Canon Eos 50D Announced

Canon have officially unveiled the EOS 50D. The 15.1 megapixel DSLR features an APS-C sized CMOS sensor, DIGIC 4 image processor, up to ISO 12800 support, a 3.0-inch LCD with Live View, face detection, HDMI output, 6.3fps burst mode. It also uses the same AF system found in Canon's 40D but with a new Microadjustment feature. This Prosumer centric model should have an SRP of $1,599 with Canon's EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM zoom lens -- $1,399 for the body only.

Canon DSLR: The Ultimate Photographer's Guide

Reviewed by: Mario Georgiou, July 2008 Author: Christopher Grey Published by: Focal Press ISBN-10: 0240520408, ISBN-13: 978-0240520407 Requires: An interest in Canon cameras MSRP: US$39.95, UK £22.99 Christopher Grey has produced a reference book which covers most Canon digital SLR (DSLR) cameras and is squarely aimed at improving your use of your DSLR. The title of the book includes the phrase "The Ultimate Photographer's Guide" which is quite a boast. So as usual when we encounter this sort of thing, our initial goal during the review is to establish whether or not the substance of the book lives up to the 'hype' of the title. The book begins by looking at the basics of photography and then briefly at the concepts of workflow. It continues by covering many of the existing workflow models and then looks into the common technology and features used in all Canon's Cameras. In the Common Ground section, Christopher Grey introduces the first of his many Photographer Spotlights found throughout the book in which he interviews and looks at the working practices of a large number of professional photographers Grey then looks at the Zones — Basic and Creative — which allow users either easy choices for shooting under different conditions or, as in the Creative zone, a more technical approach requiring some knowledge of the features and capabilities of your Canon camera. The Basic Zone uses icons to allow the user to easily select a preferred shooting mode. With shooting mode selections in Canon DSLRs for Full Auto, Portrait, Landscape, Close-up, Sports and Night Portrait, it's easy enough for most people (especially casual photographers, more serious but still novice photographers, and even many intermediate photographers). A Basic Zone selector is missing from the dial on all prosumer and pro Canon DSLR models. Canon DSLR: The Ultimate Photographer's Guide then looks at the focus, exposure and style, examining the use of external light meters, color temperature, focus methodologies and preferences. It is here where some excellent lessons are imparted regarding the judicious use of the excellent focusing technologies found in Canon cameras. Grey then takes a look at Canon lenses. The coverage here is good, firmly establishing the practical uses of a wide variety of Canon lenses and examining the where and why of lens use too. In the next chapter, the use of Canon flashes is covered including built-in pop-up flash, accessory flash, off-camera flash, studio flash and location lighting. The book's penultimate chapter looks at one of the most important parts of your toolkit: The use of the Canon Digital Photo Professional software. In this chapter the handling of your images — more specifically the Digital Negative or RAW file — is covered in some depth. Although Adobe Camera RAW (ACR) is mentioned, neither it nor Adobe Lightroom, Apple Aperture, ACDSee Pro 2 or any of the other RAW acquisition solutions are covered. The book finishes with a look at the works of a number of photographers from around the world. Cons: No coverage of other RAW software. Pros: Excellent layout and information throughout the book. Easy to follow. Although the book is aimed at the beginner and intermediate user there are many pros out there who use it instead of the manuals supplied with their Canon DSLR. Canon DSLR: The Ultimate Photographer's Guide is a book which should easily be updated as newer DSLR models are released. If you own a Canon Digital SLR camera then this excellent book from Focal Press is a worthy addition to your library. A must have for almost any serious photographer's reference library (because you never know when you might need to use a Canon). Highly recommended.

CHDK - Hacking Your Canon Point & Shoot

lifehacker.com have posted an excellent article on the Canon Hacker's Development Kit. CHDK is a free, open source project with which you can add features like RAW shooting mode, live RGB histograms, additional photographic settings, motion-detection, time-lapse, longer video recording and even games onto your existing Canon camera. The beauty of CHDK is that it is non-permanent and non-destructive, you can use when you want to; CHDK makes no changes to your camera. Installing CHDK entails having a couple of files added to your camera's memory card. Removing it involves simply restarting your camera without the memory card present.

Canon PowerShot A650 IS Review

Product: Canon PowerShot A650 IS Digital Compact Camera Manufactured by: Canon Reviewed by: Howard Carson, March 2008 Requires: An interest in photography MSRP: US$299.95, UK£289.00 Read the full review on kickstartnews.com What separates the huge assortment of mediocre point & shoot compact digital cameras from the good ones? Image quality! Canon has consistently come up with designs and technology which continue to keep it in the forefront of compact camera design, usability and image quality. The Canon PowerShot A650 IS Digital Compact Camera is a feature packed, versatile handful designed to please intermediate and advanced amateur photographers and to attract beginner photographers who want something noticeably more complex than so many of the dumbed-down and control-free point & shoot cameras available today. The PowerShot A650 IS is the top-of-the-line A-series PowerShot model as of this writing. It is a 12.1 megapixel camera with a 6x optical zoom coupled to Canon's patented Optical Image Stabilizer (IS) technology. IS is specifically designed to deliver clear, blur-free images in many low light situations and all through the zoom range. The PowerShot A650 IS is built around Canon's latest generation DIGIC III Image Processor which now provides among other things enhanced Face Detection, ISO 1600 and fast in-camera red-eye correction. Canon's extremely popular A-series is a curious thing to observe. All of the models in the series are relatively lightweight, use 'AA' batteries (two in most models; four in the A650 IS), and offer a large number of shooting and picture controls. After using the PowerShot A650 IS for a week or so and occasionally perusing the user manual during that time, you'll begin to wonder if Canon made some sort of mistake. The question you end up asking is why Canon decided to pack so many well-designed and easy to use features into a camera at this price point. There's nothing on the market right now which has this much packed into it at this price point and which does so much so well at this price point. Cons: The 173K pixels in the LCD are sufficient for a variety of purposes but pale in comparison to the bright, razor sharp, high resolution LCDs we're starting to see on cameras from competing makers. The shoot/playback switch operates coarsely—functional but somewhat inelegant—and it's hard to figure out why Canon has stuck with this sort of switch when all the other makers have mercifully moved to playback buttons. The single metal strap lug is useful but barely large enough to accommodate a small steel split ring for those people who want to attach a top quality (UpStrap or Optech) wrist strap. The Optical Image Stabilization (IS) control is located two layers deep in a configuration menu, so it takes more than a few moments to turn it on and off. Might as well leave it on all the time, while also remembering that IS does not always guarantee blur-free photos. The creditable Movie mode can be ruined somewhat by wind noise even in very light breezes. (More in the full review) Pros: I don't understand how Canon does such a consistently superior job with so many of its point & shoot cameras. Competing camera makers must spend hours every day wondering just how Canon comes up with so many good compacts every year. That's not to say other manufacturers produce junk—far from it. But Canon leads the pack because some people over there are really thinking carefully about the best combinations of features, functions, controls, image quality and usability. The variable flash power setting is incredibly useful for making well-balanced portrait photos and for controling fill light—a wonderful feature to have in a camera in this price range. The Canon PowerShot A650 IS can consistently capture well balanced, richly colored photos in a wide range of shooting conditions. The Vari-angle articulating LCD screen is wonderfully useful and offers decent quality image playback too. Movie mode works well enough to make most people think twice about the need for a separate digital video camera. Movie audio is well controlled, with very little noise and clear recording albeit mainly in relatively calm wind conditions. Prominent grip on the right side fits most hands well and provides good control and handling. Uses popular and competitively priced SD storage cards. SOHO and small business owners looking for an office or carry-around camera for use with clients and on job sites should consider the A650 IS. Image quality is suitable for framing and you'll have to spend a lot more money to take the next significant step up. Highly recommended. Read the full review at kickstartnews.com

RAW Product Announcements

There have been several RAW image product announcements this week. Bibble Labs have updated Bibble to include support for the Canon 40D, Pentax K100D Super and the Fujifilm FinePix E550. The support for the Canon 40D included tethered shooting and sRAW, check out Bibble Labs for more information on this release. Phase One announced the beta release of Capture One 4, this is a new application building on cutting-edge technology, a new architecture, and what users found best from previous generations of Capture One. The beta is available now at no cost until November 1. Capture One 4 is available for Windows XP (SP2) and Vista and Mac OS 10.4.8 (or higher) platforms. Visit Phase One for more information. Ichikawa Soft Laboratory have updated Silkypix Developer Studio to version 3.0.12 adding support for the Canon EOS 40D, visit the Silkypix product page for more information

Canon Announce New Cameras and Lenses

Canon announced a slew of new cameras and lenses, including the 20MP Canon Eos 1Ds Mk III, the 10MP Eos 40D, and the Powershot G9. Other products include the SD (ixus) 950i P&S, the Digital IXUS 860 IS, PowerShot A650 IS and the PowerShot A720 IS. On the optical front they have released an updated version of their EF 14 mm F2.8 L USM lens, and also a couple of EF-s based lenses; the Canon 18-55 mm IS and 55-250 mm IS.

Canon Updates Digital Photo Professional for Windows

Canon have recently released the updated Digital Photo Professional 3.0.1a and EOS Utility 2.0b for Windows. The Digital Photo Professional 3.0.1a and EOS Utility 2.0b updaters can be downloaded from any of the compatible EOS digital SLR pages on the Canon USA website. Source - Rob Galbraith

Canon Updates Digital Camera Software

Rob Galbraith has posted an announcement that Canon have posted updates for almost all of the applications they bundle with their line of digital SLR models. He indicates that they have also released the Canon RAW Codec Version 1.0 for Windows Vista which helps address support issues for Raw files on the New windows OS. Updaters are available for Digital Photo Professional 3.0, EOS Utility 2.0 and ImageBrowser 5.8b/ZoomBrowser EX 5.8b, as well as a full installer for RAW Codec 1.0, which can be downloaded from any of the recent-model Canon digital SLR pages on Canon's Web Self-Service System website. For the updaters to run, you must have earlier versions of Canon digital SLR software installed.

New Products From Canon

Things are definitely hotting up with product annnouncements for PMA ... Canon announced a slew of new products, including the new Canon Eos 1D Mark III, which is a 10 million image pixel, 10 fps digital SLR that is substantially improved over its predecessor. Canon has also announced the EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM lens, Speedlite 580EX II flash and Wireless File Transmitter WFT-E2/E2A. Other camera products include the 7.1-megapixel PowerShot A570 IS and A560 digital cameras, the PowerShot SD750 and SD1000. Also announced was Canon's TX1, which is a hybrid shooter which handles both 7.1 megapixel still images and 720p video. Canon also announced 3 new printers, the new portable PIXMA iP90v Photo Printer, the PIXMA iP3300 and PIXMA iP1800. I really like the Powershot SD750 ... the back of the camera features a large lcd display. They've done a nice job with this compact.