What's New in Digital Cameras

What's New - September 2008

September 22

Sample images (sort of) from Panasonic G1!
IR Publisher Dave Etchells had a chance to shoot with a prototype of the Panasonic DMC-G1 Micro Four Thirds camera at a pre-Photokina press event in Cologne, Germany yesterday, and has some images to share, albeit at low resolution. Because the cameras we were using had firmware that's still far from final, Panasonic asked us not to share full-resolution images from them yet. VGA-resolution images (all we're permitted to show) don't show anything about resolution or noise levels, but we decided to post them to our Panasonic G1 page for two reasons: 1) They do show something of the Panasonic G1's white balance capability, which seems to be excellent. It handled some tricky mixed lighting very well, and delivered very natural-looking color under a wide variety of light conditions, all while shooting with Auto white balance. Final judgement will obviously have to wait for a production sample of the G1 and (much) more controlled tests, but he was quite impressed by the prototype's ability to deliver very natural-looking color, even when faced with difficult mixed lighting. 2) A lot of the shots were taken at the development facility for the Panasonic-Toyota Formula One racing team. Since photos are almost never allowed inside F1 facilities, these may be of more interest to Formula One fans than the fact that they were shot with a G1. ;-) To see VGA-resolution copies of some of his shots with the G1, check out our Panasonic G1 Preview, particularly the Samples tab.

September 16

Hands-On Preview posted for Casio EXILIM FH20!
Casio has announced a digital camera that captures much of the spirit of its stunningly speedy EXILIM PRO EX-F1, but at a much more affordable pricepoint. For around $600, the FH20 offers a nine megapixel imager, 20x optical zoom lens, and sensor shift image stabilisation. Throw in the Casio FH20's SLR-like body with both a 3.0" LCD display and electronic viewfinder, make the whole package quite a bit smaller than any DSLR with an equivalent lens can manage, and that'd be plenty for most manufacturers. Not for Casio though. The EXILIM FH20 needed another ingredient. Speed, and lots of it. At a slightly reduced eight megapixel resolution, the Casio FH20 can capture images at an impressive 30 frames per second. Drop down to seven megapixels or below, and this increases to 40 frames per second - not quite as fast as the Casio F1, but still enough to blow most any other camera away. Throw in 1280x720 high definition video recording, and the ability to manage frame rates of 210fps or faster at reduced video resolutions, and on paper there's no question that the Casio EXILIM FH20 looks like a lot of camera for the money. So - how does that promise live up in the real world? Read our Casio FH20 preview, and see what IR publisher Dave Etchells thought of this interesting digicam!

Review posted for Panasonic DMC-FX500!
With a solid, metal body, the Panasonic FX500 is a handsome 10-megapixel pocket digital camera with a secret: its 3-inch LCD is also a touchscreen, with which you can actually select what object you want to focus on with a simple touch. But that's not all that's interesting about the Panasonic FX500. Its 25-125mm lens exhibits unusually low barrel or pincushion distortion, and it sports optical image stabilization as well. An Intelligent Auto mode analyses the scene and automatically sets the Panasonic FX500 to the proper Scene mode, and Face Detection is capable of detecting up to 15 faces in a scene. We did find ourselves unimpressed with the touchscreen, however, and found images at all ISO settings to be a little too noisy for our taste. Click here for our review of the Panasonic FX500.

September 9

Full Review posted for Sony Alpha A900!
High resolution has a new standard bearer, as Sony announces their full-frame, 24.6-megapixel digital SLR camera, the Alpha A900. The sensor and its resolution aren't the only things that are big, the Sony A900 itself is quite a handful. Fitted with a fine Carl Zeiss 24-70mm f/2.8 constant aperture lens, the Sony A900 is a truly beautiful handful that makes some impressive images. As the only full-frame digital SLR with SteadyShot, all lenses become stabilized when fitted to the Sony A900. Though you won't see the stabilization when you look through the optical viewfinder, you'll at least get a 100% view of the scene through the big, bright, high-refractive-index pentaprism. You'd think that the Sony A900 would be slow at moving all those extra pixels, but it actually cranks along at an impressive five frames per second, thanks to a specially-designed mirror and shutter mechanism. There's a lot more to talk about, so click here to read our Sony Alpha A900 digital SLR review, complete with full image analysis and nearly 4GB of test shots.

September 5

Review posted for Canon PowerShot SD790 IS!
Canon's ELPHS are all stunningly beautiful digital cameras, but the Canon SD790 IS is among the most handsome with its chiseled edges and 3-inch screen. Inside, the Canon SD790 IS is beautiful too, with a DIGIC III image processor to handle the 10-megapixel images its 3x zoom captures. Roll Canon's Face Detection and Motion Detection technology into the Canon SD790 IS to complete the package, and you have a formidable pocket digital camera. And if you think that looks good, wait until you see the Canon SD790 IS's images. While the Canon SD790 IS has some of the same corner softening and chromatic aberration of other compact digital camera lenses, its overall performance is average to above average in nearly all categories. Click here to read our review of the Canon SD790 IS digital camera for the whole story.