In the old days BD (before digital?) agreed practice was to destroy the negative after a limited edition run was sold out. How many actually did this I’m not sure, but nowadays we tend to have so many copies or backups of digital images floating around, destroying all copies would probably be quite difficult, if not impossible, in many instances.

An interesting case in the US has highlighted this exact problem as it relates to the new digital reality. The Photo District News has recently reported on a collector who is suing well-known US photographer William Eggleston over new digital prints he created and sold of his older Limited Edition works.

It makes interesting reading, especially the argument that creating new prints using different formats and with new printing technology somehow circumvents the established traditions and laws. Not being a lawyer I can’t comment on actual legalities (especially US law) but I would be very dissapointed in students or colleagues who adopted such unethical practice.

It plainly reeks of ‘bean counter’ strategy. Trying to extract (considerable) extra dollars from older works with the threat of expensive court cases to discourage disapproval.

The link to the article is here. The outcome is yet to be decided but will be interesting when it comes. Hopefully justice will prevail?

This comes on the back of a startling copyright infringement case where co-defendants are claiming an agreement existed based on an unsigned (yes you read that right, unsigned) copyright release. Not surprisingly this ‘virtual’ agreement is in favour of the defendants and takes copyright away from the photographer.

Apparently the mere fact of showing the document proves somehow an agreement was in place? In Their dreams maybe!! US courts are obviously more like comedy clubs than places of honour or integrity. A link to that amazing case is here.

I would be interested in your comments on both cases. Do you offer limited editions of your photos and do you ensure no extra copies ever will become available? Do you ever use unsigned copyright releases to protect your work? Just joking!!!!

The general opinion seems to be WOW!
But a closer look is maybe not quite so impressive. Sure the lift to 36.3MP is significant, and if you want a medium-format like DSLR then this could be for you, but otherwise there is not that much to get overly excited about.

It’s really a nice upgrade of the D700 and keeps it in line with the competition and current technology being used on other cameras.

As well as the megapixel bump the other major new feature is the inclusion of full HD video similar to that offered in the flagship Nikon D4. This now puts Nikon in step with Canon in this area who till now have been stealing a lot of ground in the surprisingly lucrative DSLR video market.

Nikon has also announced a D800e version with the same MP and specs but without the standard optical low-pass filter, sometimes called an ‘anti-aliasing’ filter, in front of the sensor. Given that on most DSLRs this filter slightly reduces the overall image sharpness, not having one potentially offers greater resolution and detail over the standard model, close to the resolution of medium format cameras. This should appeal, particularly, to studio and landscape photographers.

The rest is pretty underwhelming! 51-point AF system when in most cases a single point is enough? A (very) slightly bigger LCD screen and slower than D700 (yes, slower??) continuous shooting.

So why would you bother? A food shooter I know wants the MP boost to shoot her DSLR almost as a medium-format camera in the studio. And if you were thinking of going to the D4, you get a lot of the best from that camera in the D800 at half the price! Me, I think I’ll be sticking with my D700 for now and maybe hang out for the D900 down the track. Probably way down the track if the experience of waiting for the D800 is anything to go by!!

Note the comments above are based on the released specs and online reviews by others of pre-production models. The D800 is not actually available yet (due around March-April, 2012) so we should wait for real world results especially in the area of resolution, where there is a school of thought that many of our current lenses might not be quite up to handling the level of resolution being offered here. You knew there would be a catch, right!!!

Full details and specs for the Nikon D800 can be found on the excellent DPReview website at www.dpreview.com/previews/nikonD800.

Let us know what you think of the new Nikon D800 and whether you are looking to buy?

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Careful focusing is important to every good photograph!

So what IS the most important part of an image or what is the critical point of focus? Sometimes it’s hard to know where the best focus point is and if you are using a large aperture, for narrow depth-of-field (DOF), it’s even more critical as any error is easily spotted.

Take Control.
As the photographer you need to take control of this aspect of your photography, don’t let your camera decide randomly where to focus or rely on DOF to cover for any misfocus. However, before we look at the right technique let’s look briefly at how your camera actually does focus.

Photographic focus is achieved by arranging glass elements inside your lens and moving some of them around to make subject detail as sharp as possible on your camera sensor. Lenses inherently have a closest focusing distance, anything closer than this point will be blurred, but all lenses can focus to infinity (symbol ‘∞‘) which is the farthest distance of any subject.

Modern compound lens with multiple internal glass elements. Focussing is achieved by moving some of these glass elements back and forth.

As they rely on being able to see contrast and edges in a scene AF systems can have trouble working properly in low light. Subject movement can also confuse the AF sensor sometimes, leading to misfocus in action and sports shots.

Manual focus (MF). Because of the limitations (above) of AF there are times when you will have to turn it off and revert to manual focus to take a photo. Unfortunately many modern digitals are not well designed for this. Some compacts only have a very rough distance scale shown on the LCD screen. DSLR cameras usually manually focus with a ring on the lens but many modern viewfinders are hard to see clearly so accurate focusing is difficult.

No matter whether you are using auto or manual remember your camera lens focuses on a distance from the camera not on an object in the scene. Even though your auto focus might ‘lock’ onto an object in the scene, say a flower 1 metre from the camera, really the lens is making everything in an arc 1 metre from the camera, sharp, not just the flower.

To bring all this to some practical use here is my suggested technique for camera focusing.

1. Focus settings.
Turn off all multi-point focussing options and set one focus point in the centre of your viewfinder. Any extra focussing points within your viewfinder are mostly redundant. One focus point is enough, and the best one to set is the centre-spot although sometimes a single off-centre point can work too.

Personally I also turn off any dynamic focussing options (AI Servo, Continuous Focussing etc.). These are designed to track moving objects (especially coming towards you) and try to allow for subject movement in the time it takes to press the shutter. They can be OK for fast moving subjects (trains, planes etc.) but become a bit hit and miss, while with a bit of practice, the pre-focussing technique described below will give you more predictable results more often.
Tip: You might have to take a quick look at your camera manual to find out how to set a single focus point in your viewfinder or turn off other auto focus options.

2. Focussing technique.
Hold the shutter button half way down to turn on the camera functions and lock focus on the important part of the subject within the single focus point. Now recompose the shot if necessary, and then fully press the shutter to take the photo.

For moving subjects you use the same technique but pre-focus a little ahead of the action. Don’t follow the action but lock focus on a spot and take the photo when the action gets there. For example the winner’s tape at an athletics event or the road where a car or bike will race through.

By taking focussing out of the equation the whole process is faster because there is no ‘focus lag’ and you are more likely to catch the subject where you want it in the frame. No more cut-off bits in your action shots!!

Whenever you press the shutter and nothing happens it usually means the camera can’t lock focus. When this happens or you hear the lens ‘hunting’ back and forth try pointing the camera at a different part of the subject (some part with some obvious edges and detail) at around the same distance and then recompose back to your original shot. Sometimes it’s better to use manual focussing.

3. Selecting the critical focus point.
Before you even start worrying about pressing the shutter you will have to decide what is the most important part of your photo to focuds on. This is not as simple as it sounds. In people or animal portraits it is usually the eyes that should be the sharpest unless you are going for some unusual creative effect. For landscape shots you might have more possibilities but you still need to decide where to focus and ensure it is sharpest there.

Conclusion
Now you, not the camera, will decide what is going to be the focus of your subject, a critical step to greatly improving your photography. Good photographers use many different techniques and tricks to get the best results but look carefully now at any of their photos and you will see some (or all) of these basic ideas being applied. Now it’s your turn to give it a go!

Let us know how you go using these tips or if you have any others you use in your photography.

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Most of the reviews so far suggest the photo improvements at least are small. There is an upgrade in resolution of the full-frame sensor to 16.2MP (up from 12.1Mp in the D3s) with other focusing and speed enhancements. Biggest change seems to be the inclusion of full HD video to match the Canon DSLRs!

Dpreview.com has an overview of the new D4 here with detailed specs.

By all accounts the faster operation is aimed at sports shooters and photojournalists. No doubt, not too far down the track is a new D4 model to replace the 24.5MP D3x?

New XQD format?
By far the most interesting aspect of the release (to me anyway) is the inclusion of the new XQD memory card format which by all accounts is being setup to become a major player in the market. Maybe even to replace the venerable CompactFlash (CF) system entirely which is probably getting a bit past its use by date now? We will take a closer look at this new format soon on this blog. Stay tuned!

The new XQD format is being used alongside the older CompactFlash memory card system in the flagship Nikon D4 camera. This new format is set to replace the CF cards in pro DSLRs and better compete with the smaller SD cards? Watch this space!

Personally I’m still waiting for the D800 or whatever is going to replace the ageing D700?? Nevertheless, if you are itching to get your hands on a D4 and check it out, Nikon says that it will be available in stores soon?

What do you think? Is Nikon on a winner here or just upgrading to keep up with the competition?

FotoFreo 2012 will include two photographic projects, one by Martin Parr, the other by Western Australian photographer Bo Wong. The Festival will also feature exhibitions of work from India, curated by Devika Daulet Singh, and from New Zealand, curated by Zara Stanhope. For full details go to the FotoFreo 2012 website.

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The simpler composition and lighting of the image on the right has a more dramatic, eye catching effect on the viewer!

A close-up of a face (or part of a face) against a white or black background usually looks good. Getting in closer, either by moving or zooming, to highlight a detail will work too.

Simply lit portraits against plain backgrounds always work well.

Another simple, effective composition.

If you have any thoughts on this SIMPLE idea please let us know!

According to their website, Head On aims “…to present good photography regardless of the celebrity of either the subject or photographer“.

At the heart of the festival is Head On Portrait Prize which is definitely earning a reputation as the country’s major showcase for contemporary Australian portrait photography. In 2011 the competition offered more than $50,000 in prizes. The show’s main selection criteria are the quality and impact of the image, rather than the celebrity of the photographer or subject. As a result Head On is regarded by the arts community and reviewers as the most critically important photographic portrait prize in the country.

Winners:

In tandem with the festival and portrait prize Head On Foundation is a non-profit organisation aiming to promote photography through cultural activities. By becoming a member you will be entitled to reduced fees to Head On Foundation events (including entry fees for the portrait prize) and will enjoy discounts on other photographic products from leading retailers.

For full Head On details see the website.

In the meantime Nikon has released other new DX models such as the D5100, D3100 and D7000 presumably to fill the perceived marketing gaps but no new full-frame camera as yet? Not even for the also ageing pro D3x and D3s models. Nikon has definitely been biding its time with this one, which of course just encourages speculation, so not to be left out here are some of my thoughts on the matter.

Either Nikon are working on something really new and ground-breaking and it takes time to get such things right or maybe they have NOTHING and are just waiting to see what Canon does and will look at it then?  My money is on the latter but that’s just the cynic in me probably!

Maybe they have a few updates and some new features to build in that won’t be such a big deal and are holding off till they wring every possible dollar they can out of the older model. A big price drop about a year ago suggested a model change was imminent and encouraged a spike in sales. Or maybe something else entirely is happening here! You can probably see where this is going, right, pretty much nowhere, which is where most of the other speculation and rumour sites go too.

The current thinking (one site claims 99% probability?) is that the name will be D800 and will offer a 38MP full-frame sensor. Other rumours include 4 -6 frames per sec continuous shooting, full HD video and a larger LCD monitor screen.

Canon has just announced its new professional DSLR flagship, the EOS-1Dx with some pretty interesting new features, not the least of which are continuous shooting rates of 12 -14 frames/sec with a top ISO of 51,200. Curiously though only 18MP; maybe the pixel war is over? Canon’s direct competitor to the D700/D800? is the full-frame 5D which has been around for a while too with a tweaked MkII version the current option.

Will the Canon 1Dx send the Nikon boys (and girls) back to their drawing boards? Who knows, but whatever happens it should be worth watching. Throw the new mirrorless cameras into the mix; Nikon has several new models which could explain where their energy has been spent lately and we have interesting times ahead.

So what does this mean for the D800? Is it coming soon, later, or not at all?

I’ve got no idea really, nor does anyone else from what I can tell.  Nikon certainly aren’t telling us anything at this stage and everybody else is just guessing. I am quite happy with my D700, and not in the market to upgrade anytime soon, which is maybe what Nikon is thinking too?

What do you think? Are you a D700 user or in the market for a full-frame dslr anytime soon?

Key features of this new full-frame model include top ISO speed of 51,200 (extendable to a amazing 204,800); redesigned AF system; 12 frames per second (fps) continuous shooting; and Full HD video recording.

Most surprising though is perhaps the full-frame, 18-megapixel, CMOS sensor! This is 3 MP less than the 21MP 1D Mark III from two years ago. Reducing the pixel size, rather than going for a hefty resolution increase, has apparently allowed Canon to put the emphasis on speed and quality in this new camera with continuous shooting speeds up to 12 fps (14 fps in jpeg mode) while also retaining better quality such as the lower noise factor of the older 1Ds.

Could we finally be seeing an end to the pixel wars where each new model is expected to have more and more megapixels to keep up with (or ahead) of the competition? Maybe it’s only slowing at the top end, budget models still seem to be getting more pixels, but at worst it’s at least slowing down. It would be good to see a return to engineers designing cameras instead of the marketing department so the emphasis goes back to where it should be, QUALITY, rather than specs just pushed to be bigger or faster than the competition. It would be even better if such radical policy was applied to all models not just the pro ones.

Other features of the EOS-1DX include dual Digic5+ processors with a separate Digic 4 processor just for metering and autofocus, a new autoexposure system using a 100,000-pixel RGB metering sensor, 61 AF points (do we really need more than one?) and a new Intelligent Tracking and Recognition option that uses face-detection and tracks recognized faces (just in case anyone in your wedding party photos is a known fugitive?).

The blurb looks impressive but of course we haven’t actually used this new beast yet so until we can get our hands on one it’s hard to say whether there is any sort of a technological leap forward here or just steady as she goes! No prices have been announced in Australia but body-only prices being quoted on US sites are around $6800 US. Given the currency situation this should mean slightly less here, but past experience of camera importer price bumps suggest it will be more like $7500 – $8000 AUD.

See the Canon website for full details of the new Canon EOS-1DX. Also for information and plenty of photos of the new camera see the Australian Photography website.

I’ve been surprised for a while that modern DSLR cameras are still based around old fashioned film camera technology and mechanisms; specifically the mechanical reflex mirror (SLR) system for viewing and the multi-bladed focal-plane shutter to control the exposure time.

Both technologies have been used in cameras for well over 100 years but didn’t come into regular use until the latter half of the twentieth century. By 1990 most advanced professional level cameras were all using SLR systems and many also incorporated a focal-plane shutter.

In fact the modern DSLR camera, from the outside at least, could easily be mistaken for a film camera from the last century. Sure, under the bonnet things have changed with digital and computer technology systems doing a lot of the work and replacing vintage film recording methods, but the flip-up mirror and focal-plane shutter still remain. The question, though, is for how long!

The recently released mirrorless cameras promise to bridge the gap between compact digitals and larger but more flexible DSLRs. Sometimes called ‘hybrid’ cameras, these models are characterised by a no-mirror design and incorporate the smaller size and features of the compact digitals. They also offer larger, better quality, sensors and an interchangeable lens mount that can accept adapters for different lenses.

The Panasonic DMC-G1 - the camera that started it all!

Panasonic claims the credit for the first mirrorless interchangeable lens camera design with their Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 released in 2008. This camera was based around the micro four-thirds format also pioneered by Olympus. Since then other manufacturers have proceeded slowly but 2010 saw the release of enough new models to finally suggest that this category was to here stay.

Currently Olympus, Panasonic, Pentax, Ricoh, Samsung, Sony and Nikon are all offering mirrorless models with a limited range of interchangeable lenses to go with them. Leica and Sigma also have mirrorless models in their range and rumour has it Fuji is to release a mirrorless full-frame digital early in 2012. Canon is conspicuously absent from this list at the moment, but now that Nikon is on board, expect that to change very soon.

The biggest selling point for this new breed of camera is compact size combined with near DSLR image quality. The hype around the industry is that this category will soon replace the DSLR for many amateur photo enthusiasts, but they also hold plenty of attraction for professionals. Many are already starting to integrate them into their workflow.

In looks, some earlier models were just plain weird with a large DSLR type lens stuck on the front of a tiny, compact digital body? But newer models have been redesigned to look less like a bizarre laboratory experiment and more like a desirable fashion accessory. They retain many of the compact digital camera features, not the least being their smaller size and weight compared to a DSLR, but they also sport interchangeable lens adapters with the promise of near DSLR quality.

However, having no mirror, they rely solely on the LCD screen or use a separate electronic viewfinder for viewing the subject. Some offer an optical viewfinder option but it is not through-the-lens (TTL) so, like rangefinder cameras, will suffer from parallax error.

The electronic viewfinder is definitely this type of camera’s Achilles heel. The optical viewfinder on most DSLRs is still the best way to go for framing and seeing your subject clearly. No electronic equivalent so far has come close to being an adequate replacement.

When Leica’s product development manager Stefan Daniel is quoted as saying “Over time, as technology is improving, optical finders will get less and less important” you’ll have to excuse me for having a bit of a chuckle. Nothing on the horizon suggests we will have a really suitable electronic viewfinder anytime soon, yet manufacturers still insist on pushing their use! Perhaps they should spend less time selling and more time listening as it’s still the biggest single issue among digital users in my workshops and courses.

Adapters to fit different lenses onto a DSLR have been available for years but they were never practical to use. The mirror always made it hard to bring a lens close enough to the sensor for proper focus. Mirrorless cameras, however, are much thinner so an adapter only has to move a lens away from the body for it to focus, something easy to do. Some or all of the auto features will be lost but being able to revive your classic manual lenses should more than make up for that. After size, being able to switch lenses and use old lenses you might already have in your collection would surely be a deal breaker!

Nikon 1 - mirrorless camera system

Will it radically change everything! Probably not, but most professionals and serious amateurs, mainly for reasons of size and flexibility, will want one and this should drive the technology to improve and become an important category overall.

Check out information on Nikon’s range of mirrorless cameras here.
Go to other camera manufacturer’s websites for information on other brands.
Get the latest gossip including the Fuji full-frame mirrorless rumours here.

What do you think? Do you already have one of these cameras or are you in the market to buy one? Let us know your thoughts and/or experiences.