Innholdsfortegnelse for May - June 2016 i Camera

IF THERE’S EVER a compelling reason for going down the ‘mirrorless route’, it has to be the pair of supertelephotos recently released for Micro Four Thirds cameras from Olympus and Panasonic. As you can read in our double test of the Olympus 300mm PRO and the Panasonic 100-400mm zoom, both dramatically illustrate just why mirrorless has to be the future for interchangeable lens cameras. The 100-400mm in particular – with its Leica tick-of-approval for optical performance – is particularly noteworthy because it’s effectively a 200-800mm shoehorned into a package that’s smaller than any full-35mm format 70-200mm zoom and weighs around a kilo. Any with a similar range for a D-SLR – even one with an APS-C’ sized sensor – would be significantly larger, heavier and, of course, expensive. When you…

LEICA CONTINUES TO expand its range of made-in-Germany X Series fixed-lens compact cameras, the latest addition being the ruggedised X-U (Typ 113) which is styled by Audi Design. The X-U’s aluminium alloy bodyshell is sealed against the intrusion of dust or moisture and allows for underwater shooting down to 15 metres. Shock-proofing measures ensure the camera will survive a drop of up to 1.22 metres. High-grip, flexible TPE armouring provides additional protection, the control dials (for shutter speeds and exposure compensation) are made from anodised aluminium and the 7.62 cm monitor screen has a hardened protective cover. A fail-safe double-locking arrangement ensures the battery compartment or memory card slot cover can’t be opened accidentally. The Leica X-U has a Summilux 23mm f1.7 fixed prime lens (equivalent to 35mm) with ten-element…

Annual photographic festivals face the challenge of keeping it fresh and programming events and exhibitions that will appeal to loyal followers and also attract newcomers. In meeting this challenge, Moshe Rosenzveig – the director of Sydney’s Head On Photo Festival – throws his net wide and considers work that is shown around the globe. Last year Rosenzveig travelled to France to Les Rencontres dArles, which was established in 1970 and programs largely new work from established and emerging photographers. He also visited Photoville in New York, and tapped into networks formed through the Asia Pacific Photo Forum as well as drawing on his own extensive contacts. Also as Head On’s international reputation has grown, more photographers are submitting work for consideration, providing the Head On team with a large selection…

“THE 300MM PRO’S REAL PARTY TRICK IS WHEN IT’S TEAMED UP WITH THE FIVE-AXIS IS IN THE TOP-END OM-D BODIES TO GIVE A MASSIVE SIX STOPS OF CORRECTION FOR CAMERA SHAKE.” About the same size and weight as a 70-200mm f2.8 in the full-35mm format, Olympus’s 300mm f4.0 – equivalent, of course, to a 600mm – is a recent addition the PRO Series of M.Zuiko Digital lenses. The PRO label means both high-performance optics and a premium construction which employs metal barrel tubes and weather sealing. It’s a handsome looking lens with an integrated, telescopic lens hood and a detachable tripod-mounting collar. It’s considerably smaller than a 300mm prime in the full-35mm format, even an f4.0 speed model, so it’s not until you look through the viewfinder that you begin…

As with most inkjet printers, it’s up to the individual to run a series of tests using ‘standard images’ to gauge the difference in quality at different printing resolutions. Certainly the difference between the ‘Standard’ and ‘Highest’ settings is evident enough. The amount of ink consumed with the PRO-1000 goes up smartly from ‘Standard’ to ‘High’ and ‘Highest’, as do printing times, but in the end, it still comes down to personal preferences. My view is to always select the best settings for critical work and, with a printer like the PRO-1000, this is likely to be most of the time. In compiling a list of print times and ink usages, the figures for the outgoing imagePROGRAF iPF5100 are also included as a means of comparison. Print times and ink…

THIS CHECKLIST is designed to allow direct comparisons between different camera models, here listed in price order within each brand. The published prices are mostly supplied by the distributors as recommended retail prices (RRPs). However, some distributors are no longer supplying RRPs to the media so it has become necessary to determine an ‘estimated street price’ derived from the range of prices for a model published by retailers. Where this has been necessary, the letter ‘E’ appears at the start of the entry. A dot appearing in a column indicates that the feature is available on the camera model listed. Where a specification or product detail hasn’t yet been published or confirmed, the letters TBA (to be announced) or TBC (to be confirmed) are used. If a feature is irrelevant…

IF YOU’RE A DEDICATED user of Nikon’s D300S top-end APS-C’ D-SLR, you’ll know there hasn’t really been a direct replacement for this long-running model (launched back in 2009) despite the best efforts of the D7200. The D500 finally fills the gap, offering a ‘DX’ format (i.e. APS-C’ sensor format) model with a number of upgraded systems launched in the pro-level D5, including the latest-generation ‘Expeed 5’ processor, 153-point autofocusing, 180,000 pixels RGB metering and 4K video recording. Nikon is emphasising the camera’s combination of capabilities and comparative compactness. To achieve the latter, Nikon is using a monocoque design – similar to that of the D5500 – which integrates the body covers and chassis in one component. This construction employs a combination of magnesium alloy and reinforced carbonfibre composite materials. Extensive…

THE MICRO FOURTHIRDS mirrorless system continues to be the best served as far as lens choices is concerned, and things continue to get better with the arrival of compact telephotos from both Olympus and Panasonic. The benefit of the MFT sensor size is leveraged by both the M.Zuiko Digital 300mm f4.0 IS PRO prime lens and Panasonic’s Leica-badged DG Vario-Elmar 100-400mm 4.0-6.3 ASPH zoom. Both are exceptionally compact given their respective equivalent focal lengths are 600mm and 200-800mm. The Panasonic zoom is the longest focal length lens in the current MFT system and will obviously fit Olympus OM-D and Digital Pen camera bodies. Both lenses have detachable tripod-mounting brackets so, despite the supertelephoto focal lengths, are considered viable to use hand-held. This is assisted by advanced image stabilisation systems which…

Four years ago in this issue we road-tested Fujifilm’s X-Pro1, which was a significant new camera on a number of fronts. For starters, it was Fujifilm’s first X Mount camera, following the hugely successful fixed-lens X100 (but, we learned later, was apparently developed first). It marked Fujifilm’s return to interchangeable lens cameras of its own making, following a string of Nikon-based D-SLRs. Perhaps more significantly though, it was the first professional-level mirrorless camera and, as such, an indicator that this category was here to stay. Consequently, the X-Pro1 represented the first credible mirrorless alternative to a D-SLR… in a rangefinder-style camera body too. It continued the retro-themed styling of the X100, in the process re-establishing tried-and-true dials as the main means of controlling a camera. Retro subsequently became the new…

The Picture The hottest temperature ever recorded in Australia may have happened in the South Australian outback community of Ooodanatta, but it’s the iconic Pink Roadhouse that is generally associated with the locality. Adam and Lynni Plate not only created the colourful service centre, but were also responsible for promoting the Oodnadatta Track as a tourist destination over many decades. Following the tragic death of Adam, the roadhouse was sold to new owners who have continued the colourful theme, even putting some new paint on one of the fences. Few would consider a fence to be of much interest, but as an isolated bright and bold subject it can take on a surreal character. The Photographer Writer and photographer Trevern Dawes has the rare distinction of being a contributor to…

PUT SIMPLY, THE DG VARIO-ELMAR 100-400MM F4.0-6.3 ZOOM IS TRULY A REMARKABLE LENS. ITS SIZE NEEDS TO BE SEEN TO BE BELIEVED. Those clever people at Panasonic Australia took us to the Taronga Western Plains Zoo at Dubbo in central NSW to try out their new 100-400mm zoom. It’s not quite Africa, but it’s the next best thing given the animals aren’t in the usual enclosures, but can roam around and are contained by more discreet means. In the expansive African Savannah display; giraffe, eland, addax and ostrich wander around pretty much as they would in their native environments. The fences are a very long way away indeed. The first thing to get your head around with the DG Vario-Elmar 100-400mm zoom is that it’s actually equivalent to a 200-800mm…

The Blue Tier Forest Reserve on Tasmania’s east coast offers photographers an abundance of attractions including rainforest walks, waterfalls and animal life, mixed with a rich social history of mining and farming activities. The Blue Tier Forest Reserve is roughly a two-and-a-half hours drive from Launceston and around four hours from Hobart. The original inhabitants of the Blue Tier region are known as the Trouwunna people. Europeans discovered tin in Blue Tier region in 1876 and, since this time, the area has had a long-standing history of mining, grazing, forestry, and more recently tourism. Mining was sporadic with the last activities occurring in the late 1990s. In 1958, ‘the Tier’ – as it’s known locally – was listed as a State Forest Reserve, covering some 5000 hectares. “The St Columba…

THIS CHECKLIST is designed to allow direct comparisons between different camera models, here listed in price order within each brand. The published prices are mostly supplied by the distributors as recommended retail prices (RRPs). However, some distributors are no longer supplying RRPs to the media so it has become necessary to determine an ‘estimated street price’ derived from the range of prices for a model published by retailers. Where this has been necessary, the letter ‘E’ appears at the start of the entry. A dot appearing in a column indicates that the feature is available on the camera model listed. Where a specification or product detail hasn’t yet been published or confirmed, the letters TBA (to be announced) or TBC (to be confirmed) are used. If a feature is irrelevant…

THE AUSTRALIAN CATEGORY OF Sony’s World Photography Awards has been won by photographer Scott Portelli from western Sydney. Sony says its annual Awards are now the world’s biggest photography competition and compromises 60 national awards Scott Portelli’s winning image – titled Cuttlefish Aggregation – was chosen as the single best photograph taken by an Australian photographer entered into any of the awards’ ten Open categories. Portelli is a wildlife and underwater photographer, and his prize is a Sony A7 full-35mm mirrorless camera and an FE 28-70mm f3.5-5.6 lens. His winning image will be part of the 2016 Sony World Photography Awards Exhibition at Somerset House in London from 22 April to 8 May and will be included in the annual Sony World Photography Awards book. The exhibition will also feature…

AFTER A NUMBER OF sneak peeks, Ricoh has finally taken the wraps off its long-promised Pentax D-SLR with a full-35mm size sensor. Designated the K-1, this model becomes the fourth sensor format under the Pentax brand which extends from the pocket-sized Q mirrorless cameras to the medium format 645Z. There are already 12 compatible K- mount digital lenses available (two announced with the camera) plus numerous older types from the film-era which will fit the new body. The K-1 has a CMOS sensor with an imaging area of 24.0x35.9 mm and a total pixel count of 36.77 million (36.4 MP effective). The camera automatically switches to ‘APS-C’ crop mode when one of Pentax’s smaller format lenses is fitted, giving a resolution of 15.3 megapixels. As on the Pentax K-3 II…

THE NEARLY THREE-YEARS-OLD EOS 70D is on the way out, replaced by the new EOS 80D which incorporates quite a number of revisions and updates, starting with a 25.8 megapixels (total) APS-C’ size CMOS sensor which is coupled with Canon’s latest DiG!C 6 image processor. The sensitivity range is equivalent to ISO 100 to 16,000 with an extension to ISO 25,600. The maximum continuous shooting speed remains at 7.0 fps, but with a significantly increased burst length of 110 maximum quality JPEGs or 25 RAW files. As before, the EOS 80D has a single memory card slot for the SD/HC/XC format. With the increase in sensor resolution comes an improved version of Canon’s ‘Dual Pixel CMOS AF’ sensor-based autofocusing for live view and video shooting, and the number of AF…

With the combined efforts of chief protagonists Olympus and Panasonic – now supported by a number of independent brands, including Sigma and Tamron – the owners of Micro Four Thirds format cameras have access to the most extensive choice of lenses in the mirrorless world. When the format – with its smaller than APS-C’ sensor size and subsequently greater focal length magnification factor – was first announced, there was considerable angst about what it would all mean as far as wide-angle lenses were concerned. Advances in lens technology and manufacturing techniques have subsequently taken care of all that so you can even have a fish-eye for your MFT camera. The focal length increase of 1.97x has always meant some ‘free’ extra telephoto capabilities and now lens designers are starting to…

Canon’s new “red line special” imagePROGRAF PRO-1000 is an A2 format photo printer which brings a pro-grade build and capabilities to the enthusiast sector. The imagePROGRAF name has been used on Canon’s professional large-format inkjet printers for a while and the PRO-1000 will, of course, also appeal to pro users, especially as it’s designed to fit on the desktop rather than being a space-hungry standalone unit. The imagePROGRAF PRO-1000 replaces Canon’s imagePROGRAF iPF5100 which was pretty much exclusively a pro-level model if only because it was originally priced at over $3200. However, it was a highly-sophisticated and very much state-of-the-art A2 printer for its time. Now, almost a decade later, the long-awaited – if overdue – successor has arrived priced at just under $2000, but no less sophisticated or state-of-the-art.…

ROUND 6 WINNER Bevan Van der Leest WESTERN AUSTRALIA THE WINNER of the sixth and final round of the first Australian Teenage Photographer Of The Year competition is 17-year-old Bevan Van der Leest. When he submitted his portfolio, Bevan wrote, “I love to take photos, it’s my passion and has been for two years. I am in love with landscape photography and the different perspectives it gives on life. I have also been lucky enough to do some travelling internationally and nationally, taking my camera and photographing literally everything. It helps me learn and build as a photographer”. PROUDLY SUPPORTED BY www.avhub.com.au/teenphotographer www.facebook.com/cameramagazine…

Once in a while when reviewing cameras, something takes you completely by surprise. We thought we knew what to expect with Canon’s PowerShot G5X – after all, we’ve experienced both its predecessors and its siblings, including quite recently the G3X – but it decided to depart from the script in quite a number of ways. And these off-script ‘excursions’ make for a quite different experience. But perhaps we shouldn’t be so surprised because, among other things, the G5X is the first of the power-house PowerShots to have a built-in electronic viewfinder… the absence of which really lets down the otherwise brilliant G3X. An EVF really is an essential ingredient of an enthusiast-level camera and it transforms the G5X… both in the way it looks and the way it works.The EVF’s…