photokina

COLOGNE, Germany--Samsung, showing off its new higher-end compact NX100 camera, declared its ambition Monday to become a power in the camera industry.

"I believe the NX100 will be the catalyst for photo innovations in the digital camera industry and will propel Samsung forward to become one of the world's leading manufacturers," said Sangjin Park, president of Samsung's digital imaging division, speaking at press event at the Photokina show here.

Compact ILC (interchangeable lens camera) models are all the rage as the industry seeks to build new demand in a somewhat saturated market. Olympus and Panasonic led the way with their compatible Micro Four Thirds models, and Samsung and Sony have now arrived with models of their own featuring a larger sensor and their own proprietary lens mounts. These higher-end models aren't cheap: Samsung's costs $599 with a 20-50mm lens and $649 with a 20mm lens.

The ILC trend is still in its early days, though, and InfoTrends analyst Ed Lee believes it'll take the arrival of the industry's high-end camera powerhouses, Canon and Nikon, to truly legitimize the market.

But Samsung isn't waiting. Front and center in the effort to make more usable cameras is a new feature called i-Function to control camera settings that the company hopes will attain that holy grail, a camera that's easy to use but that offers a wealth of creative possibilities. Control over details such as shutter speed and aperture has never been simple, but Samsung promises i-Function will be different.

It works through a button on the side of an i-Function-compatible lens, of which Samsung plans a range that begins with a 20mm f2.8 pancake and a 20-50mm f3.5-5.6 zoom. Pushing the button cycles through various parameters that can be set--shutter speed, aperture, ISO, and exposure compensation--while turning the lens' focus ring changes the setting. … Read more

Just after Canon announced second-generation 300mm and 400mm telephoto lenses for its SLRs, the Japanese camera maker also said Friday that it will show prototypes of revamped supertelephoto lenses with 500mm and 600mm focal lengths.

The two prototypes, officially called the EF500mm f/4L IS II USM and EF600mm f/4L IS II USM, are second-generation successors to the current products introduced in July and September 1999, respectively. They'll be on display at the Photokina show in Cologne, Germany, later in September, at which the spotlight shines brightly on high-end gear.

Canon was characteristically reserved about the prototypes, saying release dates and specifications haven't been decided, but the company appears to be applying the similar revisions that it brought to the 300mm and 400mm lenses: better image stabilization, better image quality, and lighter weight.

"The EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM and EF 600mm f/4L IS II USM are being developed as L (Luxury)-series lenses equipped with a high-performance image stabilization system," Canon said. "Employing fluorite and other special optical materials to correct for a variety of aberrations, the lenses aim to realize high-resolution, high-contrast imaging performance in a lighter-weight body design." … Read more

Tokina has announced a versatile new 8x zoom lens, the Tokina AT-X 16.5mm-135mm f3.5-5.6 DX lens. It's a digital-only lens, featuring a wide focal length range, and it will be available for Canon and Nikon lens mounts. It has a 35mm equivalent focal length of 26mm to 216mm on a Canon DSLR, and a 35mm equivalent focal length range of 25mm to 203mm on a Nikon DSLR. The lens has a close-focusing distance of about 18 inches. No pricing or availability information was available, but it is said to be shipping early in 2009.

It's a boon that digital photos can incorporate textual information, leaving behind some film-era complications, such as having to separately record a photo's caption or copyright status.

But there are some problems handling this so-called metadata, and now Canon, Adobe Systems, Apple, Microsoft, Sony, and Nokia have banded together to solve some of them.

The companies have formed the Metatdata Working Group and released a first set of guidelines that attempts to standardize some issues that can crop up as metadata travels from cameras to computers, software, and Web sites. On Wednesday, the group announced its work at … Read more

Stereo cameras are capable of capturing 3D images, but they usually require additional accessories such as 3D glasses to view them in their full glory. Also, there are currently only film-based stereo shooters so there's the additional step of processing the negatives and printing them.

Fujifilm aims to eliminate all the hassle with the 3D FinePix Real 3D System it introduced at Photokina. The blueprint includes dual-imaging sensors that can simultaneously capture two pictures and process them with the company's newly developed RP (Real Photo) Processor 3D. The chip will analyze the two files and combine them into … Read more

Phase One is fleshing out its transformation from a maker of high-end image sensors for others' cameras into a maker of full-on cameras.

At the Photokina camera show in Germany, the company announced "successful alliances" with Leica Camera, Mamiya, and Hartblei to bring third-party lenses to its Phase One 645 camera system, and it said it will begin selling several lenses of its own by the end of the year. Those lens models are a 28mm f4.5, a 45mm f2.8, an 80mm f2.8, a 120mm f4.0, a 150mm f2.8, and a 75-150mm f4.… Read more

Lensbaby's selective-focus lenses thus far have brought a seat-of-the-pants, analog feel to the electronic and digital world that photography has become. But a new model announced Tuesday has a more traditional interface for those who weren't happy with the company's earlier approach of squeezing and flexing the lens until the image looks about right.

For the uninitiated, the company's approach deserves a little explanation here. Lensbaby lenses let people focus tightly on a selected spot; the rest of the view quickly recedes into blurriness. It's a bit gimmicky, but it gives a different look than … Read more

Nikon announced an update to its 50mm f/1.4 lens on Monday, a relatively high-speed mainstay set to go on sale for $440 in December.

The new lens, called the AF-S Nikkor 50mm f/1.4G, has less chromatic aberration and internal flare than its predecessor, Nikon said. It's also got a silent wave motor for quiet, speedy autofocus, a close-focus distance of about 18 inches, and nine rounded aperture blades for a smoother look, called bokeh, in out-of-focus regions.

Lenses with a fixed 50mm focal length are very common, though not as much as during the era … Read more