Panasonic announced the G90…no wait G95…no sorry G99!

Panasonic has that weird ritual to name a camera in different ways for some mysterious dark marketing reasons. So, if you live in Asia this new camera is named G99, in Europe G90 and in the USA G95.

Anyhow, the new G Whatever has been announced along the new 14-140mm II lens. More info below:

Preorders:
G95 at Amazon, BHphoto, Adorama
14-140mm II lens at Amazon, BHphoto, Adorama

Reviews:
Preview at DPreview. Image samples at Dpreview. Hands-on at ePhotozine. Review at CameraJabber. First look at CameraLabs. First impression at Photographyblog.

Exciting scientific news: First ever picture of a Black Hole Horizon to be shown on April 10

The image on top shows you the Black Hole as seen in the movie Interstellar. But nobody yet has ever photographed a real Black Hole. While it would be impossible to see the black hole itself due to the fact that light simply cannot escape their gravitational pull and reach observers on Earth, scientists focused their efforts on procuring an image of its event horizon. And the Event Horizon Telescope is humanity first attempt to take a  close up picture of this phenomena.

They will publish this image on April 10. You can watch the livestream here: https://www.youtube.com/c/VideosatNSF/live

Canon interview at DPreview: “the pro-level camera that you’re expecting is on the way”

DPreview interviewed Canon managers and here are some highlights:

– RF mount: “we were expecting it to be more suitable for designing wider-angle lenses, but it turned out to be very effective for designing this telephoto lens (70-200mm f/2.8)”
– About the PRO camera: “the pro-level camera that you’re expecting is on the way”
– Canon will keep developing the M-series

I hope the PRO camera will have a new kind of sensor that can be really close to Sony sensors!

Fujifilm interview at Dpreview: Full-frame can probably reach 70-80MP and with GFX we go 100MP

Dpreview had a chat with Makoto Oishi from Fuji. A couple of takeaways:

Medium format:

  • GFX doubled the market size of the medium format segment. 20% of GFX buyers are professionals.
  • Full-frame can probably reach 70-80MP. GFX lenses were all originally designed for 100MP resolution.

APS-C:

  • We’re positioning APS-C against full-frame, and its faster, and more responsive because of the smaller sensor

Open mount:

  • We don’t feel that we need to open up the mount to third parties.

The next revolution is…

  • From a sensor point of view, everyone is talking about global shutter. That is one thing, which will come at some point in the future. The other thing is more computational and Artificial Intelligence technologies making it into cameras. Probably those two things.

New Profoto Connect Wireless Transmitter for Sony, Nikon, Canon, Fuji and Olympus cameras

Profoto announced this new Connect Wireless Transmitter. You can preorder it at BHphoto and more details can be read on that product page from Profoto.

Press text:

With the Profoto Connect Wireless Transmitter, you have a wireless connection with AirTTL lights that controls flash sync, remote control, Auto TTL, and HSS. The transmitter also controls flash sync and remote control in Air lights. There are three settings on the Connect transmitter itself. Auto being the first, takes all the guess work of setting up your flashes. The manual setting is there if you want to set the flashes yourself and be more creative. The final setting, of course, is to turn it off when the transmitter is not in use.

By downloading the Profoto app and with Bluetooth connection, you can control your lights wirelessly as well and upgrade your firmware later through the app. The Connect works on a frequency of 2.4 GHz and up to eight channels with an operating range of a 1000′ when using it with normal sync flash and remote control, and 330′ with Auto TTL and HSS. The built-in lithium-ion polymer battery has a battery life of 30 hours and is rechargeable via the included USB cable. Additionally, the transmitter powers off after 60 minutes of inactivity.