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Nikon added a new lens today to their CX 1-System, it is the new 32mm f1.2 native focal length portrait lens with a starting price of $900. This is roughly a 85mm equivalent lens, thus the "portrait lens" designation.
A Nikon product manager is quoted at ePhotozine calling this lens "...this new flagship lens...".
The lens is estimated in the press release to come out in June 2013 and it is available for pre-order at Adorama in your choice of black 32/1.2 or silver 32/1.2.
This limited time offer expired... For future specials, check the Camera Deals blog with the easy to remember url noisydeals.com... Expired item after the jump...
If you want a AA-powered superzoom digital camera without breaking the bank (Dads-n-Grads coming!), you can get the Canon Powershot SX150 IS for $80 at the Target.com website. This is an online only special. Shipping is extra unless you have the Target RED card (in-house store card) which gets you free shipping and also a 5% off discount on all your Tarjay purchases.
If you are not familiar with the camera, you can research it using the list of completed Canon SX150 IS reviews.
Speaking of deals, here's a custom photo book free shipping promotion for a change, Picaboo on Groupon is offering 20-page photo books for $5 (6x8 inch) or $10 (8.5x11) or $15 (11x14). Limit one plus one more as gift. Free shipping! Groupon ends 5/18/13 at 1am ET. Make sure you read the terms and conditions and restrictions before buying!
For more specials, stay tuned to the Camera Deals blog with the easy to remember url NoisyDeals.com
On the front page of Amazon.com, they prominently feature the new Amazon Digital Coins (as if we needed yet another fake online currency!). If you have a Kindle Fire or Fire HD tablet, the Amazon account that you registered this device on has now automatically received 500 coins, which are the equivalent of $5. You can use these to get any apps from the Amazon Android-y Market. The selection may not be as large as iTunes or Google Play but they still have plenty of camera + photography apps.
Once you get/buy the apps, you can use them on any Android device that can run the Amazon Android store. You don't have to use them on the Kindle Fire!
Strategery
One strategy on how to spend it is to try and get as many new premium photography apps as possible. For example, get five 99c apps and pay nothing out of your pocket!
Another strategy is to spend it all on a higher priced app. A great example for this strategy is the PicShop Photo Editor going for $4.99 with 939 customer reviews with a 4.2 out of 5 score. Or Pics Play Pro for $3.99.
Another strategy is to use it to buy a more expensive app for less. For example, the Adobe Photoshop Touch app goes for $10. With the $5 bonus in your account, you will only be paying $5 out of pocket.
If you have any other apps to recommend from those available, please feel free to post them in the comments.
Mobile Noise is an occasional round-up that offers a sampling of some of the action in the world of mobile and smartphone photography! This is not intended to be comprehensive play-by-play coverage like the Cameraholic Digests...
Newsy - Gear
+ leakage at bluetooth bureaucracy reveals a smaller more compact Samsung Android superzoom camera, perhaps named SM-C101 via Engadget
+ new 18 megapixel smartphone from i-mobile via Engadget
+ new Google Glass Winky app offers "wink shutter" (wink and take a picture) via The Verge
+ Sony's Xperia Z flagship uber-smart-camera-phone now available for purchase for $630 from Sony Style (USA) (via Engadget)
+ new driver in Microsoft's Surface Pro enables Pen pressure sensitivity in Lightroom via Engadget
+ connected cameras are the future says new Info Trends study via Imaging Resource
Today was a Blog Updates, Improvements and Bug Fixes day! Throughout the day we updated, fixed, and improved as many things as we could on the Noisy blogs. Any changes that impact YOU are included in the list of updates below. There's still plenty of work left, but today's round is over, the technical term for it is "we ran out of steam" :)
To get it out of the way, so we don't repeat it in every paragraph below, here is a blanket apology: all apologies for falling behind and also all apologies for the various past, present and future typos/errors/confusions!
The most notable update are the Camera Boxes in the right sidebar of this (the main blog). They were at least one year behind in terms of adding newly announced cameras! We added quite a few of the most recent hot cameras du jour, and a few more will be added later on.
We also created permalinks to those boxes - look for the Camera Boxes on the right side of the screen - in the Sidebar of the blog, not the Main column. Here are shortcut permalinks to get you there: the Canon box and the Nikon box and the Sony box and the Fuji box and the Olympus box and the Panasonic box and the Leica box and the Pentax box and the Ricoh box.
"Annie" is short for Announcement. This was a necessary shortening of the word in order to have the tables over there be fairly symmetrical and conserve space.
Here is an example of what to look for in the sidebar (screenshot crop)
A list of other updates/fixes is after the jump...
More Zeiss Touits action! DSLR Magazine just published their testing report including their lab test charts and graphs for the Fuji X mount! You can also read it computer translated. Also included are two side-by-side scenes taken with the Zeiss and competing Fuji lenses of similar focal range! [NEW!]
The dunkelkammer creative advertising agency is promoting sample pictures created with the Fuji X mount version of the new Zeiss "mirrorless lenses" (both the 12mm and 32mm Touits) by Belgian retailer PCH and have posted full size real world JPEG samples squaring off the new Zeiss X lenses with Fuji's own 14/2.8 and 35/1.4 X system lenses. PCH also published a 3 minute Unboxing Video (YouTube), YouTube embedded below... (via Foto Actualidad)
Zeiss posted a 4-minute video talking about developing the new lenses, a companion to their text + pictures articles (via SAN, WOC)
digLloyd has the actual Zeiss Touits lenses in his hands and he is posting updates on his website, but keep in mind most of the content is for paying subscribers.
The new lenses are available for pre-order at Adorama and B&H Photo.
Since we finalized last night's Olympus E-P5 announcement round-up, seven more hands-on reports and official Olympus JPEG samples (via PB) were posted. We added them to the aforelinked post, but since most people have better things to do than version-control our blog-posts, we are including the new hands-on reports right below as well...
The Olympus E-P5 pre-orders are $1000 for body only and $1450 with the 17/1.8 and VF-4 at Adorama et al. Needless to say, there are plenty of competing options at $1000, so this price is probably targeting early adopters and fans of this particular design. For example, if one was lucky during today's Panasonic M43rds lightning deals, they could have ended up with three Panasonic M43rds cameras and three lenses for around $1000!
Fridays are typically quiet days, but not today! In addition to the new Olympus E-P5 and Japan-only-for-now E-PL6 M43rds cameras, we had a new super-camera-phone announcement, this one coming from Nokia with a Zeiss lens, optical image stabilization and the Pureview name, the new Nokia Lumia 928, a Windows 8 Phone.
"With a camera like this on the Nokia Lumia 928, you can leave your digital SLR at home this summer as you head out and about."
So if you miss any shots, please feel free to bill Nokia for the opportunity costs :)
The camera specifications are (per the press release):
+ PureView 8.7MP Auto Focus
+ Carl Zeiss Tessar f2.0 lens, 26mm, True 16:9 optics
+ 1.4 sensor (that's what their press material says)
+ Optical Image stabilization
+ Xenon Flash for Still Images, LED for Video
+ HD 1080p Video Capture @ 30 fps
+ 4.5 inch WXGA HD OLED; 1280 x 768; 334 ppi; ClearBlack display
For US shoppers, this will become available on Verizon Wireless on May 16 with a two year new contract for $100 after a $50 mail-in rebate. Because nothing makes people rush to get a new uberphone than the promise of having to fill up a mail-in rebate in the year 2013 ;-)
Nokia 928 vs iPhone 5 vs Samsung S3
Nokia prepared a comparison video squaring off the iPhone 5 and the Samsung Galaxy S3 against the Lumia 928. Spoiler alert: Lumia wins! The video is intended to showcase its low light capabilities and optical image stabilization over the competition.
In addition to the new Olympus E-P5, Olympus also announced another new Micro Four Thirds mirrorless camera, the E-PL6. This appears to be a model for the Japanese market, at least for now.
This is not the first time Olympus did this. The Olympus E-PL1s ("s" part of the camera name, not plural; that's why it is a good idea not to put a final "s" in camera names) came out in November 2010.
The Japanese announcement is available at DC Watch Impress - computer translated. It will be priced at 70 kiloyen body only, and 80 kiloyen with the 14-42mm II kit lens, and 100 kiloyen for the two lens kit (14-42, 40-150).
Based on the computer translation, this follows up on the existing worldwide E-PL5, and has E-M5 fundamentals and a twist-and-shout LCD on the back, Wifi, compatibility with the new VF4 EVF and things of that nature.
There is good reason why Olympus does this - compact adorable cameras, including ones of the interchangeable lens variety are very popular in Japan. The Pentax Q system is a great example of perhaps being essentially a system for the Japanese market and other affluent high tech markets in Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore, etc).
New total for 2013: 120 new digital cameras
The two new Olympus M43rds mirrorless cameras bring the total of new digital cameras in 2013 to around 120. Sixteen of these are interchangeable lens cameras. Of those 16, 12 are mirrorless, and 4 are DSLRs!
Pixiq.com was an ambitious attempt by Sterling Publishing (Barnes & Noble) to build a popular photography mega-blog owned by traditional corporate media. Apparently the owners decided to abruptly end the experiment and pull the plug. When you visit the Pixiq website, you get a spartan message "Sorry, this website is no longer active. For information about Pixiq books, please visit www.sterlingpublishing.com". All the content on the website, thousands of articles per Google search is now gone and the authors and readers have been abandoned without a chance to save their content and favorite posts or comments! Permanence in the digital era! Via Photocritic who was one of the cornerstone contributors at Pixiq.
The Friday round of lightning deals expired. For future specials, check the Camera Deals blog with the easy to remember shortcut url noisydeals.com... The expired Panasonic M43rds deals for Friday 5/10/13 are after the jump for historical purposes only. These deals are dead as a doornail...
The Olympus E-Pens have a new leader today! Olympus has officially announced the new E-P5 E-Pen micro four thirds mirrorless camera!
Olympus E-P5 Hands On Video Reports
A total of 12 videos with a total runtime of 50 minutes are included in the YouTube-embedded Playlist below. Press play once, sit back and watch them all or use the playback buttons at the bottom of the widget to navigate! Or watch it directly on YouTube.
Olympus E-P5 key features
+ based on Olympus press release
+ all metal casing
+ same 16mp sensor, auto focus system as the E-M5
+ mechanical shutter up to 1/8000
+ built-in flash 1/320
+ 9fps burst
+ 5 axis image stabilization improved over the E-M5
+ built-in Wifi [NEW!]
+ 1 million dot touch screen display on the back
Olympus E-P5 Pricing
The E-P5 body only will go for $1000 and it is available for pre-order at Adorama in silver or black or white. Olympus is also creating an enthusiast bundle with the 17mm f1.8 lens and the new VF-4 EVF bundled together for $1450, in your choice of silver or black.
This will put the E-P5 body only price at the same price level as the Fuji X-E1.
Last but not least, the new Olympus VF-4 Viewfinder has a starting price of $280 and it is available for pre-order at Adorama.
Olympus also announced the following three M43rds primes in black lens body color: 75mm f1.8 ($900) and 45mm f1.8 ($400) and 17mm f1.8 ($500).
