New Camera Coming From Big Camera Company!

Is there any more thrilling sound than the trumpets announcing a new camera? We all wake up and look about us, even if we are devotees of a different system.

In this case it is the latest evocation of a full-frame Canon DSLR - it'll be the next in order in the 5D line - the Canon EOS 5D Mk IV.

You may be forgiven for thinking that with the EOS 5D, 5D Mk II, 5D Mk III, 5DS and 5DS R, and now the EOS 5D MkIV that Canon have had more marks than the Spitfire...or Barry Cable...but consider what it means to the working photographer or enthusiast:

1. Any possible teething troubles in the basic body were worked out years ago.

2. Each new evocation has introduced new electronics and new capabilities.

3. The ergonomics were good to start with - they have gotten better. Canon cameras fit everyone's hand.

4. Everything else fits, too. L lenses, transmitters, flashes, accessories---and its you have a fitted case or bag that carried your Canon EOS 5d-series cameras before it'll carry the new one!

5. Everything has gotten better:

30.4 Megapixel CMOS sensor.
100-32,000 ISO boostable to 102.400 ISO.
4k video and flicker free viewing.
Digit 6+ processor.
7FPS and silent single and continuous shooting.
Full iOS and Android WiFi built in.
GPS built in.
Scene Intelligent Auto Mode available as well as standard PASM.
CF and SD-sized slots.
61focus points - dual pixel add system - 1,620,000-dot LCD screen that is touch sensitive.

I can thoroughly endorse the practice of adding another camera to your bag, and choosing one that is the latest of a long line of careful development. I have done so myself, and benefited. You see this in cars, watches, rifles, and many other household appliances - the manufacturer builds upon careful analysis of what has worked rather than blundering wildly out into oddball designs or untried theories - and the wise user can succeed with the gear immediately.

Consider as well the mind of the Canon shooter. If you have used a small-frame Canon camera in the past you are well on your way to knowing the operating pattern of the full-frame one. If you have used any of the EOS 5D series before you are there already - just pick it up, clap on an L series lens, and run!

Oh, pay for it before you do...the staff in the shop are built like antelopes and will catch you before you get half-way down the block...

We'll have a new camera unveiling night for the EOS 5D Mk IV at a bar in Perth at the start of September. That's a very cheery idea. It will be held at the Flour Factory, 16 Queen Street Perth, on Thursday, 1st of September. Starts at 6:00 for a 6:30 start, if that makes sense.

Hugh Brown will be speaking and that makes it a fun night just to begin with, but add a new Canon EOS camera and food and drink into the bargain and the whole thing really sparkles. I shall be there myself. All readers of this column who want to be included in the fun should register at www.cameraelectronic.com.au/events to let us know for catering.

Finally, did you know that there was a famous member of the church who wrote a textbook on artillery and also used Canon 5D cameras? It was commemorated on the maps of Spanish river systems. Go to Google Earth and look for:

Canon Canon cannon canon Cañón.

You're welcome...

Pre-Order the new Canon EOS 5D Mark IV here

Pre-Order the Canon EF 16-35mm f2.8L III USM (arriving mid-October)

Pre-Order the Canon EF 24-105mm f4 IS II USM (arriving mid-October)

Pentax K-1 In The Deep Dark Woods...

Night time. Deep in the dark woods. Dank, dripping foliage. No moon. No stars. No lights from a lonely farmhouse. No car lights. No camping torch. A black stygian abyss, devoid of comfort. And what is the Pentax K-1 photographer doing?

Changing lenses. Easily.

Thank you Mr. Ricoh or Mr. Pentax for finally doing what needed to be done a long time ago - putting working lights on a camera. This is a blessing for all the people who have been out in the wet bush darkness or down the back of a theatre trying to change lenses or find the controls on a camera by the light reflected off a black cat.

The Pentax K-1 assist lights let you find the cable release socket, the lens release button - and the dot on the mount to align things to, and the memory card slot. You can feel the switch to turn the camera on and then the menu can light up and you are away.

It sounds corny and simplistic and crude, but it really is important in dark situations to be able to do the basic things that make a DSLR system work. And you can't change lenses while holding a torch with one hand, and two lenses and the body with the other - not and keep the inside of the blessed thing clean.

As Bob Lichfield pointed out at his talk on Thursday, the Pentax K-1 also has a feature called Astral Tracker. In combination with the GPS system built into the camera it allows the machine to recognise stars and where it is when it sees them and then use that information to allow the pixel shift mechanism to cope with the movement of this stats when the camera is set firmly on a tripod. It sounded both complex and simple as he described waving the camera around out in the dark but the result certainly showed resolution and artistry.

The other blessing for the nocturnal is the increased sensitivity of the sensor/ processing engine combination for this new camera. The computer engine is the new Prime IV and it will coax a sensitivity of 204,800 ISO out of the camera. For all practical purposes this means you can take a picture anywhere in the man-made dark and most places in Natural dark. It would make the glow-worm caves in new Zealand into a disco palace.

Focusing at this low light levels has also been taken care of as the camera will go to -3 EV with effective auto focus.

Final note: When you get to the other end of the illumination scale and you're out in the icky sunshine and you can't see the screen for light, there is a quick solution, Pentax have put a dedicated switch on the outside of the body to let you adjust the LCD screen brightness. Good thinking - if it was just a menu item you couldn't see the menu to adjust the screen because of the light.

A Fleet With Two Flagships

For some time the photographers who use Nikon cameras have been wondering when the smaller of the DSLR fomats - the DX, APS-C, or 18mm x 24mm sensor, call it what you will - would have a new flagship camera body added to the lineup. They fondly remember the line of development of the D100, D200, D300 and D300s and have been patiently waiting for the next in the series. The wait is over.

Last night an expert photographer and our state representative for Nikon Australia presented a show at Camera Electronic focused around the new Nikon D500 camera. Michael Phillips was able to tell us a great deal of the technical detail of the device while Kingsley Klau let us see what it is capable of on a photo-shooting road trip down south.

The camera is definitely the child of the Nikon D300-D800-D810 styling stable. The shape is unmistakeable if occasionally a detail or line changes slightly. But remember this is a DX camera. Long-time enthusiasts will note that the pop-up flash that has been seen in other models has been left off this camera in favour of more weather sealing. Note also that while the camera bears the note of DX, it can take all of the long FX lenses as well - and therein will lie one of its special charms or selling points.

The really big news is invisible - the performance of the sensor and processor and focusing mechanism is so similar to the bigger flagship - the D5 - that you might think that you are using it with a smaller capture area. The ISO performance is up to the 51200 point and it captures 20.9 megapixels. It also captures 4K video and 10 frames per second. A sports camera indeed.
Kingsley put it through its paces utilising a fast car on a deserted road and showed the extraordinary speed and accuracy of focus on the vehicle. He was even able to emulate this with another 4WD at the first glimmer of dawn through mud puddles.

The people who will be looking at this camera seriously - there were over 35 of them on the night - will be interested in that high-speed capture and the precise line of focus that the camera can take with telephoto lenses. It would be an ideal wildlife or birder's camera. I can also imagine the dedicated night-time shooters of stars and beaches applauding the fact that Nikon have incorporated illuminated control buttons in this body. Folks, when you need to see and can't see it spoils some of the best opportunities in outdoor photography. The theatre shooter will also applaud, during the louder passages of the overture.

Have you noticed that you get a tilting LCD screen at last on a century-series Nikon DSLR? Hooray, it makes quite a difference for studio and field shooting and is even better in being a touch control screen as well.

Finally, I can sort of explain what Michael told us regarding social media sharing with the new feature side the camera - SnapBridge - but only sort of. If you think of it as a wireless sharing feature that will shuffle your pictures over very rapidly to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and whatever other social connection you use, you will not be far wrong. But the delightful thing is that you only have to set up the commands to do this once and the camera will remember that connection and re-establish it ever after.

Other wireless sharing connections require you to start them up, pair them up, press a dozen buttons and enter numerous passwords every blessed time. You eventually get sick of it or forget the special sequences needed. SnapBridge does it for you easily and means that the extremely high quality pictures that issue from this camera will start to measurably improve your images and image in the social scene. Think of it as WiFi for grownups.

Note as well that at sometime in the future the sequence of firmware updates that we all should attempt will be come far easier as the Nikon SnapBridge system allows the Nikon company to automatically update the appropriate equipment as improvements come along.

In short, Nikon is now sailing the DX seas with a very high quality new flagship.

Motorcycle Mike On His Souped Up Bike

Well, not really - but that was the title of a track by Dave "Diddle" Day in 1957 and the chance to use it may never come again...

Wednesday night at Camera Electronic and we saw what happens when a hot rod guy gets a hot rod camera - in this case Stefan Gosatti and the new Nikon D5. It was a perfect combination.
Stefan was given a chance to try out this brand-new top-of-the-line sports and action camera by Nikon - their high-speed flagship - on the road and on the football field. It was a quick trial but he was just the man who could give an accurate report.

Stefan has used Nikon professional cameras for years with fashion, sports, automotive and product illustration. The bran-new Nikon D5 is the latest evocation of their big full frame DSLR and he got a chance to wring a lot of it out. Not all - by his own admission, there were a lot of new features he did not have time to fully explore...but with the items that pertain to his professional specialties, he was able to go to town.

The prints you see in the small snapshots are from that camera - they are mere reportage representations of what are large, excellent images. Sharp, fast, and with very good colour and dynamic range. And at ISO points that are normally accessed only with oxygen and a nose bleed. While he shot his fast lady on the bike at ISO 6400, the device will go to over 3 million ISO! It's nearly impossible to think of a situation that would not be possible with that sort of camera sensor.

Of course it is never only the sensor - it is the new processor as well.

This also accounts for the rapidity with which the AF system works and the sophisticated nature of the tracking that allows the user to select what he wants to follow and then delivers sharp focus on that in spite of movement and visual interruptions.

It is also the reason that the screen on the new camera can be made to be so convenient for the photographer when it comes time to examine a sequence of shots. The high-speed nature of the shutter and associated buffer and writing circuits mean that a lot of images are going to be stored rapidly - and the photographer needs to be able to access these equally rapidly. Stefan demonstrated a scrolling bar on the LCD screen that runs rapidly through the files, allows you to stop as soon as you see a good one and then zooms, widens and searches throughout the image with the same sort of finger gestures that control smart phones.

The cameras are equipped with twin card slots - and these can be ordered with either two CF card slots or two XQD slots. Readers will be aware that the XQD cards are faster than the CF cards by a fair margin, but are more costly. Of course, a lot of people will have lots of CF cards already, so these can be utilised straight away. Camera Electronic can supply CF-ready D5 cameras right now - either in sales or rental form. XQD can be ordered but may take a little while to arrive. People who get one type and change their mind about it can have the camera converted here in Australia to the other sort for a fee.

Speaking of two different items - apparently the D5 will also produce 2 different forms of JPEG files as well as the NEF file type.

Well, they are not cheap. You can see the price on our on-line store or ring up the staff and discuss it. Think in terms of about $ 8900. If you are in the business of doing the sort of photography that these cameras do, that money is a business investment. If you are dabbling but have that sort of figure available to play with you can be assured that you will have an instrument that cannot be bettered for high-speed action photography. You'll need to put good Nikon lenses out the front and they will also cost money.

PS; No motorcyclists were injured and no laws were broken in the making of the pictures, but apparently half the dress blew off. Makes your afternoon photographing Canal Rocks sorta slow, doesn't it?

For all orders on the Nikon D5 please call in or follow the links on-line.

Canon Is Out To Launch - Part One

Plan of Attack Number One:

Northbridge Hotel, 210 Lake Street North Perth.

Thursday the 25th of February, 2016

6:00 PM

Rendezvous with representatives of Canon Australia, Camera Electronic, and Andrew Ritchie.

See launch of new Canon EOS 1DX Mk II camera. Hear Andrew discuss his work and experience with this new equipment. Watch videos. Take notes and price lists.

Eat and drink. Be merry.

Discuss pre-order price with Camera Electronic staff. Loosen wallet. Open it and blow cobwebs off credit card. Put down deposit on new camera. Chortle inwardly.

Go home and plan out new profitable shooting at weddings, sports, fashion, studio, and events. Make sure lenses are cleaned and ready to go. Get extra invoice forms ready for new clients. Stand in front of mirror and practise sneering at other shooters who do not have the new camera. Chortle openly...

Yes, Folks, it is new model time at Canon Australia and the new Canon EOS 1 DX Mk II debuts next Wednesday at the Northbridge. This is the seriously fast and professional new Canon camera that is at the top end of the action and sports list. This is the one the pro agencies require of you. Now that there is a new one, they will soon specify it. Beat them to the punch - order one now and pay a deposit for the best price.

You know who you are and you know why you need this camera...bless you. Come on down and watch the presentation and get a feeling for the gear.

Note RSVP to CE so that they have the refreshments ready....

When You Don't Know The Right Thing To Do...

You are also in the happy position of not knowing the wrong thing to do. Provided you are not engaged in defusing sea mines you may have some leeway in experimentation. A lot of photography is like this.

Case in point: in the dear days of dinosaurs, Elvis, and Plus X film, 125 ASA was the giddy limit for sensitivity in photo emulsions - at least in the sort of films that they sold in the local drugstore and that I could afford. I was new to the sport and dutifully exposed the Plus X at exactly this meter setting ( and took a careful meter reading for each and every exposure - even when neither the light nor the subject ever changed...). I was rewarded with a set of ever-so-slightly underexposed negatives. Had I known to do it, I should have rated the stuff at 80 ASA and got more silver for my money.

Then again when I underexposed the Kodachrome II slides of the period I was a little disappointed with the dark colour but now that I can scan and subject them to PSE, I am more than happy to have the highlights.

This last weekend saw me running out with a new lens and camera and a new sense of adventure occasioned by retirement. I drank a beer in a country pub at 11:00 AM and spent the afternoon in a car museum. While I shot a number of the exhibits with the Fujifilm EF42 flash providing fill, I also threw caution to the winds and racked the Fujifilm X-T10 up to 3200 ISO and let 'er rip. I can report that the jpegs are imminently satisfactory and the freedom to just point and shoot is awesome.

Of course you all knew this before I did, and in the case of some of the bigger DSLR's you have been turning the ISO dial up to nosebleed numbers for years - but this is the handy dandy mirror-less game for me and I am starting to get excited. I suspect that if more people were to come into the shop and look at the Fujifilm X-series and some of the new lenses that have wide apertures, they would join the brigade.

Note: Heading image is the museum hall - this following one is of a new Morgan three-wheeler. The graphics are execrable but the vehicle is a delight.

The Open Flash Question For Digital Shooters

Digital shooters can be be spoiled by the wonderful developments that the major manufacturers have made with camera sensors and electronic circuitry. As time has gone on the cameras have been given the ability to make pictures under darker and darker conditions with cleaner and cleaner results. In many cases digital shooters have never thought to turn on any additional artificial light. And many have eschewed it as being somehow "impure"...

Those of us who shot film, and old film, had no such qualms. When we needed light indoors we put over-run incandescent bulbs into domestic lamps, set up photoflood lights, or reached for flash guns and flash bulbs. The lucky and adventurous had access to studio strobe outfits that looked like they came out of either a Thunderbirds set or the ark... I say adventurous because they were working with strange cables, industrial plugs, and high voltages. It was never a good idea to stick your fingers in there...anywhere...

The portable reflector guns sometimes had folding fan reflectors or polished round metal bowls. You plugged in AG-1, Press 25, or other bulbs in them, added a 22.5 volt battery and tried to synch it to your shutter. Sometimes the designer of the flashgun and the camera had agreed on the sort of synchronising connector they wanted to share - sometimes not. There was a large range of proprietary designs for plugs and sockets and frequently you were holding a gun that would not attach to the camera. Even Leica was guilty of this sort of thing...

The low-tech let out for this was to take a picture in dark conditions - dark enough so that you could use one second for the shutter speed. Probably a tripod situation, though if it was dead dark you could get away hand-held.

The trick was to fire the shutter on one second and during the time that the shutter escapement was buzzing away you fired the flash by means of an "open" button on the back of the gun or simply shorting out the terminals of the synch cord with the tip of a Biro. The picture was illuminated by the flash and the negative did not know that you were the sort-of-wireless link in the process.

No relevance today? Not so - I frequently need to shoot studio stuff with lights in several paces and sometimes they need to be small lights concealed in structures. I turn out all the lights, open the shutter, and then use a portable speed light to pop wherever needed. Many of the speed light flashes can be shot in Manual mode and throttled down to 1/64th or 1/128th of their full power. These and low ISO settings mean you can have quite a degree of spot control.

Even if the need is more flash power altogether with big studio units, you can use the same  procedure. Dark studio, open shutter, then flash once, twice or four times to get two more stops of power past the top wattage of the units. It pays to turn off modelling lights unless you need more warmth in the scene or if you are frightened of the dark.

But anyone who used some of the old Lumedyne or Norman flashes isn't afraid of dark. Lightning, yes...

Low Light High ISO Hasselblad

Looks like Hasselblad have released a new camera designed to get a higher ISO going for the medium format world. Called the Hasselblad H5D-50C.

It uses a new CMOS sensor with a range of ISO from 100 to 6400. And a whopping 14 stop dynamic range! Which beats every camera I have ever owned all hollow.

The shutter can go from 12 minutes to 1/800 of a second and if you are in a hurry to stack more images in it can zip through at 1.5 FPS. Thats a lot of data writing onto a big sensor so this thing hustles.

It matches H series lenses and all the other viewing accessories. and works with all the normal Hasselblad software.