What Photo Gear

Panasonic today announced a new ultra-zoom camera - the Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ50. Specs wise, it boasts of a 10x moderate wide angle lens (28-280mm in 35mm terms) with Panasonic’s OIS (Optical Image Stabilization) system and the big news is of course its Wi-Fi capabilities. (You even get the word “Wireless” emblazoned on the camera’s grip) :p

With the TZ 50 you are able to wirelessly upload your photo’s to Google’s Picasa Web Albums straight from the camera. You also get 12 months worth of free access to T-Mobile’s Hotspot services (T-Mobile US Only)

Pretty useful I’d say, though I almost always run my photographs through a bit of post-processing in Photoshop or Lightroom before publishing them, there are times when I’d definitely want the ability to just wirelessly upload them straight from the camera.

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ50:

• 9.1 Megapixels
• 10x optical zoom with image stabilization (28-280mm equivalence)
• 3 inch LCD
• 720p HD Video Capture
• SD and SDHC support
• Allow automatic uploading of images to Google’s Picasa Web Service via 802.11 b/g Wireless

I’m still not clear on this - but from what I understand the wireless uploading option is limited only to Google’s Picasa Web Albums, so no direct wireless uploading to any other services such as Flickr. The Panasonic TZ-50 will be available in May with an MSRP of $ 449.

Full Panasonic Press Release after the jump!

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And the more interesting one out of Nikon’s 3 new camera’s today, is the Nikon P80 ultra-zoom digital camera. And this camera’s claim to fame, is going to be its 18x zoom lens featuring a whopping 27mm-486mm coverage (in 35mm terms.) So that’s from decent wide-angle to a paparazzi worthy telephoto range.

The camera looks suspiciously like a Canon S5 IS to me though, and I wish Nikon would’ve been a bit more daring with this one. Although this is a big re-design for Nikon’s P series (P stands for ‘Performance’) of digital cameras as previous P series models weren’t ultra-zooms - there are quite a few ultra-zooms out in the market right now. We’ve got the aforementioned Canon S5 IS, the Fuji S8100fd, the Olympus SP-560 UZ, the Sony H50 and the Panasonic FZ-18.

I wish Nikon would’ve thrown in an articulating LCD, or had taken the lens wider. (I’m still waiting for an update to the Nikon 8400 from 2004!) But all in all, specs wise, the Nikon P80 looks all set to rumble with all the other ultra-zooms. But will it be a case of too little too late for Nikon in this market segment?

The Nikon P80:

• 10.1 Megapixels
• 18x zoom lens (27-486mm equivalence) (f/2.8 - f/4.5)
• Vibration Reduction (And with a lens like that, VR is going to help a lot) (Nikon’s Press Literature only says that the P80 comes equipped with Optical Vibration Reduction, and interestingly, DPreview’s news article claims it comes with CCD-Shift VR, not lens based)
• Full Manual Controls
• ISO 64-1600 (ISO 3200 and 6400 only at 3MP and smaller)
• Available this April with an MSRP of $399.95

Hit the Read More Link to see the full Press Release.

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Nikon today announced a couple of new digital camera’s. First to be introduced are a pair of almost identical (save for one feature) compacts. The S52 and S52c (the S means they’re part of Nikon’s “Style” series of camera’s.)

And as I said, they’re almost the exact same camera’s, with the difference being that the S52C will be Wi-Fi enabled and will have an MSRP of $30 more than the plain S52. But otherwise, everything should be pretty much the same. They both feature a 3x zoom lens, with a pretty boring 38mm - 114mm (35mm equivalent) zoom range, the lens has a folding lens design, so you won’t see the lens extending away from the body even when zooming in and out. The good news is the lens will come equipped with Nikon’s Vibration Reduction (VR) to help minimize camera shake, and to help you get sharper pictures. (And this one is a true lens based vibration reduction feature, it’s not just the ISO boost you see in some camera’s)

The Nikon S52 and S52c:

• 9 Megapixels
• 3 inch LCD
• Compact body, less than an inch thick (3.7×2.3×0.8)
• 3x Optical Zoom (38-114mm equivalence)
• Vibration Reduction
• Auto ISO (from ISO 200-800) (Up to ISO 2000 in High Sensitivity Mode) (But ISO is selectable up to ISO 3200)

Full Nikon Press Release after the jump.

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One of the more interesting camera’s announced in this year’s Consumer Electronics Show was the Casio Exilim Pro EX-F1, Casio’s top of the line digital camera, and the first model in their Exilim PRO series of camera’s is now slowly starting to make itself into the shelves of retailers around the world, with appearances in Japan and Sweden so far.

Aside from its 6 megapixel sensor and 12x optical zoom (36mm-432mm) the EX-F1’s claim to fame is its ability to shoot at an astounding 60 frames per second. (60 frames at once, or 5 frames in 12 seconds) as well as be able to shoot full HD videos at 1920×1080 at 60 fps. And Casio has also thrown in an amazing ultra-high speed video capture of 1200 frames per second! (Unfortunately that’s only at a tiny resolution of 336×96 - tiny for sure, but certainly very usable for bloggers and the like)

A video preview, links to sample videos and images after the jump!

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It’s been awhile since the first pair of of Sigma DP1 hands-ons - but now, we’ve got two full length and quality reviews of what is turning out to be quite an outstanding camera.

The first review comes courtesy of Photoreview.com.au - and it’s all generally positive for the DP1, but there was also one tidbit that I found interesting:

The stand-out feature of the DP-1 is its ability to record a much wider dynamic range that any digicam we’ve reviewed - and also than many DSLRs. Although both JPEG and X3F.RAW files looked rather flat when viewed on both the camera’s LCD and our computer screen, it was possible to obtain very good results from the test camera - but only when we worked with raw files.

And some excerpts from their conclusion:

Sigma’s DP-1 is a revolutionary camera - and quite different from any other digital camera in the current marketplace. This, in part, accounts for its relatively high price tag and restricted feature set (prime lens, pared-down set of controls, limited video capabilities). It is not a camera for point-and-shoot photographers. Nor will it suit photographers who only shoot JPEGs and prefer not to become involved in subsequent editing.

Click here to read the rest of their review.

And next up..

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The Canon S5 IS is currently available at $150 off the regular price at Amazon - $299.99 gets you a full featured pro-sumer digital camera with a whopping 12x lens with Canon’s Image Stabilization system, a flip-out LCD, one of the best movie recording modes in a digital camera and complete manual control’s for those looking to learn photography.

Here are some high-quality reviews of the Canon S5 to help you decide if it’s the right camera for you:

DCResource

DPReview 

Imaging Resource

This is definitely one of the better camera’s on the market right now ; with a generous zoom range and a pretty light and compact body it’s a perfect fit for those looking for a camera they can grow into, and even as a back-up travel camera for when you don’t want to carry around your DSLR, and still want a versatile lens and manual controls.