu, 01/04/2024 - 07:00

We've just had the chance to put a production Sony a9 III through our studio scene. The question we most wanted to answer was: is there any image quality cost to adopting a global shutter sensor? The short answer is: yes.

Recent Videos!function(n){if(!window.cnx){window.cnx={},window.cnx.cmd=[];var t=n.createElement('iframe');t.src='javascript:false';t.display='none',t.onload=function(){var n=t.contentWindow.document,c=n.createElement('script');c.src='//cd.connatix.com/connatix.player.js?cid=a1b625fb-cd44-410e-9479-699e835fd645',c.setAttribute('async','1'),c.setAttribute('type','text/javascript'),n.body.appendChild(c)},n.head.appendChild(t)}}(document); (new Image()).src = 'https://capi.connatix.com/tr/si?token=1cad57d1-aae3-42ce-aa46-cb49bb02d99a&cid=a1b625fb-cd44-410e-9479-699e835fd645';cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "1cad57d1-aae3-42ce-aa46-cb49bb02d99a" }).render("0f952e209d6147a793d43f13d9e1cfa2"); });

Global shutter sensors have been available and used in industrial settings for some time now, but haven't made their way across to photography because the more complex design meant their image quality wasn't a match for the best progressive-scan CMOS designs. Sony said the a9 III's Stacked CMOS design overcame any compromise in ISO or dynamic range. This doesn't appear to be the case.

Buy Now:

$5998 at Amazon $5998 at B&H $5998 at Adorama

However, in the context of a professional sports photography, the compromises that have been made may well make sense, in return for the sheer speed of capture the a9 III is capable of, both in terms of burst rate and its fast, distortion-free shutter.

$(document).ready(function() { ImageComparisonWidget({"containerId":"reviewImageComparisonWidget-41675446","widgetId":898,"initialStateId":5837}) })

The most immediate difference in capability is that the a9 III has a base ISO of 250. This means that you can't give it as much light as its peers with base ISOs of 100 or lower. This is not necessarily an issue for sports photography, where maintaining a high shutter speed is much more important than the need to optimize image quality by staying at a low ISO.

Has the studio scene changed?

The a9 III is one of the first cameras we've shot since setting up our studio scene at our new location. Our a7CR images raised concerns about how consistent the results are between the new installation and our previous setup. In response to these concerns, we re-shot the Sony a7R V (whose higher resolution viewfinder makes it much easier to fine-focus than the a7CR) and checked the Raw values against the photos taken in the old studio.

With some slight adjustment of the lights, we reduced the existing 0.08EV discrepancy down to 0.02EV difference for the grey patches we use for noise assessment. We wanted to make sure that both we and our audience could have complete faith in the consistency of the test scene before testing the a9 III.

The files shot on Jan 2nd 2024 and the original versions, as featured in the comparison tool, shot on Nov 11 2022, can be downloaded here.

What might be of more concern to sports shooters is that the high ISO performance appears to be as much as one stop noisier$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5838-917692873").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5838); }); }) than its full-frame rivals, especially as you reach its highest ISO settings$(document).ready(function() { $("#icl-5839-2086734876").click(function() { ImageComparisonWidgetLink(5839); }); }). There's a noticeable softness to the 'grain' pattern in the a9 III's images too, which we suspect is the result of noise reduction being applied in the Raws.

This is in line with what we expected. Essentially the a9 III's sensor works by having two photodiodes at each pixel: one to capture the light, initially, and the second to act as a holding buffer, that allows all the pixels to be read-out simultaneously. This design effectively halves each pixel's capacity for light, which explains the elevated base ISO and the decreased noise performance, which brings it closer into line with the performance of APS-C cameras. In addition, the complexity of the design means we don't get the dual conversion gain circuitry that helps improve high ISO performance on other recent cameras.

How does the a9 III's dynamic range compare?

Just as staying at low ISOs is rarely critical for sports, nor is maximizing dynamic range for a discipline that generally shoots JPEGs for immediate delivery, with no time to exploit extra DR during careful processing as, for instance, landscape shooters might.

The sensor's reduced capacity for light has an impact on dynamic range, since the entire image becomes noisier, but we should be careful not to double-count this by interpreting it as a separate dynamic range cost. At its launch, Sony told us the a9 III has dynamic range comparable with previous models, and our measurements show that it is comparable with cameras when operating at ISO 250. Notably most other cameras can operate at lower ISOs than this, and hence have a higher maximum dynamic range than the a9 III.

When compared, the Sony a9 II, if anything, shows more noise if shot at its ISO 200 setting when brightened, than the a9 III. The a9 III's smaller photodiodes mean there's more photon shot noise in the ISO 6400 shots (simply because the Mk III captured less light), but if you try brightening the low ISO files there doesn't appear to be an additional (electronic) read noise cost. It's the same story if you try to reduce exposure at base ISO and brighten: the a9 III is a little behind the a9 II because its base ISO is higher, but there's not a big difference in additional noise if you compare similar exposures (where photon shot noise would be similar so differences caused by read noise would become apparent).

Summary

Examining the a9 III's images shows everything that you'd expect from it having a reduced capacity for light. The higher base ISO isn't inherently a problem for sports shooters, so it's simply a question of whether the noise penalty is worthwhile for all the things that super-fast 120fps shooting and global shutter bring. That's something we'll consider in more depth in our final review.

But what does this trade-off mean beyond the pro sports market? Our tests show that this sensor's performance comes with an image quality hit that might make less sense for general photography. Furthermore, this cost of up to a stop of image quality in return for added performance is likely to make global shutter less appealing in the smaller APS-C and Four Thirds formats, which don't have the luxury of so much IQ to give up.

Overall, the a9 III still looks promising, for its intended purpose, but it shouldn't be assumed to herald the future of cameras as a whole.

Buy Now:

$5998 at Amazon $5998 at B&H $5998 at Adorama
Categories: Photo News

Year in review: Cameras released in 2023

Wed, 01/03/2024 - 05:00
Our year in cameras

The major manufacturers released 21 new cameras in 2023, three more than the previous year. Perhaps this is an early indicator that the slowdown in manufacturing and chips we saw during the pandemic may be coming to an end.

We've compiled a list of every major camera released last year. There are certainly some new cameras we expect to be favorites for years to come, as well as some headscratchers. When we break it down by manufacturer, some were definitely more busy than others.

It's pure speculation what any of this means for 2024: will the trend of increased new releases continue? Will others who were quiet in 2023 ramp up this year? Will a new leader emerge? Time will tell.

A quick note: this list isn't meant to be an all-inclusive rundown. For instance, you won't find instant cameras, action cameras, smartphones or outliers like the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses in this recap. You also won't see the Sony a9 III on this list because it was only announced in 2023 and not released.

Canon

Canon released four cameras between February and May 2023.

The EOS R8 was a more-than-capable entry-level full-frame mirrorless camera that earned a place in our end-of-year buying guide. At under $1500, we gave it high marks for packing Canon's latest AF capabilities and attractive video in a compact, ergonomic body with twin dials.

Around the same time, the EOS R50 also was announced. A compact mirrorless built around a 24 MP APS-C sensor, it was aimed at entry-level smartphone users seeking something a little more out of a camera.

Later in the year, the EOS R100 and PowerShot V10 arrived. The R100 was a parts bin of camera parts, cobbled together with previous generation tech and less sophisticated autofocus, and the V10 was a vlogging camera with a mic array and social media-friendly filters.

Fujifilm

Fujifilm released two cameras last year, and both cameras were head-turners.

In May 2023 the X-S20 arrived, and it was a lot of camera for its price point. We gave it a slot in our best cameras under $1500 buying guide. It improves on the X-S10 meaningfully by improving the video, but we did note that it still lags behind competitors in AF tracking.

The GFX 100 II feels like a camera with big ambitions. Fujifilm's latest medium format sees improvements to the sensor, IS and AF. It also captures 8K video and has tools like waveform and vectorscope display.

Leica

Leica released three cameras in 2023, two of which were variations on the M11.

First there was the M11 Monochrom in April, which removed the color filter array from the M11's 61MP BSI CMOS sensor. That difference gives the camera a base ISO that's one stop higher than that of the color version (without filters absorbing the light, the sensor doesn't need as much exposure to saturate).

In October, the M11-P variation came with the usual flourishes that come with 'P' models (no Leica red logo stamp on the front, a glass screen cover) and also added metadata recording abilities following standards from the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI). That latter addition also makes it the first camera on the market to use CAI systems.

In between these, the Q3 refreshed Leica's fixed-lens range-finder style camera line. It updated on its predecessor with a higher resolution 60MP full-frame sensor, improved burst rates and added the ability to shoot 8K/30p video.

Nikon

Nikon released two cameras last year, and they both earned high marks in our buying guides and our annual DPReview Awards.

The Z8 took everything great about the Nikon Z9 and trimmed it down into a smaller package for $1500 less. Wonderful image quality and AF are married with nice video performance and thoughtful ergonomics. We liked it enough to give it our award for Product of the Year 2023.

Another DPReview award winner, the Zf finally gave users the full-frame retro-inspired camera they'd long awaited. Combining modern tech with late 70s/early 80s design language, it brings forth a photo/video camera that is fun to use and be seen using.

OM Digital Solutions

It was a quiet year for OM Digital Solutions; the Tough TG-7 was its only camera released in 2023.

A rugged, waterproof compact with a 25-100mm equivalent zoom lens, it's fully waterproof down to a depth of 15m (50 ft). We recommend it as our best waterproof compact, in part because, unlike other rugged cameras, it lets you shoot Raw images, which can come in handy if you're shooting underwater and need to make adjustments.

Panasonic

Panasonic released three cameras last year. Well, two, really, as the DC-S5II and DC-S5IIX were announced at the same time, and the differences between them are primarily in video specs aimed at professionals and power users. The 'X' version adds the ability to output ProRes footage directly to an external SSD or Raw footage over HDMI. If you're only interested in stills, there's no need to pay more for the 'X' version. The result is a well-priced camera that offers both stills and video shooters a reason to look closely at the L-mount system.

On the other end of the spectrum from the feature-packed enthusiast-level full-frame cameras is the DC-G9 II, the company's first Micro Four Thirds camera with phase-detect autofocus. It's a high-end model aimed at still shooters, with a clean layout that places the most often used controls at your fingertips.

Ricoh / Pentax

Ricoh only had one camera release last year.

The Pentax K-3 Mark III Monochrome is a variant of its 25.7MP APS-C DSLR with no color filter array. The loss of the color filter array results in the usual benefits: gain a stop of light across all ISO settings, sharper images (no need to demosaic), no chroma noise, and more image detail overall. It was a big swing, and we were glad to see Pentax trying something different.

(Note: we're not counting the WG-90 as a 2023 camera since it won't hit store shelves until later this year.)

Sony

Sony, by far, released the most new cameras in 2023. It put out a whopping five new cameras, ranging from pocketable compacts to feature-packed 60MP full-frame cameras.

March saw the ZV-E1, a camera that asked, what if we took some of the tech from the Sony a7S III and Sony FX3 and jammed it into a camera aimed at vloggers? The result was a full-frame high-end camera that reframed what it meant to be a 'vlogging' camera.

A few months later, the ZV-1 Mark II arrived; it was an update with an enticing 18–50mm equivalent F1.8–4.0 lens. A stacked CMOS sensor aided video capture with great AF and a quick readout. The camera excelled at video, but we felt it came up short for stills.

July's a6700 added a new enthusiast-level APS-C mirrorless. It excelled in everything we threw at it and continued the a6000 series' reputation as a great bang-for-the-buck option for users willing to trade a larger sensor and some ergonomics in exchange for robust image quality, video and some of the industry's best AF.

Finally, we have the a7C II and a7CR, two cameras with similar body styling, button layout, AF systems and 10-bit video capture. The major difference lies in the sensor: 33MP for the a7C II and 61MP for the a7CR. Each represents an interesting option for shooters interested in specs and traveling light.

That's all folks

And that's the year. It's interesting to see the slight uptick in new bodies (both 2021 and 2022 saw 18 central camera releases each). It makes you think about what might be next.

How do you think the camera industry did in 2023? Where do you think it's going in 2024? What are you most excited about? What would you like to see next? Share your 'hot takes' in the comments, and let's meet in 12 months to do it again.

Categories: Photo News

Have your say: Best gear of 2023 - Reader's Choice Award winners and final vote!

Tue, 01/02/2024 - 05:00
Have your say: Best gear of 2022

For the past few weeks, our readers have been voting on their favorite cameras and lenses released in 2023. Now that the first round of voting is over, it's time to reveal the winners. Notably, 2023 appears to be the first time a single brand came very close to a clean sweep across all the Reader's Choice award categories.

Remember, though, it isn't over just yet! It's now time to pick an overall winner. Don't miss your chance to cast your ballot – this one's for all the bragging rights.

Best prime lens Honorable Mention: Nikon Z 600mm F6.3 VR S

First up is the 2023 honorable mention for best prime lens, the Nikon Z 600mm F6.3 VR S, a super telephoto that's light enough for long periods of handheld use. It achieves this in part through the use of a size-reducing Phase Fresnel element, resulting in a lens that's 278mm (11") long and at 1,390g (3 lbs). It's compatible with Nikon's 1.4x and 2x teleconverters for even more reach.

In recent years, Nikon has done a great job designing compact prime lenses that put high-quality telephoto options within the budgetary reach of enthusiasts, and it looks like it's hit another home run with the 600mm F6.3 VR S.

Buy now:

$4897 at B&H $4897 at Adorama $4797 at Amazon Best prime lens Winner: Nikon Z 135mm F1.8 S Plena

The 2023 Reader's Choice Award for best prime lens goes to the Nikon Z 135mm F1.8 S Plena, a mid-telephoto portrait prime for its Z-series cameras. It's Nikon's second Z-mount lens to carry a unique moniker, joining 2019's 58mm F0.95 S Noct, and is designed for sharpness, edge-to-edge brightness and round bokeh with minimal cat's eye effect. We were mighty impressed with this lens when shooting our pre-production sample gallery, and apparently, you were, too, because it won this category by a healthy margin.

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$2500 at B&H $2500 at Adorama Best zoom lens Honorable Mention: Sony FE 20-70mm F4 G

Receiving an honorable mention for best zoom lens is the Sony FE 20-70mm F4 G, an ultra-wide to normal, constant aperture zoom lens. On paper, it doesn't sound much wider than a standard 24-70mm zoom, but those extra four inches at the wide end make a world of difference. Optically, this lens is sharp wide open while providing pleasing bokeh.

It pairs particularly well with Sony's newest compact bodies, the A7C II and A7CR, providing a relatively compact yet versatile travel kit with a full-frame sensor. We're not surprised that readers selected this lens as one of their top picks of 2023.

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$1098 at B&H $1098 at Adorama $1098 at Amazon Best zoom lens Winner: Nikon Z 180-600mm F5.6-6.3 VR

The winner of the 2023 Reader's Choice Award for best zoom lens goes to the Nikon Z 180-600mm F5.6-6.3 VR, the spiritual successor to Nikon's F-mount 200-500mm F5.6 lens, covering a versatile telephoto to super telephoto range in a single optic. At 1955g (4.3 lbs) without its tripod foot, it's not the lightest lens in Nikon's lineup, but thanks to 5.5 stops of vibration reduction and a short, 70-degree zoom ring throw to switch between extreme focal lengths, it is pretty usable even handheld.

Along with the 600mm F6.3 that won the honorable mention in the prime lens category, the 180-600mm F5.6-6.3 is the second Nikon telephoto lens to win a Reader's Choice award this year.

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$1696 at B&H 1696 at Adorama Best camera Honorable Mention: Nikon Zf

The Nikon Zf ticks off almost all the essential boxes on an enthusiast camera spec sheet, but what makes this camera unique is its classic style, designed to mimic the look of the company's FM2 SLR from the early 1980s. The Zf isn't Nikon's first attempt at a retro camera, but it's the one many enthusiasts have been waiting many years to arrive, and with an MSRP at the $2000 price point, it's very price-competitive in its category.

We were impressed enough with this camera to give it the Best Enthusiast Camera award in our 2023 Annual Awards, and it looks like you agree that it's one of the best products of 2023.

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$1997 at B&H Photo $1997 kit at Adorama $1997 at Amazon Best camera Winner: Nikon Z8

The 2023 Reader's Choice Award winner for best camera goes to the Nikon Z8. We're not surprised to see this topping your list as 2023's best camera: it features the same 45MP stacked sensor and processor as its big brother, the Nikon Z9, but in a smaller body and much more approachable price point. In some ways, it's the mirrorless successor to the Nikon D850, one of the best DSLRs ever made, and we think it's an apt comparison.

In our 2023 Annual Awards, the Nikon Z8 walked away with two trophies: Best High-End Camera and 2023's Product of the Year. It looks like it may be trying to make a clean sweep of the Reader's Choice Awards as well.

Buy now:

$3997 at B&H Photo $3997 at Adorama $3997 at Amazon Have your say - vote for Product of the Year!

You helped determine the winners in these individual categories, so now's the time to cast your vote in one last poll! Choose your favorite product from this list of winners and runners-up between now and Monday, January 8th. Watch for an announcement of the winning products shortly after the poll closes.

As always, thanks for casting your votes and being a part of our community throughout the year.

. Have your say$(document).ready(function() { Poll({"pollId":"2390005152","openForVoting":true,"mainElementId":"poll0","slot":null,"isSingleChoicePoll":true,"minNumberOfChoices":1,"maxNumberOfChoices":1}); })Have your say: 2023 Product of the YearNikon Z 135mm F1.8 S PlenaNikon Z 180-600mm F5.6-6.3 VRNikon Z 600mm F6.3 VR SNikon Z8Nikon ZfSony FE 20-70mm F4 GYou need to login to vote

Poll Rules:

This poll is meant to be a bit of fun. It's not sponsored, promoted, or paid for in any way, and DPReview doesn't care how you vote. Our Reader's polls are run on the basis of trust. As such, we ask that you only vote once from a single account.

Categories: Photo News

Start your year off right, sign up for the free DPReview Newsletter

Mon, 01/01/2024 - 06:09

Subscribe today for free and get the latest news, reviews and more from DPReview, delivered weekly.

Photo: Shaminder Dulai

Happy New Year! Welcome to 2024! As we start a new year, now is a great time to subscribe to DPReview's recently re-launched weekly newsletter. It's the best photography, camera and gear news, delivered right to your inbox.

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And we don't just stop at the news. Newsletter subscriber benefits include behind-the-scenes articles, letters to the editor, exclusive sneak peeks on what we’re working on, ways to share feedback directly with DPReview editors to help us shape future stories and more! No AI here; there are real people writing the newsletters and reading your feedback (me!).

For instance, newsletter readers knew about the DPReview Awards, the Studio Scene test becoming operational and previews for upcoming reviews before we published them.

With exclusive access and interactive experiences you can't find on the website or forums, our aim is to make this newsletter a 2-way conversation. That means we want to hear from you. Let us know in the comments what you'd like to see in the DPReview newsletter. Do you want exclusive Q+A interviews, reader polls, photo challenges, more behind-the-scenes or special offers such as DPReview T-shirts or other merch? Let us know. All ideas are welcome, you can help us shape this.

So let's start 2024 right; sign up for weekly recaps, inspiration and interactive activities. We have some fun stuff in the pipeline, but only for the most die-hard members of the DPReview community.

Categories: Photo News

Behind the Photos: Russel Albert Daniels’ aerial landscapes reveal industrial degradation in the west

Fri, 12/29/2023 - 05:00

The White River winds its way through the Uinta Basin in northeast Utah. Fracking sites, the Deseret Power Plant and the Uinta Mountains in the background.

Photo: Russel Albert Daniels

Russel Albert Daniels' aerial landscapes of the Uinta Basin are stunning, but if you spend a bit of time with the photographs, you will realize they reveal a much darker reality. His project, Mother Wound, takes a bird's eye view of the environmental damage that the fossil fuel industry has caused to the region – an area that includes the White River, which is a crucial watershed for the Colorado River.

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Daniels has spent the last two years working with nonprofit publications like Mother Jones, ProPublica and High Country News to capture the work. “Flying in a plane is not cheap, so none of this would have happened without all these nonprofit organizations,” he says.

Here, he talks with us about the challenges and benefits of shooting from the sky, and how this particular perspective is valuable for environmental stories.

Why was an aerial perspective an important journalistic tool for this particular story?

I think a lot of people have a romanticized image of what the West is—it's a pretty landscape that’s unharmed. But a lot of the environmental degradation is happening in areas you just can't see, and it's large-scale. Having aerial access allows you to see the full picture. You don't really get to see it when you're on the ground sitting at that pump jack, you still really can't see how many acres, hundreds of square miles of public land are being leased out to oil and gas companies.

I'm definitely not the first person to go on a plane and take photos of similar circumstances, so I knew the power of the photograph from the air. I wanted the work to draw people in by its beauty, but then, as they sat and looked at the photo, to start realizing what’s going on here – and it’s kind of a shocker. What’s hidden underneath the beauty is the reality of mineral extraction.

Fracking wastewater evaporation pools above the White River in the Uinta Basin in northeast Utah.

Photo: Russel Albert Daniels

What are the benefits of shooting from the Cessna rather than using a drone?

A drone is an incredible tool for journalism – it's affordable and pretty easy to use, but it has limitations. You can only fly to a particular height, it has a wide-angle perspective, and you usually see the horizon line. With the plane, we’re typically 1500 feet above ground, and as the photographer, it gives me the ability to use wide-angle lenses and telephoto lenses to zoom in and reveal more details.

I made a decision not to become a drone pilot. It’s a whole other class of photography that I'm not interested in getting into at this point. I feel like my talents and my skills are still photography. Another advantage of flying in a plane is that you can simply cover hundreds of miles within a few hours.

What challenges came with photographing from the window of the Cessna?

There are a few challenges. I’m working with nonprofit news organizations to do this work, and we reach out to nonprofit aviation services that often have funding to allow journalists to use their pilots and airplanes, often at no charge. The first challenge is having a good enough story that it's worthwhile for someone to use their resources and get us in the air. As a photographer, ideally, I want to go at particular times when the light is the best, but sometimes you are shooting in the overhead sun, which doesn't make for the most beautiful images.

Once you are on the plane you have to make the decision of where you want to sit. The passenger seat up front means you might be able to shoot out the window, but you really only have one or two angles to shoot from. You might get a plane with a seat in the back; if you sit there, you can shoot from either side, but shooting with my camera against the closed window can mean getting images with a lot of glare.

Russel Albert Daniels shooting from the window of a Cessna plane.

Photo: Bear Guerra

Is there particular gear that you like to bring along on these shoots?

There are these big rubber hoods that are real floppy, that go over your lens, and you just plop it up against the window. That eliminates a lot of the reflection and glare. Wearing all black really helps, too, since it’s the white objects on the plane’s interior that show up.

I like to have two camera bodies, one with a 24-70mm lens and a second with either an 80-200mm or an 80-110mm lens. I find that I like to zoom in and capture a tighter detail when shooting these images. I'm often eliminating the horizon line in some of these images, which almost automatically creates abstract images. When you remove the horizon, you lose that sense of reality. The abstraction allows for more of an impact when people finally get the bigger picture.

Fracking sites near the White River in the Uinta Basin in northeast Utah.

Photo: Russel Albert Daniels

How long are you typically up in the air?

These flights are often about three hours, and I’m definitely shooting for about 2-2.5 hours. My wrists are so tired by the end, but I’ve got to take advantage of the time. There's also just a lot of interesting things to see up there, so I'm going to get a shot, even if it's not particular to the story I'm working on.

Why is it important for you to keep going back and working all the angles of this particular story?

The climate crisis we're mitigating right now, it's evident, it's here and all the science has been pointing at it for a long time. It's a little slower than we were scared about it being. It didn’t come as fast or as some big apocalyptic nightmare. It's just a slow, ongoing dread that we are dealing with. The apocalypse is slow, and you still have to go to work.

I think it's important to show people the world and views of these landscapes that show the harm and the destruction that mineral extraction is doing because it's affecting us now. You can look at why that's happening and we can see that these oil and gas corporations and politicians are in bed together, and they are denying the wishes of many, many citizens to find other alternatives to this. We're going to continue to have problems no matter what, but this is obvious. Science has pointed this out. We're seeing the effects, and it's time to change it. If not, we're doomed.

Coal-powered Deseret Power Plant in Bonanza, Utah. The power plant was built in anticipation of the production of oil shale in the Uinta Basin.

Photo: Russel William Daniel

The photos are beautiful and abstract, but there’s an undeniable sadness in them. Do you find yourself needing time to reset and process after working on the project?

Yes, all the time. A lot of my work is done with the Native American territories and reservations that are suffering the most; it’s happening on their land or just adjacent to it in their ancestral territories. So I'm also dealing with that trauma that's just being passed through. It's not just the climate, it's people too. And it's not just native people, it's often just rural communities that happen to be next to these mineral extraction sites.

I don't always deal with it the best way. Sometimes I just try to forget about it. Having Native American ancestry, I do have tools to ceremony and different personal practices and community practices that I’m able to do that recenter me. Sometimes, having a beer helps in the short term. Talking about it with other people and friends helps too. The work is also healing in its own right. Showing what’s going on, showing my frustration with the world, and doing my part to help resolve it.

A photo zine of the Mother Wound work can be purchased through Russel Daniels website. Two of the images from the project were acquired by the Utah Museum of Fine Arts earlier this year and are included in its current exhibition Shaping Landscape: 150 Years of Photography in Utah. The work is also currently on view in downtown Salt Lake City, displayed publicly on the Temporary Museum of Permanent Change’s 14 placards.

Categories: Photo News

Gear of the Year: Eric's Choice - Google Photos

Wed, 12/27/2023 - 00:00
Photo: Eric Limer

I fell in love with photography as a wordless creative outlet. After over a decade as a professional writer, most recently at Gear Patrol and now at DPReview, it’s unspeakably refreshing to create something without struggling for synonyms or getting tied up trying to articulate. Now and then, I’d order some prints and maybe put together a little photo book. Whatever struck my fancy. It was all just for me.

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When my son was born last year, the game changed. I still like taking pictures of sunbeams with mirrorless cameras and processing them in Lightroom, but my photographic priorities have shifted a bit for the near future. I am more frequently a documentarian, an archivist and a media distributor than I am an artist. And nothing has been more helpful in that endeavor than Google Photos.

Like many Google services that have managed to avoid the Google Graveyard, Photos is, in some ways, a shadow of its former self. Google’s promise of unlimited cloud storage, a powerful gateway drug, is long gone. But, staring down the barrel of creating a practical workflow for culling, sorting, and, above all, sharing photos, I haven’t found anything that’s come close to being half as useful.

Natural language search is a life-saver for those shots you forgot to bookmark.

Image: Eric Limer

There’s no shortage of ways to share pictures over the internet, of course. But sharing them in a way that’s both collaborative and at least partway private is another story. There are, I’m told, some apps that aim to tackle this task specifically with parents in mind. I never bothered to research them because they can’t touch Google Photos' biggest strength: most of my family already uses it.

The workflow goes like this. Almost every day, I take quickdraw, burst-fire photos and videos with my iPhone – by far the most sweatpants-friendly camera I own. Once a week or so, I dig through the camera roll to star the selects and add them to the album, shared with grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts and uncles, that serves as our canonical selection of shots of the boy.

"Google Photos' biggest strength? Most of my family already uses it."

Finally, once every oh-god-im-almost-out-of-storage-on-my-Google-account, I endeavor to mass-delete the rejects to free up space but instead opt to increase my storage subscription. I now pay $3 a month for 200GB, up from $2 for 100GB. The next jump is 2TB for $10, and one I'm hoping to avoid.

My process runs a little counter to what Google seems like it wants from me. Whenever I open the app, I quietly cringe at its suggestion that I simply acquiesce to creating an auto-album of the person Google has somewhat chillingly learned to recognize from infancy to toddlerhood. But the whole point of curating an album is deciding what not to include. Besides, if I want the full firehose, I can always just search by his face. I refuse to tell Google his name on principle, as if it won’t find out or doesn’t already know.

Options stamped '1' appear exclusively for storage-buying 'Google One' subscribers. Image: Eric Limer

While AI organization and editing is certainly Google’s selling point for Photos (you get access to additional tools like Magic Eraser when you sign up to pay for storage), I basically never use them. I don’t want to 'magically erase' the mess; I want to document it. Besides, what’s more brain-ticklingly fun than trying to make a decent composition out of a background of blocks and blankets and trucks and stuffies?

Photos’ meager social elements, however, are some of my favorite features on the app. 'Likes' on a photo in a shared album, abstracted from algorithms and news feeds, are much more fun to receive, I find. And the notification they generate serves as a great reminder to catch up on adding more photos. While comments and likes are attached to the relevant photo, you can also view the activity on an album in one big stream. A cluster of photos, followed by a stream of hearts and a few comments. A feed that’s both absent of ragebait, ads and other trash but also mercifully finite — until someone adds more photos.

I also use Google Photos to share more serious photos and film scans, like the ones from my trip to the Miami Grand Prix.

Photo: Eric Limer

That collaborative capability is ultimately what makes Google Photos such an essential tool. I can use shared albums as an archive (and offsite backup) for my own photography, from iPhone shots to film scans. But I can also use them as a repository for pictures that would otherwise be spread across smartphones or lost to time by giving my family the necessary permissions to add photos to them as well. Though not without maintaining some curatorial veto power for myself and removing the ones I don’t like after it’s long enough that the submitters won’t realize they’re missing.

"Collaborative capability is ultimately what makes Google Photos such an essential tool."

The most enticing alternative to Google’s app, one that occasionally calls out to me through notifications of its own, is Apple’s. A conscious contrast, Apple’s Photos app performs many of the same functions but with local AI processing power, instead of piping all these pictures of my family and my home and my life back to the mothership (though it does still want to sell me cloud storage). I’d consider switching on principle, but there are too many Android phones in the extended Limer universe to even bother scoping it out.

In a few years, when my son’s fine motor skills are a little more developed, I’ll hand him a disposable film camera or maybe buy him a top-of-the-line digital camera from a decade or so before he was born. Then, we can tackle a new workflow for pictures by him and not just of him. For now, the current setup suits me quite well.

Categories: Photo News

Year in review: Our favorite stories of 2023

Tue, 12/26/2023 - 06:00

This year, DPReview published reviews and stories on some of the greatest cameras and lenses we have ever seen. It's never easy for our team to select winners for the annual DPReview Awards, but the competition felt exceptionally close in 2023, with our debates stretching late into the night.

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We also published reviews and breakdowns of smartphones, software, drones, instant cameras, accessories, bags, gadgets and more. Throughout the year, we sprinkled a series of how-tos and explainer articles to get the most out of your gear. Whether you're a weekend warrior or a full-timer making your income from photography and video, we strive to be a resource to help propel your learning. If we can make it easier for everyone to enter the wonderful world of cameras, then we're only helping more people discover the thing we love.

During our, let's call it "the semester abroad touring the River Styx phase," we tried to say all the things we never said. We thought DPReview was closing and we'd all have to part ways, so it was our now-or-never moment, and we leaned in.

During our quarter century, we've seen a lot of experimental gear, from ideas ahead of their time to just head-scratching weird. Last May, we looked at 14 of the most novel big swings in cameras.

We started publishing those "one day if I have time" passion projects. We got nostalgic looking back on 25 years of DPReview and the history of digital cameras. And we tried to have fun with things we hadn't tried before.

Between writing and research, we read thousands and thousands of your comments; some made us think, and others, well, we love you anyway. But seriously, thank you for spending 2023 with us. The end of the year is often a time to take stock; we're no different and have been looking back.

There are several stories this year we're very proud of; please enjoy this collection of some of our favorite articles from this year.

Part I: Looking back DPReview by the numbers

It's been a long road since DPReview launched in 1998. Take a walk down memory lane as we look over some of the key stats that defined us

Read the story

Most significant cameras of the DPReview era

In the first part of a 3-part series, we looked back at the landmarks we've seen in camera development and called out some of the most noteworthy. This was a fun one to work on and sparked many internal and external debates.

Read the story

Tech timeline: Milestones in sensor development

Digital sensors are at the heart of digital photography, but their development sometimes gets obscured by the marketing claims made along the way. We went back to the early days of CCDs to better understand the milestones of the past and what's really going on today.

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Ode to my first DSLR, the Canon EOS D2000

You never forget your first love, but even more, your first love-hate relationship with a camera. Born the same year as DPReview, this trip into camera history was filled with melancholy and a little wonder at how far we've come.

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A history of the test scene

Is there anything more iconic at DPReview than our studio scene? It's hard to imagine DPReview without it. We wanted to revisit how we landed on our current version while digging up old versions. Among the surprises, apparently we had a fresh flower budget in the early days.

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April Fools at DPReview - a look back

April Fools Day pranks and internet media go together like butter and toast. We dug into the archives and reached out to former staff to look back at some of our favorite gags.

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Part II: Digging deeper The state of the camera industry, according to the people who make cameras

The camera industry has been on a roller coaster ride for years, with sales spiking and dipping as new tech arrives and casual users shift to mobile photography. We wanted to know, straight from the source, what the future holds for cameras. So we bent the ear of company executives.

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Go inside Sigma's factory to see how lenses are made

If you’ve ever bought a new lens, you know the joy of removing a beautiful, pristine optic from its box and attaching it to your camera for the first time. But have you ever wondered what it takes to design and build that lens? We went behind the scenes at Sigma's factory in Aizu, Japan, to find out.

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New sensors aren't bringing better image quality but cameras are still getting better

The DPReview forums are a bastion of experts and newcomers coming together to learn, share and grow skills. From time to time, while reading forum threads, we come across an interesting question that sparks internal debate. That was the case when we noticed a chat about sensor development, whether it had plateaued years ago, and what it meant for camera IQ.

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Finer Points: Web rot is erasing our images and videos

The Internet is burning away our photos, videos and older websites daily. At nearly 40 years old, the Internet had lost much of its early history to changing technology and corporate and user desires. We look at how to save your work before it disappears.

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Intro to Colorimetry: Color measurement basics and how colorimeters work

Color accuracy is critical for modern creative work, but many creatives have no idea what a colorimeter is actually doing when you put it on your display. We go over the basics of colorimetry so you can understand how we measure and plot color, and how colorimeters use this science to confirm your display's color accuracy.

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Interview: a camera-store-eye view of the camera industry

In the middle ground between camera manufacturers and consumers are the retailers. Last Spring, we dropped in on a Seattle camera store to ask photography's frontline workers about the state of the industry.

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More than a number: a closer look at dynamic range

Dynamic range figures are widely quoted and sometimes discussed as if they are a measure of image quality. Not so fast there! In reality, dynamic range is an aspect of image quality but one that doesn't come close to telling the whole picture. Taking on a bit of a mythbuster approach, we break down what dynamic range is and why putting a number on it isn't a particularly good way to understand camera performance.

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Part III: Bucket list Learning to shoot rodeo with the Canon EOS R3

One of the joys of working at DPReview is the chance to find creative ways to test new features. While testing the Canon EOS R3, Managing Editor Dale Baskin spent three days photographing bulls and broncos. He brought us this dispatch of his journey along with his analysis of the R3's eye-controlled autofocus.

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One thing: What is your digital shoebox? Do you have a legacy plan for your photos?

Before the world went digital, people stored photos in shoeboxes, creating a photographic legacy for future generations. What is your digital shoebox, and what happens to your photos after you're gone? (Okay, so technically, we published this at the end of 2022, but the theme of saving our work before it was too late hits home for how we felt in 2023.)

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A DPReview film festival

On the eve of the Oscar Awards, we wanted to do something different and curated our own film festival that celebrates our favorite star - photography! After posting our lineup, some of us made social media mini-reviews of each film as we watched them. Should we do it again with a new list this year and invite you all to watch with us? Let us know.

See the lineup

Finer Points: What would you want to see in a hybrid camera? For me it’s shutter angle and 32-bit float audio

There are plenty of hybrid cameras on the market, but often a user needs to choose between photo- or video-centric models in terms of features. Video producer Jason Hendardy explains why he wants to see shutter angle and 32-bit float audio as added features in hybrid cameras.

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A distortion of the truth? Here’s why we’re not against software lens corrections

Another hot topic often misunderstood: Is it cheating to use software correction in lenses? The short answer: we don't think so. The long answer: we break it down with examples in this article.

Part IV: Fun stuff Canon PowerShot Pro70 added to the studio scene database

This was the first camera ever reviewed at DPReview, way back in 1998. We had long thought it would be fun to revisit the camera with our modern studio scene and see how it stacked up. It so happened we had one handy and thought, well, it's now for never, and went for it.

Examine the studio scene

DPReview March Madness

March in America is marked by bars and workplaces arguing over which college athletics team is the best at basketball. For DPReview, it was also an opportunity for a good old-fashioned camera fight. Over five rounds, thousands of votes were cast, and some very odd debates were had, all in good fun.

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Leica marks James Bond's 60th* with a special edition D-Lux 7

In one of the most pun-tastic articles of the year, Senior Editor Shaminder Dulai decided to pay homage to his dad's love of spy films and books and go over the top with as many 007 references as he could cram in. Did he miss any? Let us know.

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Film Friday: Xpan 'Triptych Tokyo' captures the chaos of city life

Inspiration is all around us, and even old ideas are new when you put your own spin on it. We don't always get to go in-depth with creatives on their process and motivations. When we caught up with photographer Takashi Fukukawa we learned how his daughter's frustration led to his inspiration.

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DPReview readers' showcase: The cameras you imagined

We asked you to tell us about your dream camera, and hundreds of you cosplayed as Dr. Frankenstein to conjure all manner of plausible and implausible cameras. Thanks for the inspiration and the laughs. Who knew DPReview was full of such dreamers?

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Part V: Onward! Behind the scenes: DPReview moves to a new studio

What's that saying, when one door closes, another one opens? We take you along with us as we pack up thousands of items of gear, nervously document and disassemble our testing and studio equipment and say goodbye to our former home and hello to the future.

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Behind the scenes: Setting up DPReview's studio test chart

If there's one thing we know, our studio scene must be protected at all costs. After a few sweaty-palm tense days, we had our studio scene set up and back in operation and invited you behind the curtain to see how the proverbial sausage was made.

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Season's Greetings and happy 25th anniversary from DPReview

We made it! It's our 25th anniversary. The site officially launched on December 25, 1998, with the publication of the Canon Pro 70 review. We’ll be celebrating this anniversary throughout 2024. We want to extend our heartfelt thanks for sticking with us through a doozy of a year. Your enthusiasm and unwavering support are part of why we’re still around to celebrate the holidays with you. Thank you.

Celebrate with us

Categories: Photo News

Season's Greetings and Happy 25th Anniversary from DPReview

Mon, 12/25/2023 - 05:00

Season’s greetings! We want to extend our heartfelt thanks for sticking with us through a doozy of a year. Your enthusiasm and unwavering support are part of the reason we’re still around to celebrate the holidays with you. As 2023 draws to a close, we wish you all a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Boxing Day, Happy Kwanzaa, a Joyous Festivus, and Happy Holidays for your traditions during the holiday season.

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Today is a big day for DPReview: it's our 25th anniversary. The site officially launched on December 25, 1998, with the publication of the Canon Pro 70 review. We’ll be celebrating this anniversary throughout 2024, but you can get a head start: scroll to the bottom of our homepage and use the archive browser* to travel back in time to any month or year in DPReview's history. There's never been a better time to re-read our original review of your favorite camera.

Regular readers will know we weren’t supposed to be here by December. Earlier this year, our parent company announced plans to close DPReview as part of a larger restructuring. We were disappointed about the prospect of losing our jobs, but to us, the real tragedy was the idea of losing DPReview as a resource for the photography community. It’s our favorite site, too, and the prospect of an internet without DPReview was just as devastating to us as it was to you.

Fortunately, that’s not how our story ends. In June, we were acquired by Gear Patrol, another company focused on high-quality product journalism whose values and mission align with our own. Not only that, but Gear Patrol CEO Eric Yang is an enthusiast photographer who has a great vision for the site, and we're excited about what the future holds.

"Today is a big day for DPReview: it's our 25th anniversary."

However, the experience earlier this year was humbling, and we were shocked at the level of support we received, not just from readers but from industry leaders, the national news media, manufacturers, and even some of our competitors. It reminded us that we are stewards of something special, something bigger than us.

We’re so grateful for your support over the past 25 years. We’ve seen many changes to digital photography during that time: the DSLR revolution, the rise of smartphones, the evolution of mirrorless technology, and much more. As we look back over the past quarter century, we're reminded of all the DPReview staffers who put their blood, sweat, and tears into the site over the years, as well as all the members of our community who contributed to making DPReview such a special place. We’re proud of what we’ve accomplished together.

Before you go, please take a moment to share a few of your favorite highlights from DPReview history in the comments. We're on this journey together, and we'd love to know what stands out in your memory.

From all of us at DPReview – the editors who research and write stories, the developers who work so hard behind the scenes to make things work, and the business teams who keep us on solid footing – we wish you a happy and healthy holiday season. We can’t wait to see what the next 25 years will bring.

*The archive browser is available using the desktop version of DPReview.

Categories: Photo News

2023 DPG Masters Underwater Imaging Competition winners announced

Fri, 12/22/2023 - 06:00
Winning images from the 2023 DPG Masters Underwater Imaging Competition

Photo: UnderwaterCompetition.com

This morning, DivePhotoGuide (DPG) announced the winning images in the 2023 edition of its underwater photography competition. Featuring seven categories and entries from thousands of photographers, the competition crowned one Gold winner per category, along with a Silver, Bronze and Honorable Mention.

'Best in Show' went to Italian photographer Marco Gargiulo, for an image featuring a snow-topped Mount Vesuvius and a juvenile imperial blackfish catching a ride on a jellyfish. The photo also took the Gold award for its respective category.

You can view all the top images here, or check out the announcement on DivePhotoGuide.com or UnderwaterCompetition.com where you can also have a look at this year's winning short films.

Best of Show, Over-Under – Gold: "The Passenger"

Photo: Marco Gargiulo / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “It’s not often you see snow on the Vesuvius volcano here in the Gulf of Naples, where I live in Sorrento. It soon vanishes due to the mild temperatures. I’ve always wanted to take a photo, and I finally managed to get into the water to do it. During my walk along the Marina Grande in Sorrento, my usual place for winter night diving, the wind pushed a large quantity of jellyfish along the coast. I was lucky to find one that had a small passenger on board, a juvenile imperial blackfish (Schedophilus ovalis).”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Nikon 16–35mm F4 lens at 35mm | Nauticam housing | Nauticam 9-inch dome dual ONEUW One 160X strobes | F13 | 1/200s | ISO 110

Shooting Location: Castellammare di Stabia, Naples, Campania, Italy

Over-Under – Silver: “Smalltooth Sawfish Among the Mangroves at Dawn”

Photo: Grace Pempek/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Grace Pempek / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “One never expects to encounter a critically endangered species while taking a sunrise stroll along the beach, but luckily I was ready. My camera was set for wide angle, as I planned to do some diving on the famous wrecks of Key Largo later that morning. I use a wet lens with only a five-inch dome port for my wide-angle shooting, and it is certainly not intended for splits. I had to very precisely angle my dome so there would not be a line of water across the image. As difficult as it was, an over-under shot was my only option, as the juvenile smalltooth sawfish did not venture into water deeper than around six inches. Compounded with the limited morning light, the easily silted-up bottom and the struggle of holding my camera in the exact position to capture the elongated subject, this is one of the most challenging, and most rewarding, shots I’ve ever taken. After this encounter, I was able to share my shot and notes on behavior with Florida Fish & Wildlife to increase knowledge of this rarely observed animal.”

Equipment and Settings: Olympus PEN E-PL10 |Olympus 14–42mm F3.5–5.6 lens at 14mm | AOI Octo housing AOI UWL-09PRO wide-angle diopter | dual Sea&Sea YS-D3 Mark II strobes | F13 | 1/50s | ISO 250

Shooting Location: Key Largo, Florida, USA

Over-Under – Bronze: “American Alligator” Photo: Mirko Zanni/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Mirko Zanni / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “During my last trip to Florida, I went to visit the Everglades to photograph American alligators in the company of a friend of mine. It didn’t take us long to find some very large specimens, and they were not at all afraid of my camera housing. The alligator in the photo remained motionless for a few minutes.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS 5D Mark III | Canon EF 8–15mm F4 fisheye lens at 15mm | Seacam housing | Scubalamp SUPE strobe | F16 | 1/45s | ISO 400

Shooting Location: Everglades, Florida, USA

Over-Under – Honorable Mention: “Primal Plunge” Photo: Suliman Alatiqi/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Suliman Alatiqi / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “An over-under photo of a crab-eating macaque (Macaca fascicularis). These macaques can be seen at various pockets around the Phi Phi Islands and are known for occasionally foraging in the water in search of food or to get around a rival clan. I committed extensive time in the field to understand the maritime behavior of these animals, and this photo is a result of that effort.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Nikon AF-S 8–15mm F3.5–4.5 fisheye lens | Nauticam housing | F22 | 1/250s | ISO 2000

Shooting Location: Phi Phi Islands, Thailand

Traditional – Gold: “Sea Lions at Work” Photo: Fabien Michenet/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Fabien Michenet / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Every year, in the south of Magdalena Bay, on the Pacific coast of Mexico, a sardine run occurs between October and November. As millions of Pacific sardines (Sardinops sagax) gather over seamounts, fin whales, humpbacks, striped marlin, mahi-mahi, Pacific sea lions and other predators are attracted by the feast. After a few hours of searching, we found this baitball of densely packed sardines, and we observed marlin and mahi-mahi—particularly abundant this year due to the El Niño phenomenon—feeding on the fish. Suddenly, a group of sea lions took over the area, denying other predators access. Keeping the sun at my back, I positioned myself so that the scene was illuminated symmetrically, taking a few images as the ball of churning fish, surrounded by sea lions, moved away.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon Z8 | Nikon AF-S 16–35mm F4 at 16mm | Nauticam housing | F7.1 | 1/400s | ISO 640

Shooting Location: Magdalena Bay, Baja California, Mexico

Traditional – Silver: “My Home” Photo: Helmut Theiss/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Helmut Theiss / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “As my wife and dive buddy really enjoys watching coconut octopuses, how they move and interact, we chose this particular dive site for our first dive of the day. We found two of them, one walking on its arms with shells covering its body and another hiding between two shells. I took a few photos and they looked good, but they were very similar to other pictures I had seen before. The idea came to me to enhance the image artistically using colored light. We placed two lights on the sandy bottom, one blue, one red, and combined the light by playing with the angles of the beams. I asked our dive guide, Hiros, to help me shine an additional white light, with a snoot attached, on the animal’s face. Hiros’ assistance and understanding of photography helped me make this more-creative photo.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS 5D Mark IV | Canon EF 100mm F2.8 macro lens | Sea&Sea housing | dual Weefine 1200 FR torches (one with Weefine WFA61 snoot lens) | single Bigblue RGB-II dive light with Bigblue Snoot 35 | F13 | 1/320s | ISO 500

Shooting Location: Lembeh Strait, Sulawesi, Indonesia

Traditional – Bronze: “Icarus Reaching the Sun” Photo: Martin Broen/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Martin Broen / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “I am fascinated by the strange environments in Mexico’s cave systems. Among those natural phenomena is the color modification of the otherwise translucent water created by the tannic acid that washes from the jungle into the cenotes. The water color changes depending on the density of the tannic acid, from a low-concentration green to a yellow, and if you are extremely lucky, a high-concentration red tone. To witness this, you need to be in the water after a long period of very heavy tropical rain. When two consecutive hurricanes hit Mexico over 10 days, I decided to go to the famous Cenote Car Wash to shoot a diver immersed in the high-tannic water, backlit by the sun and surrounded by water lilies.”

Equipment and Settings: Sony a7R Mark III | Canon 8–15mm F4 fisheye lens at 15mm | Nauticam housing | F11 | 1/40s | ISO 3200

Shooting Location: Cenote Car Wash, Tulum, Yucatán, Mexico

Traditional – Honorable Mention: “Electric Frogfish” Photo: Nicolas Remy/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Nicolas Remy / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “During night dives in Chowder Bay, swarms of tiny shrimp sometimes gather around our underwater torches (we call them “swarmies”). They are a pain for the many underwater photographers who dive the bay, the trick being to work quickly when you find a subject, take a couple of shots and move away, before the swarmies show up. I was thinking that the swarmies could actually make for a nice background, with adequate lighting: I went diving with the idea to embrace them, rather than avoid them. The plan was to use a colored light so that they would stand out and emphasize the main subject. I thought a frogfish would be ideal, and easy to find as they gather in Chowder Bay during the warmer months. Together with my wife/lighting assistant, we went searching for them and found four different frogfish that night. With its yellow/orange color, this particular individual looked best, and I chose a blue backlight for the swarmies, so that the colors would complement each other.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D810 | Nikon AF-S 105mm F1.4 macro lens | Nauticam housing | Nauticam EMWL with 100° objective lens | Retra Flash Pro strobe with Retra LSD snoot | Backscatter MW-4300 video light with blue color filter | F18 | 1/10s | ISO 800

Shooting Location: Chowder Bay, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Macro – Gold: “Gone Fishin’” Photo: Byron Conroy/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Byron Conroy / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “For a long time, I have been an admirer of frogfish. The way they hunt fascinates me, so the challenge was to capture this special behavior in all its glory. To get this shot, I had a snoot positioned on my camera locked in place and waited patiently for the moment when the lure came out. A shot like this can take patience, as the fish needs to be relaxed to exhibit its usual behavior. The snooted subject with the black background draws the eye into the action, and the black negative space was chosen to give the idea that any potential meal could be about to enter the scene.”

Equipment and Settings: Sony a7R Mark V | Sony FE 90mm F2.8 macro lens | Nauticam housing | Retra Pro strobe with Retra LSD snoot | F11 | 1/200s | ISO 80

Shooting Location: Lembeh Strait, Sulawesi, Indonesia

Macro – Silver – “Giving Birth” Photo: Todd Aki/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Todd Aki / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “My wife and I were at the end of a dive when I spotted something that did not make sense: Why was a seahorse free floating in the water column? I could not believe my eyes at what happened next. The seahorse convulsed and out came hundreds of babies! Shooting is always my top priority, but I wanted my wife to experience this moment with me, so I banged my tank with my muck stick to get her attention and missed the opportunity to fire off a couple of shots. I was able to get into position and got three shots of the male seahorse’s next release. My wife was now at my side and the current took the baby seahorses right next to her mask. After a final release of offspring, the seahorse dropped to the ocean floor, exhausted.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS R7 | Canon EF-S 60mm F2.8 macro lens | Nauticam housing | dual Inon Z-330 strobes | F9 | 1/250s | ISO 100

Shooting Location: Tompotika Dive Lodge, Pulau Dua, Balantak Utara, Central Sulawesi, Indonesia

Macro – Bronze: “Young Turtle” Photo: Claudio Zori/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Claudio Zori / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “A surprise encounter with a juvenile turtle. Using a particular camera angle and a fast shutter speed, it was possible to create a pleasing mirror effect.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D300S | Nikon AF-S 60mm F2.8 macro lens | Tamron 1.4x teleconverter | Sealux housing | Seacam Seaflash 150 Digital | F32 | 1/320s | ISO 200

Shooting Location: Raja Ampat, Indonesia

Macro – Honorable Mention: “Speedy Boxfish”

Photo: Byron Conroy/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Byron Conroy / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Juvenile boxfish are quite common in Lembeh, but there are a few issues with shooting them. Firstly, they are constantly moving, making it a challenge to capture them. Then, the background is usually ugly, gray sand. So to get this shot, I decided to use a snoot to light the fish, then use a long exposure along with intentional camera movement to blur out the background and also to capture a sense of the fish’s movement. The shot was taken using manual focus with a locked snoot on an arm, so that when I could see the eyes were in focus, the snoot would land on the subject. After initial setup with an off-center snoot, it then took a lot of time and patience to wait for the perfect eye connection with the subject.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS 5D Mark IV | Canon 100mm F2.8 macro lens | Nauticam housing | Retra Pro strobe with Retra LSD snoot | F13 | 1/4s | ISO 500

Shooting Location: Lembeh Strait, Sulawesi, Indonesia

Wide Angle – Gold: “Wishing Well” Photo: Suliman Alatiqi/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Suliman Alatiqi / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “An underwater photo of a crab-eating macaque gazing at the water from the edge of a rocky platform, as seen through Snell’s window. After touring the islands known for their macaques, I noticed that the animals tend to stay on cliffs close to the water during the day. This made me think about the possibility of capturing an underwater perspective of the animal with the scenery above. The biggest challenge was lighting a subject completely above the water, as I did not want a silhouette. After some experimenting, I waited patiently for the right opportunity and managed to get this moment on breath-hold. The macaque seemed inquisitive about my approach, which made the photo possible.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Nikon AF-S 8–15mm F3.5–4.5 fisheye lens | Nauticam housing | dual Sea&Sea YS-D2J strobes | f/20, 1/250s, ISO 280

Shooting Location: Phi Phi Islands, Thailand

Wide Angle – Silver: “Fish Buffet” Photo: Yinan Liu/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Yinan Liu / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “I found a reef about 10 meters underwater, surrounded by small fish. Suddenly, two coral groupers jumped out from under the reef to hunt for fish. I stayed near the reef and continued to wait for them to rush towards the fish again, and took this photo.”

Equi​pment and Settings: Canon EOS 5DSR | Canon 8–15mm f/4 fisheye lens at 15mm | Nauticam housing | dual Ikelite DS161 strobes | F8 | 1/160s | ISO 50

Shooting Location: Aka Island, Kerama Islands, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan

Wide Angle – Bronze: “Trio” Photo: Annie Guttridge/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Annie Guttridge / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “While returning home from an incredible day on the ocean, we noticed several dorsal fins breaking the water on the horizon. We’d encountered a pod made up of both Atlantic spotted and bottlenose dolphins. I carefully and cautiously slipped into the water and observed the dolphins feeding, playing, and frolicking beneath the waves. The dolphins were tightly intertwined, but they seemed to divide as they surfaced to breathe. After observing this behavior for several minutes, I decided to pull back and stay at the surface. By doing so, I appeared to engage the curiosity of these hard-to-impress marine mammals, who are familiar with divers eager to get close. Spotted dolphins are known for their bold and playful personas, but bottlenose dolphins are typically more withdrawn and hard to excite. With this in mind, and to my surprise, three bottlenose dolphins chose to elevate together in unison, directly and purposely towards me. It was in this moment that I patiently waited for just the right moment to capture the shot.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Sigma 15mm F2.8 fisheye lens | Nauticam housing | F9 | 1/640s | ISO 1100

Shooting Location: North Bimini Island, The Bahamas

Wide Angle – Honorable Mention: “Reflections”

Photo: Cédric Péneau/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Cédric Péneau / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Humpback whales migrate from their polar feeding grounds to tropical seas to breed and mate during the austral winter, and on good years, we are lucky to have many of them come very close to our little Island’s shores. Boats can approach within 100 meters, and we can carefully approach the whales on snorkel, hoping they will allow us to share amazing, intense moments of mutual curiosity. This particular mother, which stayed around for a few weeks, was easily recognizable due to its severed fluke, and it often let us come close to her and her calf. This picture shows the end of a long and calm interaction in a particularly flat sea—hence the reflections at the surface.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D7200 | Tokina 10–17mm F/3.5–4.5 fisheye lens | Nauticam housing| F13 | 1/125s | ISO 200

Shooting Location: Réunion Island, Mascarene Islands, Indian Ocean

Conservation – Gold: “Massacre" Photo: Yinan Liu/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Yinan Liu / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “When we went out to sea in the morning, we passed a small island and saw the fishermen on the island cutting up sharks and throwing the unused parts on the beach. When we returned in the afternoon, due to the high tide, the abandoned parts had been brought out into the sea, allowing me to go underwater and capture this heartbreaking scene. I hope that through this photo, more people can work together to protect sharks. If there is no trade, there will be no killing.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS 5DSR | Canon 8–15mm F4 fisheye lens at 15mm | Nauticam housing | F10 | 1/250s | ISO 200

Shooting Location: Magdalena Bay, Baja California Sur, Mexico

Conservation – Silver: “The Anisakis Parasite Leaves the Host” Photo: Guido Villani/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Guido Villani / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “On Italy’s southern coast, within Cilento National Park, in the communities of Pisciotta, Palinuro and Camerota, there survives a traditional anchovy fishery called menaica. Handed down from generation to generation, it is now carried out by just six small boats under the control of the coastal authority. Taking place in May and June, this particular fishery utilizes a drift net with a 12mm mesh size, up to 400 meters in length and 20 meters deep, which is left drifting with coastal currents in the calm waters. The activity takes place at sunset and is limited to one hour, necessitating an in-depth knowledge of local currents. The catch is restricted to adult anchovies and does not result in by-catch. Menaica anchovies are a highly appreciated resource all along the Campania coast and represent a distintive component of the Mediterranean diet.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D800E | Nikon AF-S 8–15mm F3.5–4.5 fisheye lens at 15mm | Seacam housing | dual Retra Flash strobes | f/29, 1/160s, ISO 200

Shooting Location: Cilento National Park, Pisciotta, Salerno, Italy

Conservation – Bronze: “Problem Props” Photo: Simon Hilbourne/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Simon Hilbourne / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Whilst working for Manta Trust in the Maldives, I had come to know this manta called Babaganoush quite well. However, just before this encounter with him, he had been hit by a speedboat, the skeg of the outboard motor cutting deep into his body and each rotation of the propellers leaving perpendicular gashes. The severity of his injuries was unprecedented, and we were unsure if he would survive. Sadly, this story is repeated throughout the Maldives, with more and more whale sharks and manta rays bearing the scars of boat strikes. As tourism in the country develops, operators are switching from traditional dhonis to faster speedboats, which give vulnerable wildlife little chance to get out of the way.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D7100 | Tokina 10–17mm F3.5–4.5 fisheye lens | Isotta housing | F13 | 160s | ISO 200

Shooting Location: Hanifaru Bay, Baa Atoll, Maldives

Conservation – Honorable Mention: “Is This a Hobby?” Photo: Gaetano Gargiulo/UnderwaterCompetition

Photo: Gaetano Gargiulo / UnderwaterCompetition

Photographer’s Comment: “This very friendly eel was never shy with the many photographers diving Chowder Bay. Sadly, one day it got hooked and was released with the hook piercing one eye. Since that day, it stayed sheltered in the hole at the base of the pylon where it used to live. It could not hunt, and it disappeared after about two months, likely succumbing to its injuries.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Nikon AF-S 60mm F2.8 macro lens | Isotta housing | dual Retra Pro strobes | Weefine WS07 light with adapted Backscatter snoot

Shooting Location: Mosman, New South Wales, Australia

Black and White – Gold: “Parallel Universes” Photo: Martin Broen/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Martin Broen / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Over the year, I have had the pleasure of capturing the beauty of over 250 different Mexican cenotes. One of the most fascinating aspects of these cave systems is their stunning formation enclosure and decorations, and the ability to move freely to explore them in every direction and in a perfectly translucent environment. Nothing exemplifies this freedom of movement more than breaking from your bidimensional constraints and jumping into vertical opening tunnels—as if entering a parallel universe.”

Equipment and Settings: Sony a7R Mark III | Canon 8–15mm F4 fisheye lens at 15mm | Nauticam housing | dual Bigblue 15,000-lumen lights | F6.3 | 1/50s | ISO 6400

Shooting Location: Cenote Xa’ay Ha, Tulum, Yucatán, Mexico

Black and White – Silver: “Silfra Sunrise” Photo: Byron Conroy/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Byron Conroy / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “The ice cold water of the Silfra fissure has long been famous for very specific shots, but it’s the only dive site in the world where you can use landscape photo techniques underwater due to the incredible clarity, with visibility of over 100 meters. I wanted to find a new angle at this iconic site, one that allows me to convey the experience of diving here. Silfra is often called ‘liquid air’; by using black and white, I was able to express the clarity of the water and also show the feeling of diving between two diverging tectonic plates by having a strong contrast between the water, the model and the plates. To make this shot possible, I chose the time of day and the time of year to ensure the sun was in the right place.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS 5D Mark IV | Sigma 15mm F2.8 fisheye lens | Nauticam housing | F11 | 1/125 | ISO 800

Shooting Location: Silfra, Iceland

Black and White – Bronze: “Crossing Under the Light” Photo: Miguel Ramirez/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Miguel Ramirez / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “In July 2023, we had the opportunity to snorkel with humpbacks off Réunion Island. This pair of whales, one of which was lighter colored than the other, was very calm and allowed us to approach. The clarity of the water and the sunlight made it possible to have magnificent sunrays underwater. It was a magical, touching encounter.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D500, Tokina 10–17mm F3.5–4.5 fisheye lens | Hugyfot housing | F10 | 1/160 | ISO 640

Shooting Location: Réunion Island, Mascarene Islands, Indian Ocean

Black and White – Honorable Mention: “Amongst Clouds of Sediment” Photo: Francis Glassup/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Francis Glassup / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Once a common sight around Africa, dugong populations have tragically plummeted in recent decades. This is thought to be due to seagrass habitat loss and human pressure. Fortunately, the lagoons of Abu Dabbab in Egypt still provide refuge for a few of these magical creatures. After days of studying the behavior patterns of this large male, I was able to position myself in an area I thought he might come to. Luck was on my side and after a long wait, he slowly approached, unperturbed by my presence. I wanted to capture an image that portrayed the dugong’s raw power and beauty as it vacuumed up seagrass amongst the billowing clouds of sediment.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D800 | Nikon AF-S 16–35mm F4 lens | Hugyfot housing | dual Ikelite DS161 strobes | F13 | 1/250s | ISO 100

Shooting Location: Abu Dabbab, Egypt

Blackwater – Gold: “Flamenco Pose” Photo: Magnus Lundgren/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Magnus Lundgren / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “It was a night filled with drama when I encountered one of my dream subjects in Balayan Bay. The Taal volcano was erupting, sending fireworks into the dark sky like a huge dragon, and the deep, thundering sound of earthquakes rolled through the ocean. At the same time, this female blanket octopus appeared from nowhere, out of the dark, in front of my camera. She started rolling out her long blanket, ending up in this Batman-like pose. False eyes decorating her flamenco-style webbing between her arms stared back at me. It is believed that the blanket is probably used to spook or confuse predators.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Nikon AF-S 60mm F2.8 macro lens | Nauticam housing | Inon Z-330 strobes. | F16 | 1/250 | ISO 320

Shooting Location: Anilao, Balayan Bay, Batangas, Philippines

Blackwater – Silver: “Juvenile Moray Eel” Photo: Liang Fu/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Liang Fu / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “Moray eels are generally found living in coral reefs, but juveniles often live pelagically in open waters until they mature into adults. During a blackwater dive, I found a transparent creature swimming at a depth of over 20 meters. It had curled its body into a heart shape in the water. Upon closer inspection, I realized it was a juvenile moray eel! Unlike the adults that live in reef crevices, juveniles drift in the open ocean, their transparent bodies providing camouflage against predators in the vast blue. I was very lucky to spot this elusive juvenile moray eel in the dark waters.”

Equipment and Settings: Canon EOS R5 | Canon RF 35mm F1.8 macro lens | Nauticam housing | dual Retra Flash Pro strobes | F13 | 1/200 | ISO 400

Shooting Location: Romblon, Philippines

Blackwater – Bronze – “Sparkling Wunderpus” Photo: Magnus Lundgren/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Magnus Lundgren / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “As a photographer, I can only smile when I encounter this spectacular octopus, whose scientific name is Wunderpus photogenicus. For me, this alien-like creature is a reminder that 80 percent of the ocean remains unexplored. I found this particular juvenile wunderpus at night in the pelagic zone, around 200 meters from the seafloor. The wunderpus spends its life in the open ocean before settling on the seafloor and changing into its adult form. It gains banded white markings as an adult and has the ability to mimic other animals, just like the mimic octopus.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D850 | Nikon AF-S 60mm F2.8 macro lens | Nauticam housing | Inon Z-330 strobes | F18 | 1/6s | ISO 320

Shooting Location: Anilao, Balayan Bay, Batangas, Philippines

Blackwater – Honorable Mention – “Dinner Time” Photo: Dennis Corpuz/UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photo: Dennis Corpuz / UnderwaterCompetition.com

Photographer’s Comment: “It was almost at the very end of our blackwater dive when I spotted this crab swimming near the lights at around 5 meters (15 feet). I noticed the crab was swimming frantically, and when I followed it to investigate closer, I was surprised to see that it was chasing a small fish. Eventually, the crab caught up with its meal, and I was able to take a few pictures before running out of air and returning to the surface.”

Equipment and Settings: Nikon D7000 | AF-S Nikon 60mm F2.8 macro lens | Sea&Sea housing | dual Backscatter Mini Flash 2

Shooting Location: Anilao, Batangas, Philippines

Categories: Photo News

Aura Carver 10.1" digital photo frame review: A window to the photos you almost forgot

Thu, 12/21/2023 - 06:00
Photo: Michelle DeLateur

A step below tablets in functionality and offerings but more interactive and striking than a regular frame, digital frames are perennially giftable. What easier way to display photographs, including new ones sent digitally by friends and family? The Aura Carver 10.1" Wi-Fi Digital Picture Frame is a great choice, though not without flaws.

Buy now:

$149 at Amazon $149 at Aura Key Specifications:
  • 10.1" display
  • 1280 x 800 resolution (150 PPI)
  • Landscape orientation only
  • Weight: 1.61 lbs
  • Wi-Fi
  • Photos and videos can be uploaded via the Aura App (iOS/Android)
Overview

The Aura Carver 10.1" HD frame is a digital display for photographs and video, with easy set-up through the Aura app and ostensibly unlimited storage through its cloud features.

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Powered by an AC adapter and proprietary cable, the frame is designed to be positioned in landscape orientation only, with the ability to display portrait images in pairs, side by side. The frame can also display videos but with some caveats.

The screen is not a touchscreen (not that you'd want to be smudging it up with your fingers), but the frame has a touch strip along the top edge that you can use to swipe through photos and interact when necessary.

Packaging and build

I ran into my first two hurdles of the Carver unit right out of the box: its color and cord. The frame itself is an impressive and robust unit. It feels stable, sturdy, and professional. The Gravel (black) coloring, however, can scratch onto white surfaces. A white shelf or table, for example, may feature black scuff marks courtesy of the Carver when you set it up. The Carver also comes in Sea Salt (white), but if you'd prefer the black, the scuffs are nothing that a Magic Eraser or some caution can't solve.

Photo: Michelle DeLateur

The Carver uses a unique power cord instead of a more standard variety like USB-C or Micro USB, and the unit also needs to be plugged in to run. Because you can't retract the cord or swap it out for a shorter or longer one, some cleverness may be required to keep your frame area neat and tidy.

Photo: Michelle DeLateur User Experience

One of my mounted photograph prints watched jealously over my shoulder as I set up the entire Aura Carver digital frame in approximately 90 seconds, coming in under the two-minute estimate on the Aura website. This included downloading the app, linking the frame to my phone, and selecting photos to send over. You can spare your recipient part of this setup with Aura's gift mode, which allows you to pre-load some content and even a message that will display when they boot it up.

Photo: Michelle DeLateur

The Carver frame defaults to slideshow mode, and you can select the length of time between each photo and video. Because the default is 10 minutes, I didn't realize slideshow mode was on in the first place. It can be configured to switch photos as quickly as a matter of seconds or up to 24 hours, depending on how quickly you want new photos to appear. Photographs look vibrant on the screen, and it's a joy to revisit pictures I would have otherwise forgotten.

"It's a joy to revisit pictures I would have otherwise forgotten."

While landscape photos fit the frame's aspect ratio, vertical photos do not and can be displayed side by side using Photo Pairing mode. As Aura explained to me for this review, photos are paired by the time when in Chronological Photo order, whereas, in Shuffle Photo Order, the photos are paired in a rough attempt by Aura's app to match the subject and location. You can also set a background for single vertical photos, either black or 'filled', which fills the negative space with a zoomed-in, out-of-focus version of the photo itself. When I selected 'filled', the treatment was not consistent for all of my shots, and some reverted to a black background.

Videos have a hurdle of their own. When a video comes up on the unit, a 'Loading' progress bar appears on the screen with a 'Tap Touch Bar For Sound' at the top. The video is sometimes choppy upon playback and returns to a thumbnail at the end. It's functional but not particularly slick, so the Carver is best suited for portfolios that are heavy on still photos and light on videos.

The touch bar at the top of the Aura Carver digital frame.

Photo: Michelle DeLateur

To interact with the frame, you'll use a limited-function touchbar along the top of the device. You can 'like' a photo by tapping the top twice (not unlike Instagram), move through photos by swiping left or right, or turn the frame off by holding the touch bar's integrated button down.

The Aura Carver digital frame has an automatic on-and-off function determined by light, not motion detection. When I placed the digital frame into a bathroom with no ambient light, it responded surprisingly when I turned off the lights. With regular sunlight and no additional artificial light, the unit will stay on. In bright conditions, glare is mercifully absent. Overall, the glare was far less noticeable than the MacBook Pro on which this article was written.

Image: Aura Conclusion

While framed prints have a certain reliability and charm no digital screen can touch, the Aura Carver's utility and ease of use make it a great supplement to surface forgotten memories and add a bit of variety to any part of the home (that's sufficiently close to an outlet).

The Aura Carver's easy setup, simple app and handy gift mode make it a great present for anyone who appreciates revisiting their memories but isn't necessarily technologically or photographically inclined.

Buy now:

$149 at Amazon $149 at Aura
Categories: Photo News

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