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October 28, 2009
[INNOVATION AND VISION]
Steve Sasson with a mockup of the world’s first digital camera
Now that digital photography seems to be here to stay it is safe to start handing out the prizes to the inventors. And this is the month for awarding the gongs.
Part of this year's Nobel prize for Physics goes to Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith of Bell Laboratories in America "for the invention of an imaging semiconductor circuit – the CCD sensor".
In 1969 Boyle and Smith invented the CCD (Charge-Coupled Device) which is the solid-state heart of the digital camera, replacing film in the photographic process by capturing light and turning it into electric signals. These signals are then passed through the camera's image processing engine and turned into a visible, full colour picture.
The first CCDs were coarse by today's standards, having only a few light receptors (pixels) on the light-capturing surface. But it was one of these simple devices that was passed on to the Kodak research laboratory in Rochester, where it was handed over to Steve Sasson, a young Kodak scientist, who was told to see if there was any useful application for it.
Today, 29 October, Steve Sasson is in London to receive The Economist’s Innovation Award for Consumer Products and Services “for contributions to photography and imaging which have revolutionised the face of consumer photography today.”
As The Economist describes Sasson's achievement: “The invention of the digital camera began with a 30-second conversation when Mr Sasson's supervisor asked whether it was possible to build a camera with a new type of electronic sensor called a charge-coupled device.
“Mr Sasson's original prototype weighed eight pounds, recorded black and white images to a cassette tape, had a resolution of 0.01 megapixel and took 23 seconds to capture its first image. In 1978, Mr Sasson was issued a US patent for the digital camera and Eastman Kodak was the first company to develop a megapixel digital camera in 1986, and one of the first companies to develop a consumer digital camera.”
In fact Sasson demonstrated the first camera to his colleagues in 1975. The camera had been cobbled together from bits in the Kodak parts box and the image was stored on a modified audio cassette recorder. The picture was displayed on a small, crude black and white TV.
He says that his colleagues viewed his box of tricks with a mix of curiosity and scepticism, but the realisation that Kodak, the film company, had created its own nemesis didn't dawn until “...I saw the image transceiver work in 1989, using jpeg compression, to send pictures out from Tiananmen Square, I knew it was going to happen. And it was going to happen by the mid 90s.
“It would impact the professionals first before the consumers. Not because of quality but because of cost. In 1991/2 we realised what was going to happen and we started a serious effort around bigger images …
“The bigger question was when it would really hit the consumer. And we never got a good handle on that. The reason being that there were so many other things that had to happen to influence the migration of the technology into consumers’ hands. The internet, broadband, thermal printing, inkjet printing. Without a clear vision of all of that going on it was impossible to predict when we would get to that point. You could argue that technically if you had 3mp and you could fit it in your pocket and you could store images reasonably quickly the consumer would be interested in it. But we found even when we got to that point, because it was based on a computer and the average person wasn’t really comfortable with computers at that time, that it was going to take a little bit longer for the ease-of-use factor to make it mass market acceptable.”
Now digital photography for the masses is here and the inventors are being honoured. Kodak's former employees might not be so ready to heap prizes on the inventors – the company's workforce has shrunk from 132,600 in 1993 to 24,000 in 2008 with more sackings this year. And there is more bitter irony for former Kodak workers to contemplate. The red, green and blue filter array that is essential to reinterpret the greyscale information coming from the CCD and to turn it into colour was also invented in the Eastman Kodak laboratory by Bryce Bayer – hence the name Bayer Filter.
Altogether Kodak holds more than 1,000 patents on technology fundamental to digital photography and at various times it has taken legal action against Sony, LG, Samsung and RIM (Blackberry) for alleged infringements. Which raises the question: is there any precedent for a great corporation spending millions to destroy itself? Where is Shakespeare when we need him to tell the story?
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Posted by terry at 06:47 PM | Comments (0)
October 22, 2009
[REVIEW—PANASONIC LUMIX GF1]
Price: $1650 with 14–45mm lens
A little marvel
The low-down: This 12 megapixel Micro Four Thirds camera is, in effect, a DSLR in a compact body. The Live MOS sensor (shared with Olympus) is similar to that used in Olympus SLRs and Panasonic's G1 and GH1. Body construction is solid and the lens is mechanically excellent with smooth zoom and focus mechanisms. There is an ingeniously articulated pop-up flash and a low light focus assist lamp. An optional electronic viewfinder slides into the flash hot shoe. The 7.5cm LCD is of good (middling) resolution. Movie mode is 1280 x 720, not full high definition but very good. Capture format is AVCHD lite. Sound is mono and only with the inbuilt microphone. Weight, with zoom, is 537g, so it is not pocketable.
Like: Panasonic has solved the problem of auto focus speed in a compact camera using the contrast detect method. There is little difference between the focus speed of the GF1 and any SLR at the same price. Images are sharp with excellent contrast. Image quality in either RAW or jpeg is gorgeous.
Dislike: The camera ergonomics and implementation of controls are not the best. The Olympus E-P1 has been criticised for its user-unfriendliness, but we would rate it better than the Panasonic. But once the GF1's idiosyncrasies are understood it is easy enough to use.
Verdict: This is a marvellous camera. There is a saying that the best camera is the one you have with you, and on that criterion alone the GF1 ranks as one of the best. It is also not surprising that demand for the Olympus E-P1 and Panasonic GF1 has overwhelmed supply. This is a new and long overdue camera type – top image quality from a compact form.
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Posted by terry at 10:43 AM | Comments (0)
[TWEEDLEPANA AND TWEEDLEOLY]
We now have two compactish SLR-quality digital cameras to choose from – the Panasonic Lumix GF1 and the Olympus E-P1. Partisan wars between brand loyalists are raging, so when placed side by side, what are the facts?
The sensors are the same (score one-all) but the image processing engines are different and produce different jpeg outputs. Which is better is a matter of taste. Olympus is loved for its film-like images and Panasonic for its clinical accuracy. However both can be tweaked in imaging editing programs.
RAW output from both cameras is near enough to identical, as is to be expected. So this is also one-all.
Our test cameras have zoom lenses. Olympus has a collapsible 14-42 (28-84mm) lens which makes the camera/lens combination about 25mm thinner than the Panasonic, with its rigid 14-45mm lens. Both are f3.5–5.6.
Some people find the telescoping Olympus lens disconcertingly flimsy and claim that it leads to a loss of sharpness. We tested the two lenses in different camera/lens permutations (lenses are compatible with both cameras) and found the Panasonic lens a little sharper, perhaps due to better contrast.
The Panasonic lens/camera combination auto focuses much faster than the Olympus. This contest is one-zero. When the Panasonic lens is mounted on the Olympus focusing time is reduced, but it is still not as fast as the competition.
We rate the ergonomics of the Olympus higher than the GF1. The E-P1 has been criticised for its poor menu layout, but we found that, while it wasn't intuitive, once we had a clear overview of its workings it is fine. And external controls are better placed.
The GF1 has a higher resolution LCD, a pop-up flash and an expensive optional (zoom) electronic viewfinder. The E-P1 has an expensive optional flash and an optional optical viewfinder fixed at 17mm angle of view. Score the Panasonic one for features.
The E-P1 has image stabilisation by sensor shift while the GF1 has IS in the lens. Both cameras can be used with legacy lenses with adapters, but they are only stabilised on the Olympus. Score one for the E-P1.
The GF1 costs more but it has the in-built flash and a focus-assist lamp that makes low light focus a breeze. This is a case of scoring one for the Olympus on price and one for the Panasonic on features. Or perhaps one and a half – that low light focus lamp is very desirable. And for the party snapper the flash/focus-assist makes choice easy – it has to be the Panasonic.
The distinguishing feature that is hardest to score is aesthetics. Some love the retro metal skin of the E-P1 while others prefer the austere simplicity of the Panasonic. We think the E-P1 looks the cat's pyjamas, but beauty is in the eye of you-know-who.
We bought the Olympus before we had seen the Panasonic. Would we change our mind? No. But nor would we scoff at anyone who prefers the Panasonic. They are two excellent little cameras.
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Posted by terry at 10:38 AM | Comments (1)
October 15, 2009
[REVIEW—EPSON PERFECTION V600 SCANNER]
Price: $550
VERSATILE
The low-down: This scanner is the latest from Epson to combine flat bed scanning of opaque materials with film scanning, positive and negative, 35mm and 6 x 6 cm. It has scanning resolutions up to 6400 x 9600 dpi at 48 bit colour depth. A4 page scans are fast, film scanning is slower, depending on the resolution chosen. Slides and negative strips are held in position on the scan plate with a simple plastic frame, which locates the film under a slot in the scanner lid. The white backing plate used for flat scanning is removed and the film is trans-illuminated from a light in the lid. The scanner is supplied with the excellent ABBY optical character recognition software which turns a page of text into a word document with amazing accuracy. Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 is also included.
Like: Let's deal with the big question: can a flat bed scanner really produce film scans to compare with a dedicated 35mm scanner? In our opinion most users will be well satisfied with the Epson output. Scanned Kodachrome slides retained colour, detail and subtlety. We could make decent prints from slides scanned at high resolution.
Dislike: There is no printed instruction manual and the unit, by default, is set to Automatic mode. In this mode it will not scan negative strips correctly. The scan mode must be set to Professional (even if you think that doesn't mean you) to get proper control of scanning.
Verdict: This is an outstanding scanner. Scans of opaque materials are excellent and the film scans are the best we have seen from a flat bed scanner. The bundled software makes the package good value for the money. There are cheaper scanners, including the fine Epson V350, but the V600 is proof that you get what you pay for.
Posted by terry at 09:36 AM | Comments (2)
[THE GOOD, THE GROTESQUE AND THE UGLY]
Taking a new camera from its box is one of life's great pleasures. You hold the shiny baby in your hand for the first time and give silent thanks to the engineers and designers who have created such beauty. And then, when the first flush of love is past, you look around for something to snap.
The natural inclination is to look for something pretty – a beloved's face, a baby's smile, a flower, the cat, the dog, a towering mountain and a tranquil lake (except that we don't have any of those, so it's back to the dog). So how perverse do you have to be to deliberately go looking for the ugly and the grotesque?
Roger Ballen is an American mining engineer who lives in South Africa. Right now (until 1 November) there is an exhibition of his photographs at the Monash Gallery of Art, called Brutal, tender, human, animal. This extraordinary collection of images has been the subject of an article in The Age by arts writer Gabriella Coslovich.
Ballen is quoted in the article: “The problem with photography is the mechanics are too easy. Everybody can buy a camera, everybody can take a photo. In fact photography is a difficult art form to achieve anything with...” He reckons that with the billions of photographs floating around the world it is not easy to create a distinctive vision. He's right about that, so we just had to go and see.
The Monash Gallery of Art (the city, not the university) is primarily a collector and exhibitor of photographs. Its permanent collection includes the work of famous Australian photographers from Cazneaux to Henson, and its temporary exhibition program shows new collections every few weeks. The Roger Ballen show is in the temporary program.
Ballen has taken his camera into the homes of poor, white South Africans and photographed subjects who cannot be called beautiful, by any stretch of the politically correct imagination. When you look at these pictures with a photographer's eye you ask yourself: How did he do it? How did he persuade these people to pose for the camera? What did he tell them he was doing? Did they know that they would be exhibited around the world as carnival grotesques?
Serious photographers will be discomfited by the ethical implications of the photos.
What right does an educated, rich American have to go into these squalid homes to take cruel pictures of subjects who have no idea what the consequences of the snap will be?
Even the photographic technique is ugly, in many cases direct flash throws harsh shadows on the walls, something the rest of us aesthetically fastidious picture takers go to great lengths to avoid.
And yet the photos are mesmerising and provoking, unlike the obscenely beautiful pictures of lepers and starving babies that have been called “the pornography of poverty”. Two words spring to mind: honesty and pity.
There are cats and dogs in Ballen's pictures, but they're not beautiful, either.
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Posted by terry at 09:33 AM | Comments (0)
October 08, 2009
[REVIEW—RICOH CX2 compact camera]
Price: $600
One of the best
The low-down: This 9.3 megapixel camera has a 28–300mm (film equivalent) lens with image stabilisation by sensor shift. It is heavier and bulkier than most compacts, but in a reassuring way. The all-black (also siver and two-tone grey) no nonsense finish suggests a serious camera. The 7.5cm high resolution LCD is superb and the menu graphics are elegant. The camera's unique feature is its dynamic range extension mode which is used to preserve detail in the extreme light and dark parts of the image. The 245 page instruction manual is exemplary.
Like: Focus is fast and accurate, even at the 300mm extreme. Colour fidelity and resolution are both outstanding. In fact the image quality at 300mm is about the best we have seen from a compact with such an extreme focal length range. The DR (dynamic range extender mode) works well, but only for stationary subjects. Bizarre effects are produced when the subject moves because the process involves the rapid taking and blending of two images exposed at two different settings.
Dislike: There is some noise reduction effect (blurring of fine detail) even at low ISO speeds. The tiny joystick control is a tad touchy.
Verdict: Ricoh, like Fujifilm, is a brand that stands in the shadow of the big names of Canon, Nikon, Sony and Panasonic. But Ricoh has a much longer history in cameras than the last two. Their digital offerings always feel as though they have been designed by photographers for photographers, with a strong emphasis on image quality and usability rather than on gimmicks. The CX2 has a modest pixel count compared with the competition and doesn't have any gimmickry. This is a camera for taking pictures, not a toy for playing with. Highly recommended.
Posted by terry at 08:53 AM | Comments (0)
[MAKING A SCENE]
You know those Scene Mode settings on your digital camera? Do you ever use them?
The Portrait mode is supposed to give better separation between face and background. On the other hand the Landscape mode should make everything sharply in focus, from nearest rock to most distant mountain, and at the same time enhancing blues and greens. The Macro mode is for sharp close-ups of the grasshopper's eye. And the Sport mode stops the action in mid jump. Not to mention the Slimming mode that trims kilos from the subject and the stupid Smile mode that prevents the shutter firing until it sees a grin.
When one of these Scene modes is selected the camera automatically sets itself to the best combination of shutter speed, aperture, colour saturation and ISO speed for the shot.
We have not been impressed with the usefulness of Scene modes that we have encountered. Our Canon EOS 40D SLR has scene settings, but we would never use the Portrait mode because it automatically activates the flash in situations where it is not needed. We know enough about cameras to be able to select our own shutter/aperture combinations for separation of face from background.
Our Samsung ST550 goes one step further with Portrait mode and provides for several Beauty settings which are supposed to turn an ordinary snapshot into a glamour photograph fit for Vogue. It doesn't work, for the simple reason that in choosing Portrait mode you lose the most important control on the camera – exposure compensation.
The Olympus E-P1 has two portrait modes, the first is the conventional wide aperture, warm saturation combination. The second mode is called ePortrait which works by recording a Portrait image and then post-processing in the camera to smooth out skin texture and remove blemishes while keeping eyes and hair sharp.
A chap writes that after his wife had seen her face in an Olympus ePortrait she insisted that that is the way it must always be. For our taste we think the smoothing is too radical and the resulting skin is Barbie-doll plastic.
Some Olympus cameras, including the E-P1, have another set of effects called Art Filters. We have been sceptical of these in the past, preferring to add our special effects, after the event, in Photoshop. However we are starting to see some merit in the Filters, which consist of Pop Art (exaggerated colour saturation), Soft Focus, Grainy Black and White and a couple of tone-altering settings. There is even a pinhole camera simulation.
We like the Soft Focus. This really does work as a glamour effect on a portrait, producing a romantic soft glow around the subject. Of course it works best with female subjects – males look merely out of focus! So far this is the only camera scene mode that we use frequently and with pleasure. As for the rest, we still think it is better to understand how a camera works and to make the settings ourselves.
[Olympus E-P1, using Soft Focus Art Filter]
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Posted by terry at 08:50 AM | Comments (0)
October 01, 2009
[REVIEW—OLYMPUS PEN E-P1 micro four thirds camera]
Price: $1400 with 14–42mm lens
Love at first sight
The low-down: This 12.3 megapixel camera is the company's first “micro four thirds” compact. Internally it is essentially the same as the Olympus E-620 SLR, but the mirror/prism viewfinder has been removed, resulting in less bulk, but not much less weight. Lenses are interchangeable, but the micro four thirds optics are not the same as standard two thirds lenses. An adapter is needed. There is an optional 17mm lens and also a viewfinder with that angle of view. Olympus and third parties make adapters for legacy OM lenses. All accessories are expensive. Construction is excellent and the retro appearance, reminiscent of the Pen half frame film cameras, is delightful. All controls are well damped and luxurious in feel. The 14–42mm (28–84 film equivalent) lens collapses in a neat action.
Like: The retro look and metallic touches are irresistible. The image quality is excellent, comparable with the fine E-620. Colours are over saturated in default mode, but that is easily corrected. This is, in effect, an SLR that fits in the pocket.
Dislike: The E-P1 is slow! Auto focus, even after the 1.1 firmware upgrade, is sluggish and the shutter is not as responsive as an SLR.
Verdict: We fell in love with the E-P1 the moment we took it from the box. So we bought one! We know that for years we have been advising readers not to buy cameras without proper viewfinders, and now look what we've done. Well, we were right – an LCD is no substitute. It is morning, and we still love her, but we are not blind to her flaws. She is gorgeous but cranky and demands that we do it her way. When was love ever any different? (Sample images here)
[Taken with the Olympus E-P1 using the Soft Focus Art Filter]
Posted by terry at 10:14 AM | Comments (2)
[MOVE OVER MR SPIELBERG]
Confession time! Here Chez Imaging we are a bit slow to embrace the latest gimmicks and gadgets. New cameras we love. The latest printers we welcome. Send us as many scanners as you like. But when it comes to things like face detection, smile activated shutter release, blink blocking and art filters we are sceptical.
For years we have resisted the movie mode in still cameras on the principle that if you fancy yourself as a Spielberg then you shouldn't be buying a Cartier-Bresson camera. There are tools for the job and there is no Swiss army pocketknife camera that will do it all. Or so we thought!
We started to rethink our prejudices when the Nikon D90 popped up as the first DSLR with movie capture. It offered middling high definition in a still camera, but when we tried it we were still not convinced. Canon followed the trend and we were moderately impressed with the 5D MkII's move making ability.
Then Panasonic really pulled a bunny from the hat with the Lumix GH1 Micro Four Thirds camera. This camera delivers a decent movie making mode with true 1080 line high definition quality. And its ace up the sleeve is its AVCHD recording format that permits immediate playback on a Panasonic TV or peripheral, such as a DVD or BluRay player, equipped with an SD card slot.
Olympus then entered the Micro Four Thirds lists with the E-P1, which also does nice video, albeit at 720 lines, which is not quite up to the Panasonic standard, but is still pretty good. And the Olympus does slightly better sound than the Panasonic, though neither is brilliant.
We were getting interested. Perhaps there is more to movie making with a still camera than we had appreciated. We are no longer in the realm of 640X480 pixels at a jerky 15 frames per second.
Then we had another epiphany. We stumbled across www.vimeo.com and our scepticism was gone forever. Vimeo is like an upmarket YouTube, except that the small videos posted here are not of talking dogs and fat men being smacked in the goolies with a cricket ball. These are serious works that demonstrate just what is possible.
To have your breath taken away just look at Michael Fletcher's Images of the West Kimberley (www.vimeo.com/6639576) shot with the Canon 5DMkII. It is a stunning illustration of what is possible with a still camera, a photographer's eye and imaginative post production.
Then have a look at Philip Bloom's Joshua Tree, created for the launch of the Panasonic GH1. (vimeo.com/4714724)
Mike Kobal's collection of videos (www.mikekobal.com/blog/) is made with several cameras – a Nikon D90, Canon 5DMkII, Panasonic Lumix GH1 and an Olympus E-P1. It's obvious that the camera is not as important as the creator's imagination and editing skill. In fact for Alina: a retro collage he uses all the cameras to achieve his effects. And in the process blows away our scepticism. Movie mode works!
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Posted by terry at 10:10 AM | Comments (1)