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Rangefinder
Magazine Digital Photography
by John Rettie If this magazine didn’t languish in your in-tray for days before you picked it up you’re probably reading this at about the same time that the photo industry is descending on Las Vegas for the annual PMA show. Of course I’m writing this column one month before the event so it can’t be a show report! Fortunately, I have been privileged to get an advanced look at some of the new products that will be unveiled, although I suspect there will be many more products shown that I have no inkling about at this time.
While many, including myself, expected Nikon would unveil an all-new digital SLR camera that does not seem to be happening at this time. Instead Canon will wow the crowds with the EOS 10D, which is a replacement for the D60 and will sell for only $1499 (estimated street price). Considering the D60 was only launched less than a year ago and has been in short supply the whole time it is a very pleasant surprise that it’s been upgraded already and will sell for $700 less. What’s perhaps even more important is that Canon says it has upped production threefold so it should be in good supply fairly soon after PMA. This means those “unfortunate” Canon users who couldn’t get a D60 in the past few months should now be able to obtain a better camera for less money. The 10D does not, as its name might suggest, have a 10-megapixel chip. Instead it utilizes the same 6.3 megapixel CMOS chip that was used in the D60. That’s not a bad thing as the results obtained by this chip are well liked by most everyone who uses the camera. Officially the D60 was not described as a professional camera body, mainly due to its slower operation and less robust body. It also had a few shortcomings, including slow autofocusing in poor light. Nonetheless it appealed to many professionals who used it with great success. The Canon EOS-10D uses an all-new body that is made out of rigid magnesium alloy and is much the same size as the D60. It features a high-speed wide-area 7-point autofocus system that should be much more efficient. Canon claims that its latest DIGIC-based image processor produces improved image quality over the D60. The camera will also be faster in operation as it is capable of shooting at 3 fps up to nine consecutive frames, in RAW, JPEG or simultaneous RAW+JPEG. On the surface it would appear that the 10D will be an ideal camera for all but a few professionals who need the really high speed and rugged waterproof body provided with the EOS-1Ds. From a cost point it’s a no-brainer as you’ll be able to buy five 10D cameras for the price of one 1Ds. Because of this Canon will probably have to lower the price of the EOS-1Ds before too long. With Nikon introducing specially designed DX lenses for digital SLRs with small chips, it would seem natural for Canon to do the same. However, Canon officials remain tight lipped when asked the question.
Fuji is another company that is upping the ante in quality with the announcement of its fourth generation Super CCD chip. Fuji engineers quite rightly state that the number of pixels in an image capture device is not the only criteria for producing a quality image. To this end it is introducing two versions of the new chip. The Super CCD HR (high resolution) chip is similar in concept to previous generations but packs 6.63 million pixels onto a tiny (7.3 x 5.4mm) chip. That’s a density equivalent to over 140 million pixels on a full size chip or 58 million pixels on a chip as found in the Canon 10D! The second new chip, called the Super CCD SR (Super Dynamic Range) is the more intriguing one as it features a second set of small pixels coupled to the regular ones. Fuji claims that the new configuration produces approximately four times wider dynamic range than the previous Super CCD. Although the chip has 6.7 million pixels, its resolution is actually the same as a 3.3 megapixel chip as half of them are the so-called S-pixels and the other half R-pixels. When information captured by the two sets of chips is combined, the resulting image delivers more detail in shadows and highlights. Fuji likens the results to a negative film with good tonal range. In examples shown by Fuji the quality of images captured when overexposed was as good as a perfectly exposed image captured by the previous generation Super CCD. It seems to be particularly good at avoiding blown highlights. The FinePix F700 is the first camera to be introduced with this chip, but it is only a consumer point-and-shoot model. We’ll obviously have to wait until later in the year to see the technology incorporated in a new Fujifilm SLR camera body. If one does some simple math, it’s easy to see that a larger chip size as used in the FinePix S2 Pro, could easily have a resolution of 12 megapixels and each photo site would still be larger than those in the upcoming consumer camera. It sure looks as though Fuji will be able to deliver a professional level image capture chip with good resolution and great dynamic range without resorting to a full frame chip. Many people thought that Olympus would unveil a new SLR system at PMA after announcing its plans for a new standard at Photokina last year. However, unless the company changed its mind right before the show, it indicated to us that nothing would be shown publicly. It seems then that Nikon has beaten Olympus to the punch by delivering a new lens series tailored for digital photography. Perhaps Olympus should adopt the Nikon bayonet F-mount as its “standard” instead of developing a new incompatible mount? With Kodak having delayed the introduction of the 14N camera with a full-frame chip and the high price Canon has placed on its full-frame model, it would seem that we are still some years away from having low priced (under $2000) full-frame camera bodies. If Nikon and Olympus prove to be right in predicting the need for different optics in order to garner the best quality from digital image capture devices and Fuji’s new chip delivers greater dynamic range we may find that 35mm size chips will never be needed for the majority of professional or high-end amateur camera bodies. Maybe full frame 35mm chips are not the Holy Grail. Apple’s Improving Outlook Apple also introduced a smaller version of the PowerBook with a 12-inch screen. It’s smaller size and lighter weight makes it ideal for those who need to travel light and work on an airplane but can’t afford first class tickets. Despite its small size it still includes an integrated CD-R drive and a G4 processor. About the only thing it lacks is a PC card slot. Perhaps Apple should have included a Compact Flash slot so photographers could download images without needing a cable or external card reader. In my experience one of the few shortcomings of a Mac compared to a PC has been slow Internet access. It always seemed that pages took longer to load on a Mac than on a PC. No more. It turns out it wasn’t the computer but the software. Apple has introduced its own web browser called Safari that loads pages much faster than Internet Explorer, which has been the default web browser for many years. I have made Safari my main browser and even though it is a beta copy it works well and is quite stable. There are some bells and whistles missing such as automatic form filling and the option to not print the background of a web page. There’s still one area where the Mac is losing ground and that is pure speed. Intel and AMD have continued to produce faster and faster CPUs that are now reaching 3GHz. Motorola, makers of the Power PC chips used in the Mac, have had trouble getting chips to run faster than 1.2 GHz. Although the actual workflow on a Mac may still be just as fast, there’s no question that when it comes to processing images and running complex filters in Photoshop pure processing speed still counts. If one reads between the lines it would appear a solution is at hand. A week after Macworld, IBM announced that it would be working with AMD on future CPUs. At the end of last year there were persistent rumors that Apple might switch to using AMD chips. IBM has, of course, been a partner in the Power PC chip business with Motorola and Apple since the beginning. I reckon that behind the scenes IBM, Apple and AMD engineers are feverishly designing a new CPU for use in high-end Macs that will run more than twice as fast as those we’re seeing today. It’ll probably not happen until the end of the year but Apple has to do something to speed up its computers, it’s about all that’s wrong.
Lexmark Color Laser printer A week before I finished this column I got a Lexmark C750n color laser printer in for review. Although laser printers are the only printer worth considering for general business use they have been a non-starter for photographers as the images they produce have not been acceptable for photographic work. When I saw the output from a Lexmark color laser at Comdex last year I was amazed at the quality in a sample I was shown. Okay it was not strictly 100% photo quality but it was 90%. I realized that a color laser printer could make an ideal proof printer as well as be used for producing customized fliers and general office work. Now that I’ve played with this printer for a few days I’m even more convinced that a color laser printer can make sense for many professional photographers. It’s not yet a substitute for a good dye-sub or inkjet printer for final output of photographic images. However for quick proofs it has distinct advantages, such as lower material costs and speed. I was also under the mistaken impression that good color laser printers were still expensive. They are not. Smaller printers are now available for under $1000. However, the C750n costs $2399, but that is $1000 lower than when it was introduced. It’s big, heavy (105 lbs) and fast plus it’s a networked workgroup printer that can survive a duty cycle of 60,000 pages per month. Considering these specs it’s actually a reasonable price. When I plugged it into my Ethernet network I was amazed when my Mac recognized it immediately. In addition, I was able to print from applications running under Mac OS X without loading any drivers or performing any set up procedures. On the other hand, on my PC I had to download a driver and manually enter network addresses to get it to work. Fortunately I have the printer on loan for several weeks so I plan to run more tests and see just how good an output I can achieve. I’ll report back on more of my findings in a future column. In the meantime if you do a lot of proof printing or need to produce printed color work take a look at color laser printer. They’ve come a long way in the past couple of years. Quick Book Review: Essentially each pair of pages in the 128-page book ($24.95, published by Amphoto Books) covers a technique on altering or improving a picture. Many of the techniques described are useful for a photographer who is new to digital image making, while others will appeal to those who’ve learned the rudimentaries of Photoshop but want to begin experimenting. Each section shows the end result and briefly describes procedures with full color images and screen shots. John Rettie is a photojournalist who resides
in Santa Barbara, CA. He has been using a camera as a professional for
33 years, a computer for 23 years, and has combined his knowledge of both
for the past ten years. Readers can contact him by e-mail at john@johnrettie.com
or by snail-mail c/o Rangefinder. |
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Digital
Image Making