When Digital Imagery was Still New...

Imagery or Full Motion Video - Cross over is the norm

Open letter to Japanese manufacturers on the enthusiast video market – improve or lose it

EOSHD.com by Andrew Reid 4:45 pm

The Blackmagic Pocket Cinema camera is a wake-up call to the bigger manufacturers and their afterthought video modes.

A very traditional photography philosophy pervades the Japanese offices of Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji and Olympus. For only really Panasonic have made any attempt to take cinematic video to the masses.

Canon have been by far the luckiest of the major manufacturers when it comes to video and the filmmaking community. The 5D Mark II paved the way for increased sales of Rebels and the 7D to video enthusiasts the world over. They never intended for that to happen.

Several high profile filmmakers helped further cement Canon’s position at the top of the food chain at the same time Panasonic was offering more features and a sharper image on the GH1 and GH2.

Then with the 5D Mark III, just as the dying embers of the Canon DSLR video era were burning out and users were changing to other cameras like the GH3 and Sony FS100, Magic Lantern develop raw video. Canon really have had luck on their side big time.



It’s a lack of attention and focus which also hurts stills photographers using the live-view display.

On the X100S for example, an other superb stills camera, the EVF and LCD become virtually unusable under certain types of lighting as the sensor is only enabled for NTSC frame rates no matter what region it’s sold in.

On the RX1 video quality is like a broken VHS cassette despite Sony putting the same sensor into a dedicated video camera.

That lack of attention on video during the sensor design stages screwed the Sony VG900 on the market and it has seen massive discounting down from 3000 euros to 1000 euros in just 12 months.

I firmly believe the manufacturers are their own worse enemy.

Then comes the Blackmagic Cinema Camera, which proves the manufacturers CAN do what we’re asking of them.

The Canon 1D C 4K cinema DSLR costs $15,000 and yet doesn’t shoot ProRes. This does.

It has peaking for manual focus, something stills cameras have only just begun implementing, though not the 1D C!   The colour space and sampling for video on the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera is 10bit 4-2-2 and even though the sensor is a small Super 16mm chip it’s actually perfectly usable at ISO 1600 in low light.  There’s none of the mushy compression AVCHD gives us or any of the electronic looking colour of 8bit codecs, all this for under $1000.

With all the technology and resources at their disposal, I am amazed none of the big corporations in Japan can properly cater for the enthusiast and prosumer video market.

Embracing the niche

All new markets start as a niche.

You also have markets trickling down from the very top of the filmmaking industry and becoming more widely known. A perfect example of this is that of the anamorphic lens.



At play here is a cultural element that is very hard to see in the sales stats.

Director J.J Abrams has been using anamorphic lenses and flare in a range of massive cultural hits in the West.

As a result the anamorphic look has become more mainstream and more sought after (even creating price bubble for lenses as there are so few of them).

Nobody at Canon or Sony take any notice of things like this because they are focussed so intently on where the next billion dollars of growth is coming from.

The enthusiast video market is not as big as the prosumer stills camera market so Canon neglect us.

They prefer to concentrate on high added value products like the Cinema EOS range.The problem with this is that you become stuck with the status-quo and exposed when the momentum changes.This happened to Nokia when Apple came along out of the blue with the iPhone.

Today Blackmagic are too small and shipping in too low a quantity to be Apple and truly hurt Canon with disruptive technology, but there are signs of it happening elsewhere.  Smartphones have killed the compact camera while Samsung have disrupted Sony and Panasonic’s TV businesses in a major way, simply by giving consumers a better image for much less money.

In the end that simple business principal will come to the enthusiast video market and the big manufacturers will completely lose their grip on it.

The post Open letter to Japanese manufacturers on the enthusiast video market – improve or lose it appeared first on EOSHD.com.

Nikon Digital Camera Stats

Nikon-Droid - You will be absorbed...

Nikon Coolpix S800c Android camera first look

By R Butler | Published Aug 22, 2012 | Product Reviews & Previews

Tagged with: android coolpix nikon smartphones

Preview based on a pre-production Coolpix S800c

Smartphones have quickly become the most serious challenge to face the conventional compact digital camera since they first emerged onto the market. It's no exaggeration to say that all the big camera makers are becoming desperate to develop camera models that can stand up to this challenge. Nikon's response is the Coolpix S800c - the first camera from a major manufacturer to be openly based on the Android mobile operating system.
There are several reasons why smartphones have become so compelling as photographic tools: they're devices that people tend to have with them at all times and they are well connected to mobile data services to allow uploading and sharing of images. An additional benefit has come from the emergence of apps and the platforms through which they're sold which have encouraged third-party developers to create software adding new capabilities to the devices they run on. From Instagram to Angry Birds, apps have encouraged people to use their Smartphones for all sorts of things the hardware makers couldn't have predicted.
This seemingly boundless flexibility comes in stark contrast to conventional cameras, which tend to offer the same capabilities and features on the day they're consigned to a dusty shelf as they had when they were taken out of the box. The S800c is a full Android 2.3 (known as Gingerbread) device, meaning it can run any apps that an equivalent smartphone could offer - so you can run Photoshop Touch to spruce-up your images, rather than being dependent on the manufacturer-supplied processing options. For that matter, there's nothing to stop you passing the time with a quick game of Temple Run or Fruit Ninja.
Compact cameras do still have some advantages though - they tend to have larger sensors (which means better image quality, particularly in lower light), and they tend to have optical zooms, giving greater photographic flexibility. They also tend to come with removable memory, meaning you can easily expand and swap-out the storage of your camera - something most smartphones don't allow. The S800c offers the same 10x zoom lens and 16MP backlit CMOS sensor as the Coolpix S6300, meaning you get a proper compact camera as well as the capabilities of a fully-functioning tablet computer. For perspective, the S6300 had a list price of $199 at launch, compared to the $349 Nikon is asking for the S800c.

Nikon Coolpix S800c key specifications

• 16MP 1/2.3"-type BSI CMOS sensor
• 25-250mm equivalent F3.2-5.8 lens
• 3.5" WVGA OLED touchscreen
• Android v2.3 operating system
• Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS
• 2GB of internal memory (690MB of this for Apps)
• Up to 8fps continuous shooting
• 1080p30 video

Apps such as Instagram and Hipstamatic have made a virtue of smartphones' generally disappointing cameras. It'll be interesting to see whether any app developers will develop apps that take advantage of the better camera that the S800c offers. In the meantime, the only app Nikon offers is its exisiting 'My Picture Town' app for uploading to its cloud storage service of the same name.
In addition to apps, the use of Android means the S800c gains all the capabilities of the operating system. As such, it has well-established tools for connecting to Wi-Fi networks and gives a choice of browsers, so you can even log on to Wi-Fi networks that require a web form to be filled-in. This means you can access your email and browse the web from the camera, if you need to research something you just photographed. The S800c also has GPS capabilities, meaning you can add location data to your images as well as making use of the many navigation and mapping apps available for Android.

In addition to letting you run apps, the S800c allows you to check your mail, or perhaps browse dpreview from your camera.

Battery life is pretty disappointing at just 140 shots per charge (when tested to CIPA standards), but the S800c has an advantage over most smartphones of having a removable battery. This means that, unlike most smartphones, you can swap a charged battery in when the existing one is exhausted. The small EN-EL12 battery offers 3.8Wh of power. For perspective, the Nikon S8000 managed to get 210 shots per charge from the same battery.

Unlike most smartphones, the S800c retains the ability to use SD cards and a removable battery, in this case a 3.8Wh EN-EL12. At 140 shots per charge, the camera's lifespan isn't great (and the CIPA tests do not include time spent web browsing), but at least you can slot a spare battery in if you need to.

Gingerbread isn't the latest version of Android, with 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) taking hold on flagship smartphones and 4.1 (Jelly Bean) on its way, but it is the most widely supported. Nikon isn't clear on whether it might upgrade to one of the newer versions of the operating system - enabling use of the Chrome web browser. The majority of current apps are compatible with 2.3, however.

Hacker's delight

In addition to the intended app capabilities, a camera running such a common mobile operating system is a big deal because it opens up all sorts of unofficial customization, especially if the Android 'hacking' community takes an interest. Groups such as CyanogenMod offer custom ROMs (modified versions of the underlying firmware) for a wide range of Android phones and tablets. These versions offer modifications such as CPU overclocking and other performance and interface enhancements. CyanogenMod also usually makes the latest Android version available on many devices before the manufacturers or telecom-providers do. There’s no reason why the same thing could not be done on the S800c, so we may well see Android 4.1 ‘Jelly Bean’ running on a Nikon rather sooner than later, with the Google Now 'personalized search application' telling you what the traffic is like on your way home from your photo excursion.

Handling and first impressions

Camera control is essentially via the touchscreen (aside from zoom and shutter) – our first impressions are that it’s responsive and looks quite intuitive. The camera can connect to Wi-Fi hotspots directly, and will be able to set up a peer-to-peer connection with smartphones to transfer images to them, if they're running the Nikon apps for Android or iOS. You can also run Nikon's 'My Picture Town' app to upload images directly to the company's cloud hosting service, but this makes more sense for backup than anything else.
When you turn the S800c on you reach a simple menu screen with the choice of going straight to the camera. However, if you choose to go through to the Android home screen, the camera can be accessed just as the camera on any other Android device would be - by opening the camera app. Based on our use the S800c seems powerful enough to jump to the camera very quickly, though we didn't time it.
Because you've got the familiar apps for whichever social networking services you use, you can send images from the S800c to those sites just as easily as you would from any smartphone. It’s a directly-comparable transformative experience towards using a compact camera as the iPhone was for many mobile phone users. Suddenly you have a device that acts as a little portable computer on the back, and a pretty decently-specced camera on the front. Our biggest concern is the price (which is significantly higher in Europe than in North America).

Panasonic Droids...

http://www.geek.com/articles/mobile/panasonic-eluga-is-a-lightweight-waterproof-and-oddly-named-android-smartphone-20120221/

Back in December, Panasonic announced that it was preparing a full-on global assault on the smartphone market. Up first is Europe, where the company’s opening salvo will be fired in a 4.3″ shell. That phone has now gotten official as the Panasonic Eluga.

An interesting choice in names, to be sure, but it probably has something to do with the phone’s aquatic exploits (like the whale that rhymes with Eluga). It joins the ever-increasing list of waterproof and dustproof phones, though it’s anything but whale-like in terms of weight at just 103g. That makes it lighter than even the waifish NEC Medias N-04C. Hardware details are very thin at this point, but Panasonic has revealed that the Eluga’s 4.3-inch display packs 540 x 960 pixels — no word on whether it uses an OLED panel as previously rumored.

As Sony and Samsung do with their Android phones, Panasonic has designed the Eluga to work in perfect harmony with its Viera smart TVs. Images and videos can be transferred from phone to television with a simple swipe, and you’re also able to display what you’re viewing in the Eluga’s browser using the just-released Viera Remote app version 2.0. One other slick function Panasonic offers is a controller mode, which turns your phone into a gamepad for big-screen fun on compatible Viera sets.

The Eluga is set to land on European shores in the very near future, and it’s being shown off by Panasonic ahead of MWC 2012. Keep your eye on this post for updated hardware details once they’re announced.

Who made that camera?.. BlackMagic?

Blackmagic Cinema Camera packs 'feature film' 2.5K quality, touchscreen for $2,995

from Engadget by Richard Lawler

While Canon, Sony and Red have already stolen the show with new camera announcements here at NAB 2012, Blackmagic Design is trying to carve out a niche for its new Cinema Camera. Priced at $2,995, where the company sees this as differing from the competition is its ability to capture film quality video on its 2.5K sensor and output it to CinemaDNG RAW, ProRes and DNxHD file formats. That camera housing can take Canon or Zeiss lenses on the front, contains a built-in SSD within and has a capacitive touchscreen display for control and metadata entry. Once you've captured the video, the included copy of DaVinci Resolve can take care of all color correction needs, while the video can be pulled from the SSD over a variety of high speed ports including BNC SDI and Thunderbolt. Check out a few in-person pics in our gallery below and more specs in the press release after the break.

Move to Digital Film  

Blackmagic Cinema Camera features a high resolution sensor with wide dynamic range so it’s perfect for independent film, television commercials and episodic television production. DaVinci Resolve software for Mac™ and Windows™ is included so you can work at the highest quality and get the best results. Blackmagic Cinema Camera is both affordable and a complete solution because it includes a built-in recorder and monitoring, so it’s perfect for displacing video-only cameras for work such as sporting events, weddings, music videos and more!

Get one of the world’s finest digital film cameras with a beautiful design that features a machined aluminum chassis, interchangeable optics, high resolution 2.5K sensor, 13 stops of dynamic range and 12-bit RAW uncompressed and compressed ProRes and DNxHD file formats! Includes sun shield, power supply, carry strap, UltraScope waveform monitoring software and a full version of DaVinci Resolve Software for Mac OS X and Windows.  BODY only $2995 plus Lens...

Fast Metadata Entry

Logging file metadata directly into the camera dramatically speeds up the post production process. With the Blackmagic Cinema Camera 'slate' you can enter information such as shot number, search tags, scene number, timecode and more! You can even set shot number and other data to increment automatically! Metadata is compatible with leading editing software and is fully searchable so when you're editing your project you can avoid the time consuming task of searching for specific shots!

Say goodbye to annoying custom cables you can never find when on a location shoot because Blackmagic Cinema Camera uses only standard connections! You get jack mic/line audio inputs for recording the highest quality uncompressed audio, as well as 3 Gb/s SDI out for on set monitoring or for sending to live production switchers. Also included is 12V to 30V DC input for power and battery charging, 3.5mm headphone socket, LANC remote control and high speed Thunderbolt port for computer capture!

With Blackmagic Cinema Camera you can use the most amazing optics from the world’s leading lens crafters such as Canon, Zeiss and many more. Blackmagic Cinema Camera is compatible with EF and ZE mount lenses, so you can use the lenses you already own! With Blackmagic Cinema Camera you are not locked into any specific lens and you can choose the lens you need based on the creative style of your shot! Blackmagic Cinema Camera allows full electronic control of your lens, so you can simply point, set iris and focus on command!

Top Sellling DLSRs Nikon D3100 #1

Global Smartphone Statistics

STATS: Global mobile market share data for Q1 2011

from EuroDroid by Gary C

2 people liked this

There’s so much data in the latest Gartner global mobile phone data it’s hard to know where to begin. It shows that Nokia still leads the overall handset sales league, although it’s lost 5% of its market share over the last 12 months.
And incredibly, on a global basis. ZTE sold more units than HTC in the first quarter of 2011…

But that’s the entire market. In terms of smartphone sales alone, Android is the clear success story of the last 12 months…

…lifting its global smartphone market share from 9.6% in the first quarter of 2010 to 36% in the first quarter of 2011. That’s officially meteoric.
Related posts:

1. STATS: Android’s global smartphone market share rises 22% in 12 months
2. STATS: Android has 25% of global smartphone market, will grow at “twice” the rate of others in 2011
3. STATS: US Android market share nearly alongside Apple & RIM
4. STATS: Android now 10% ahead of iPhone in US smartphone market share

Sony, Nikon Narrow Gap to Canon With New Digital Camera Models

By Kazuyo Sawa and Mariko Yasu - Apr 15, 2011 2:05 A

An employee of Sony Corp., holds the Sony NEX-5D mirror-less camera at a Sony showroom in Tokyo. Photographer: Kimimasa Mayama/Bloomberg

Sony Corp. (6758) and Nikon Corp. (7731) narrowed the gap toCanon Inc. (7751), the world’s largest camera maker, last year after introducing a new lineup of models.

Sony, the world’s second-biggest camera maker, controlled 17.9 percent of the market, improving from 16.9 percent a year earlier, researcher IDC said in an e-mailed statement to Bloomberg News yesterday. Nikon had 12.6 percent compared with Canon’s 19 percent, which remained unchanged from a year ago.

Worldwide camera sales jumped 10 percent to 141 million units last year, helped by the introduction of new models and economic growth in markets such as China. To win new customers, Sony and Samsung Electronics Co. are among companies unveiling devices that eliminated the need for a mirror in professional- grade cameras, where Canon has the lead.

“Sony’s and Samsung’s launching new mirror-less digital cameras helped them obtain more market share,” said Masahiko Ishino, an analyst at Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities Co.

Samsung had 11.1 percent of the market last year, improving from 10.9 percent. Kodak Co., Fujifilm Holdings Corp. and Casio Computer Co. were among manufacturers who lost market share last year, according to the data.

In the market for cameras with interchangeable lens, or single lens reflex cameras, Canon controlled 44.5 percent of the market, followed by Nikon with 29.8 percent and Sony with 11.9 percent, according to the data.

Following is the table for worldwide digital still camera shipments by vendors from IDC Japan in an e-mail release yesterday.

Worldwide Digital Camera Market Shares by Vendor
====================================================
Vendor                 2010             2009
----------------------------------------------------
Canon                  19               19
Sony                   17.9             16.9
Nikon                  12.6             11.1
Samsung                11.1             10.9
Kodak                   7.4              8.8
Panasonic               7.6              7.6
Olympus                 6.1              6.2
Fuji                    4.9              5.4
Casio                   4                4.7
PENTAX                  1.5              1.7
Vivitar                 1.2              0.7
Other                   6.7              7
-----------------------------------------------------

To contact the reporters on this story: Kazuyo Sawa in Tokyo at ksawa3@bloomberg.net; Mariko Yasu in Tokyo at myasu@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Young-Sam Cho at ycho2@bloomberg.net

120 Million Digital Cameras in 2010

Camera sales rise again

from (title unknown) by Paul Worthington

Japan’s Camera & Imaging Products Association reports its total shipments of digital cameras in 2010 reached 121.5 million units — marking a new record.

CIPA says it began compiling sales totals in 1999, when digital cameras were still in their infancy. Since then, digital camera shipments recorded steady growth, reaching 100 million units for the first time in 2007. In 2009 sales fell, due to the global recession.

At the beginning of 2010, CIPA forecast a return to growth — and even that was not optimistic enough as the projection was “substantially surpassed.”

Compact cameras totaled 108.6 million units, a year-on-year increase of 13.2 percent.

Interchangeable lens cameras reached 12.9 million units, a 30 percent increase.

21.7 million lenses shipped, a 34.8 percent increase.

The forecast for 2011 is 131 million units total, a year-on-year increase of 7.8 percent, with 115.5 million compacts and 15.5 million ILCs.

The end is near for PNDs?

82% of smartphone nav app users would not buy a PND
Feb 10, 2011

The challenge to the PND from mobile apps has been predicted since the arrival of the first GPS-enabled smartphones, with analysts such as ABI Research recently forecasting that software will take half of the total navigation market by 2016.

Now according to research from mobile navigation developer ALK Technologies, this challenge is very real.

In a survey of more than 5,000 users of ALK's CoPilot Live navigation apps, 82% of respondents said they would be unlikely to purchase a dedicated sat nav device in the future.
Today's touch screen handsets such as the iPhone and Google's Android-powered devices are capable of providing the same detailed mapping and voice-guided directions as dedicated systems for a fraction of the price. They are also more convenient for pedestrian navigation, as well as inherently connected for seamless access to useful navigation-based services such as local search, traffic information and even the price of petrol at nearby filling stations.
The survey also revealed that 65% of respondents use CoPilot Live at least once a week, dispelling the myth that smartphone navigation is only for occasional use or as a backup for a dedicated system.
CoPilot Live also allows users to have detailed street maps stored directly on their phone, rather than having to download them for each journey - a PND-like feature preferred by 85%.
"This survey is concrete evidence that smartphone navigation is a direct threat to dedicated devices," commented David Quin, marketing director, CoPilot Live navigation at ALK Technologies.
Quin pointed out that full-featured apps like CoPilot Live now provide the same advanced guidance features and detailed maps as high-end sat navs on a wide range of handsets, and that, for the majority, there's no going back.
"As smartphones reach mass market penetration, it is inevitable e that the dedicated device will become the niche product," he concluded.

North American Consumer Digital Camer...

North American Consumer Digital Camera Market Faces New Demands and Challenges

InfoTrends has just released its North American Consumer Digital Camera Forecast for 2010 – 2015. With the camera market beginning to mature, repeat purchases have become critical for sales, as 95% of all cameras purchased in 2009 were bought by households that already owned a camera. Although first-time buyers still represent an opportunity, the market is largely fuelled by purchases of replacement and additional cameras. New features and products will be crucial to getting consumers back into the buying cycle.

Interchangeable lens cameras are the brightest spot in the digital camera market, as they are projected to account for 32% of all digital camera revenues in 2015. The landscape for interchangeable lens cameras is expanding. The emergence of Micro Four Thirds and mirrorless hybrid cameras means that the term “digital single-lens reflex camera” (DSLR) no longer covers the full range of products available.

The new breed of compact interchangeable lens cameras will appeal to consumers on two levels: form factor and technology. The greatest challenge for new entrants is to develop a comprehensive range of lenses and accessories, as they will drive profitability.

Another challenge facing vendors is creating products that fit into the connected experience of sharing photos anywhere, anytime. The connected experience refers to connecting devices like TVs, set top boxes, game consoles, mobile phones, photo frames, and PCs with personal and commercial content and services. Digital cameras need to integrate with this ecosystem or they will risk being left out of the equation.

Having the ability to share photos instantly and use them to interact with others will be a driver for photo activity. Digital camera vendors must develop products that provide consumers with this option so they remain relevant to today’s user experience, otherwise they run the risk of losing the battle to camera phones.

InfoTrends’ North American Consumer Digital Camera Forecast for 2010 – 2015 provides a forecast for the U.S. market in terms of units, revenue, and average selling price for the consumer (sub-$1,500) digital camera, with price segments broken out. It also includes an analysis of the key market drivers, barriers, digital camera vendors, and ongoing market issues, as well as digital camera design and technology trends. In addition, the report provides a six-year forecast for Canada’s unit sales.