Author: Jeff Fenske Page 52 of 55

The last five northern lights shots in this 91-photo slide-show are AWESOME!

http://www.adn.com/2012/01/24/2280672/reader-submitted-2012-aurora-borealis.html#id=2281129&view=large_view

How much to charge is a challenge to photographers.

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From: dpreview.com…

PetaPixel has published an excellent response from a photographer to a Seattle-area bride criticizing the pricing of wedding photographers. In a remarkably calm response, Nikki Wagner details the expenses connected to her wedding photography business, dismissing the idea that wedding photographers set their prices high simply because they can. After reading Wagner’s response it’s understandable why the bride is having so much trouble finding an ‘exceptional, amazingly talented, fun photographer’ that she also deems ‘decently priced.’ The post also acts as a reminder that there can be good reasons why there’s a gap between what a product or service costs and how much you think it should be priced. (From PetaPixel)

It looks like the wider zoom range of its tiny lens still has serious sharpness problems. This is disappointing, and may be a result of Canon trying to design the impossible.

– jeff

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From: DPReview

Just Posted: Our review of the Canon PowerShot S100. The S100 is the latest in Canon’s range of pocketable photographer’s compacts, building on the success of the popular S90 and S95. This most recent model offers a more ambitious 24-120mm equivalent, f2.0-5.9 zoom in front of a Canon-made 12MP 1/1.7″ type CMOS sensor, marking a much bigger advance than in the last update. Is it another step towards the perfect pocket shooter or has the camera giant over-reached itself? Find out in our review.

[…]

Overall Image Quality/Specifics

Canon’s new purpose-built CMOS sensor in the S100 is capable of capturing images that are detailed, nicely saturated and very clean, especially at the lower end of the camera’s ISO scale. The new CMOS sensor gives slightly better image quality than the previous-generation 10MP CCD – an improvement that is subtle but noticeable, especially at higher ISO settings. While the 2MP increase in sensor resolution over the S95 is modest in terms of the additional detail that the camera can capture, the 20% increase in total pixel count does help to offset the effect of noise at a given display size/magnification.

Although the S100 has a broader (24mm – 120mm) zoom range than its predecessor the S95, we’ve found that the new lens is not as uniformly sharp across the frame. We’ve tried no fewer than five sample cameras for our studio testing, and in the worst cases significant decentering of the lens causes one side of the frame to be noticeably out of focus in our studio scene (shot at a subject distance of approximately 1 meter). In all cases, moderate to strong softening occurs at the edges of the frame. This is very apparent in our studio comparison tool, where it is easy to spot any visual discrepancies at a pixel level. However, this does not tell the whole story, in our real-world sample shots decentering has been much less of an issue and most of our shots are not overtly blurred by the lens (take a look at the ‘lens’ page of this review for more detail).

Entire Article Here

From: DPReview

The Cameras

For the purposes of this roundup, I’m restricting my coverage to those compact cameras which offer full manual control over exposure, are capable of shooting raw files, and have flash/accessory hotshoes. There are six cameras on the market which meet these criteria, and all six are covered, but the fullest treatment is reserved for those cameras which offer optical viewfinders (and arguably the ultimate in enthusiast-friendly ergonomics) in addition to their rear LCD screens:

• Canon PowerShot G12
• Fujifilm X10
• Nikon Coolpix P7100

Entire Article Here

The new Canon S100 is having some sharpness issues.

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First Impressions: Using the Canon PowerShot S100

Sometimes reviews get delayed. It can happen for all manner of reasons, and I’m sorry to report that our review of the Canon PowerShot S100 is taking a lot longer than I had hoped. We’re not sitting on our hands though – we’ve used three S100s, and the delay has been caused by concerns over optical issues displayed by the cameras that we’ve seen. Testing, retesting and analyzing results from multiple cameras takes time, and the worst thing we could do in my opinion is to rush a review out before we have the full picture (for a more complete explanation of the issues that we’ve encountered, turn to page 2 of this article).

This article is not meant to replace a full review, but rather to augment our detailed preview of the S100, published when the camera was first announced. Since we published our preview we’ve been able to do a lot of shooting with the S100 and although we are not yet able to pull this experience into a full review, I would like to share some of it with you as we work towards that goal.

[…]

It is too early to make any definitive statements about the S100’s image quality, partly because we have a lot more testing still to do ahead of a full review, but also because the camera sitting on my desk in front of me is the third sample that I have looked at, and the third with what appears to be a slightly decentered lens. Quality control issues can affect cameras from early production batches (and inevitably, review samples tend to fall into this category) and I hope that we have simply have been unlucky with the samples that we have received so far.

Entire Article Here

Related:

Four Noteable Upcoming Compact Cameras: Canon S100 / Olympus SP-810UZ / Fuji X10 and X-S1