February 17, 2012

FOR # 18

This year’s winner of the coveted World Press Photo of the Year award went to a colour image taken on 31 March, 2003, by French photographer Jean-Marc Bouju. The image depicts a hooded Iraqi war prisoner holding his 4-year-old son at a US detention camp in Iraq and portrays a rare moment of humanity in a war zone.

February 17, 2012

First Cameras from Panasonic/Leica Collaboration

Panasonic is about to release its new Lumix range of digital still cameras, which combine Leica optics with Panasonic’s electronics technology. Aimed at users who require high image quality, the Lumix line-up includes four models: the DMC-F7 and DMC-LC20, which feature a 2.1 megapixel CCD (2.0 megapixels effective) and the DMC-LC40 and top-of-the-line DMC-LC5, which have 4.0 megapixel CCDs (3.9 megapixels effective). The DMC-F7 and DMC-LC20 will be fitted with Leica’s DC Vario-Elmarit lenses and feature a primary color filter. Leica DC Vario-Summicron lenses have been chosen for the DMC-LC40 and DMC-L5, along with a complementary color filter to capitalise on the 4-megapixel CCDs in these models. Panasonic has also developed new Pure Color Engine LSI circuitry, which converts the CCD output signal into an RGB signal at an early stage and extracts the low frequency luminance component to provide excellent colour reproduction. This will be fitted to the DMC-LC40 and DMC-L5 lens systems.. All models come with built-in USB ports and SD Memory Card slots and the 4-megapixel models are also network-capable. Panasonic has also added a new MEGA BURST recording feature, which allows users to capture up to8 frames at 4 or 5 frames/second (depending on the model) with no loss of image quality.