Zigview gets Nordic Representation...

I received an email today from Shiftlenses, that they have picked up the representation for Zigview in the nordic countries (Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland and Iceland). They have also informed me that Minolta and Pentax are now available for the Zigview. Shiftlenses sells some nice accessories and specialised lenses for a variety of camera systems.

Annual PIX Digital Imaging Contest Announced

Photo District News is again calling for submissions for its annual digital photography contest. Categories include personal, commercial, web, news and collaborative. Feeling up to the challenge then submit your work ... its always a good rush when you win.

I always hate this part ... it costs to submit and they haven't announced the prizes. Competition Deadline is August 8th 2005. More info is available here.

Zigview Review Posted

Reviewed by: Mario Georgiou, June 2005
Manufactured by: Seculine
Requires: Digital SLR camera
MSRP: UK£119.99 (additional adapters £6.99)

I was awakened by an urgent knocking on my front door. Very groggily I answered it and there was a delivery man holding a box. I took one look at the box and the packing slip which said Intro2020 on it, and that was enough to snap me awake. I wasn't expecting this—a Zigview had arrived on my doorstep. So some of you may shrug and ask what on earth is a Zigview? Good question.

I will answer the question with a scenario. You are doing some macro photography at a client's facility. A low angle shot is required, but being low angle it's going to be a real pain to get the shot while lying on the floor. So you reach into your kit bag and pull out the Zigview. Slide the Zigview into place over your cameras eyepiece, and switch it on. The Zigview's LCD screen comes to life displaying the image from your viewfinder. Neat yes?

The Zigview is distributed in the UK only (so far) by Intro2020, a company which specializes in photography accessories and products. Zigview is a very useful gadget which allows you to see what is visible through your camera's viewfinder via its LCD. The concept behind this is very nice and simple, both to set up and use. The unit will facilitate the use of your camera in situations where you can't access your laptop for tethered shooting and need to be able to see through your viewfinder with ease.

The unit is shipped in a small box which contains the Zigview, user manual (written in English and Korean), a charger, eyepieces compatible with Canon, Nikon and Fuji D-SLRs, mounting screws for the eyepiece, a screwdriver and a soft cloth bag to store the unit in when it's not in use.

I charged the unit and then mounted it to my Canon EOS D-SLR. The Zigview is very light and doesn't put any undue stress on the eyepiece. The unit uses a self contained battery which requires charging. It takes about two hours to get a full charge which should provide about six hours of continuous usage.

When I switched the unit on, it took a few seconds and then sprang to life giving me a partial view of what was in my cameras viewfinder. I then used the Zigview's joystick to switch into the configuration menu and adjusted the settings until the viewfinder displayed what I wanted (including the camera settings display inside my viewfinder). The configuration settings were then saved to one of the memory banks. You can have up to five configurations saved for different scenarios.

The built-in zoom capability allows you to zoom right in to check how tight your focus actually is. Scenarios where this will be useful are common. If the camera is on a boom above your head at crowded events, when you need to shoot over an obstruction like a wall which is just a bit taller than you are or when using a telescope which would require that the camera be attached at a low angle, the Zigview is ideal.

The display itself is about the same size as a typical color cell phone screen. The quality of the display left me a bit disappointed as the resolution was only 220x176 and appeared a little grainy. It's good for indoor use and on overcast days but should you need to use it in bright daylight you'll need a hood for it; easy enough to do these days. The display's clarity wasn't bad either, but considering that this is a tool which is designed for some very specific uses there are no real complaints.

At about the same price as a 2 megapixel point & shoot the unit does its job well, providing decent value. However I would recommend using it only in situations where your camera's autofocus can really handle itself. That means no low light shooting and no shooting at locations where focus is absolutely crucial. Zigview does the job but seeing as this is a first generation product, I'm eager to see what future developments have to offer. I'd love to see a Bluetooth variant which allows the screen to be used away from the camera and with a higher resolution display.

Cons: English in the manual needs to be cleaned up. Screen could do with more resolution and sharpness. I do not recommend using the Zigview where it could get knocked around because solid impacts might damage the eyepiece.

Pros: Supplied with screwdriver and adapters for Canon, Nikon and Fuji. It does its job well. Compact and Easy to configure and use. The unit doesn't occlude or interfere with any camera controls. The Zigview rotates nicely about the eyepiece. The Zoom is very useful.

When I first got news of this product, the question of whether or not it would do the job was high in my mind. I can honestly say, that were I to have need of the Zigview, I would definitely buy one. I think that it still needs some work, but with a better quality sensor/display it would be a great product instead of just a good one. As a first offering from Seculine they have done a nice job. I recommend the Zigview for anyone who does macro Photography, shoots at crowded venues where you have to hold the camera at arms length and for astronomy photography in the field.

This Review has been reposted in it's entirety from kickstartnews.com.

Zigview Reviewed

I was woken up on thursday morning by a delivery. In that delivery was a surprise - the Zigview - Digital Angle Viewfinder. I didn't waste anytime before opening the box. Inside the box was everything I needed to get the Zigview up and running. It is a very nice piece of kit, which is easy to set-up, configure and use. After spending several hours playing with it and in several different scenarios, I wrote my review, which will be published on the kickstartnews website. My conclusion, is that it's a nice unit, which does what its supposed to do, and one which although not perfect holds much promise. It will certainly win a lot of favour from photographers with specific needs. I can see that portrait photographers, astrophotographers and photographers shooting under conditions where it is not easy to use the SLR's eyepiece easily, will like it.

DPReview post their Photoshop CS2 Review.

Vincent Bockaert, the author of "The 123 of digital imaging" has posted his 'In a Nutshell' review of Adobe Photoshop CS2 on DPReview. The review takes a look at the new features and improvements made by Adobes on their latest incarnation of Photoshop. The gist of the review, is that it is well worth the upgrade.

New Photography & Digital Imaging Books from Focal Press

Focal Press have announced 3 new books in their Essential Skills line of photography and digital imaging books.

Photoshop CS2: Essential Skills by Mark Galer & Philip Andrews
A thorough and well illustrated book, with an accompanying CD-Rom providing coverage of Photoshop 7.0 through to CS2.

Digital Imaging: Essential Skills by Mark Galer & Les Horvat
A great primer covering the digital imaging process from capture through to output. The Accompanying CD-Rom includes over an hour of video tutorials and support materials.

Studio Photography: Essential Skills by John Child
A series of structured tutorials which will teach you the essentials of studio photography.

Focal Press are known for their excellent technical and creative publications. Previous publications include; Martin Evening's Photoshop CS for Photographers, which has been recently updated with coverage of Photoshop CS2.

Eye Candy 5 - Impact for July release

Alien Skin Software have announced the July release of EyeCandy 5: Impact. Impact features a set of 10 filters, which includes 7 re-written classic Eye Candy filters and 3 new ones. The new filters include: Backlight for light beam, extruded light trail and spotlight effects. Brushed Metal which simulates metal surfaces and Extrude which is self explanatory.

Kodak to end production of black and white photo papers.

So, heres another big nail in the coffin for silver halide based photography. Fox News indicated that Kodak will be killing off production of their black and white photographic papers. I will wait to see if this means all production of black and white paper or just that which is made in brazil. But the portents are not good for students of photography, what with Ilford and Agfa all having financial troubles, time will tell. As far as I'm concerned these are I'll tidings, as I believe that every photographer should learn their craft in the darkroom and with black and white in addition to colour. Thanks to DPReview for this one.

Microsoft release their RAW Thumbnailer and Viewer

Microsoft has released their new RAW Thumbnailer and Viewer for download. The new "PowerToy" (as Microsoft have described it), allows the viewing of Canon RAW and Nikon RAW files as well as TIFF images and other standard image formats. The utility comes as a joint Windows XP shell extension which provides preview, edit and print functionality for RAW files and as a RAW viewer. The 47 MB download is available here and requires the Microsoft .NET Framework (included in the installation) and Windows XP SP2.

Extensis release free CS2 product compatibility updates for registered users.

Extensis Inc announced free updates for all its Photoshop Tools products, including Mask Pro, PhotoFrame, Intellihance Pro and pxl SmartScale. The free updates for registered users will provide Adobe Creative Suite compatibility. For more info visit here.

nik multimedia, Inc. release nik Sharpener Pro 2.0

nik multimedia, Inc. have released the newest version of their image sharpening plug-in for Photoshop. The plug-in has been improved with support for 16bit images and allows the user to sharpen images for different output devices using a number of predefined profiles. It also allows for the sharpening to be applied to the image using your mouse, brush or other input device. nik are well know for their excellent nik Color Efex Pro 2.0 photographic plug-in filters for Photoshop. More info can be found here at the products homepage.

Microsoft release Acrylic Beta

When Microsoft acquired Creature House in 2003, they also got Expression, which was a hybrid raster/vector illustration tool. I had recently wondered what had happened to Expression and now I guess I got my answer ... I'm now downloading the Beta and will install and play with it to see just exactly what Microsoft have done with the technology they've acquired. I came across this bit of news whilst visiting one of my favourite blogs; The Design Weblog. Download a free 77mb beta version of Acrylic here.

Apple and Intel ...

Imagine sometime in the far flung future where you get up in the morning ... browse the web on Windows and then decide to do some graphics work ... so you switch OS and lo and behold you are running Mac OS? and on the same box!

Not so far fetched an idea in light of Steve Jobs keynote address at Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference 2005. The CEO set out his vision for transitioning Mac computers from PowerPC to Intel microprocessors in 2006. Now, don't go out and sell your wintel box just yet, as I don't think that there are plans as yet to completely share the same architecture, hopefully I'm wrong. But this is something which in my mind foreshadows a taste of things to come ... for me, the ability to chose which OS I want to run on my box will be an awesome step in the right direction. I'm now waiting for an announcement of them partnering with AMD too ... wouldn't that just piss off a lot of egos ...
Read the Apple press release for additional information.

Who's hardware is better? The answer will be YES...

The perfect accessory ... ZIGVIEW

Rarely do I come across an announcement of a product that is so useful that it seems to perfectly fit the preceding bit of news. ZIGVIEW is a device which simply attaches to the eyepiece of your SLR. The view in the viewfinder is captured by a CMOS sensor built into the ZIGVIEW and then relayed in real time to a 1.9 inch TFT colour display attached to this device for easy viewing at any angle.

The ZIGVIEW is perfectly suited for low angle photography and situations where you cannot easily access the viewfinder. If you are an astrophotographer, a macro or press photographer, this nice piece of kit is built for you. For more information visit DPReview's article here.

The ZIGVIEW is being marketed by UK distribution company Intro2020 and will retail for around £119.99. Adaptors for your camera will cost around £6.99.

Canon woos skyshooters with EOS 20Da

Canon USA has finally announced their EOS 20Da in the US market. This variant of the 20D is specifically aimed at the astrophotography markets and has been modified with a low-pass filter which is positioned in front of the EOS 20Da’s 8.2 megapixel CMOS sensor. It has been modified to allow for sharper and higher contrast photos to be taken of subtle astronomical phenomena such as diffuse reddish nebulae.

According to the press release: "The modification increases the transmission of light at the specific wavelength of 656nm, known as the Hydrogen Alpha line, or H wavelength, by a factor of 2.5x compared to the standard EOS 20D digital SLR. Although optimized for astrophotography, the EOS 20Da can also be used for most conventional photography by mounting an optional filter on the lens in use."

Other useful (and read this Canon) desirable feature improvements include Mirror Lock-Up capabilities and a live view mode through the display and via a TV or monitor. I'm wondering if the remote control and capture capabilities of the camera have also been improved ... Read the press release here.

Microsoft and Partners announce Camera Raw Support in Windows.

The below is an extract of a press release issued by Microsoft Yesterday, IT details upcoming downloads and native support for Camera RAW in Windows XP and the upcoming Windows "Longhorn".

REDMOND, Wash. - June 1, 2005 -- Microsoft Corp., together with leading companies in the digital imaging industry, today announced enhancements to the family of Windows® operating systems that will enable consumers to easily work with RAW files in current and future versions of Windows. Working closely with digital imaging industry leaders including Adobe Systems Inc., Canon Inc., Fuji Photo Film Co. Ltd. and Nikon Corp., Microsoft plans to deliver native support for digital camera RAW images in the next major version of Windows, code-named "Longhorn."

In addition, Microsoft is enhancing the digital imaging experience for Windows XP with the upcoming availability of the Microsoft® RAW Image Thumbnailer and Viewer for Windows XP, allowing consumers to view thumbnails and preview and print Canon and Nikon RAW files from Windows Explorer in Windows XP. These features, as well as the ability to organize and edit Canon and Nikon RAW files, will also be available in a future version of Digital Image Suite.

Microsoft also announced it is developing a certification program for third-party RAW image codecs that will ensure their solutions provide a consistent experience for consumers who are using RAW image files. With this new RAW support across the Windows platform and products, Microsoft is enabling a seamless experience for consumers working with RAW digital images and delivering an extensible architecture for hardware and software industry partners.

For the more information and the full release visit here. Whilst this isn't a surprise at this point in time it will hopefully place some pressure on the need for the development and use of a common or open standard for Camera RAW Data. What this means for users is that they can get access to their images directly from the operating system, however it remains to be seen just how good Microsoft's implementation of RAW handling will be...

Corel announces Painter IX Summer Offer

Corel UK have annouced that new purchasers of Painter IX will be receiving a FREE Lynda.com training CD worth £35. This offer will last as long stocks last. The CD, which is produced by Lynda.com, features about 11 hours worth of tutorials and features over 50 movies designed to help new users get familiarity with Painter IX. If you've thought about picking it up then now would be a good time to do so. Dont forget to pick up a Wacom tablet too ... you wont regret it. For more info visit www.corel.co.uk.

Kodak discontinue SLR/n and SLR/c

Yesterday, Kodak confirmed that they were discontinuing the manufacture of their 14 megapixel SLR's. Kodak insist that support will continue for these Digital SLR's and that this will not be the end of the road for their professional solutions. Support will continue till 2008 with firmware and software updates, if neccessary. I hope that Kodak continue with development of new Digital SLR's and associated technologies, because of their positive contribution to the history and technology of digital photography.