Cell Phone Market Also On Lytro’s Radar
Yesterday we wrote that Steve Jobs had been interested in Lytro‘s novel camera technology during the final years of his life. PC World did an interview with Lytro executive chairman Charles Chi, who seems to indicate that Lytro is very open to the idea of partnering with cell phone makers and licensing light field technology...
PressPausePlay – a documentary on technology in the digital age of artists – take time to watch this
Last week, I watched this fascinating documentary and then promptly sent it to my daughter who’s very interested in pursuing a career in some kind of art. It isn’t specifically aimed at HDSLRs, but it sure hits home to all kinds of artists including filmmakers. “The artist always comes after the technology… The artist didn’t...
planet5D 2012 direction and beyond – take the poll and drive
This is the time of year that many people reflect on the past and what will come in the following year – and here at planet5D, we’ve been thinking about that for a while, but now, we’d like to have some input from you! Since you spend the time coming here for news and more,...
Olympus Patent Reveals Extra Hot Shoe Lens for 3D Photography
Olympus and Panasonic might be cofounders of the Micro Four Thirds movement, but the companies appear to be taking different approaches toward 3D photography. While Panasonic offers a special 3D lens that contains two lenses, a newly discovered Olympus patent shows an even more novel approach: adding a second lens to a camera via its...
CompactFlash Cards to Be Replaced with the Smaller XQD Format
Perhaps in response to the growing capacities and falling prices of SD cards, the CompactFlash Association has announced a new format to replace CF cards for professional photographers. It’s called XQD, and has a size that falls between CF and SD cards (it’s thicker than SD cards, but smaller than CF cards). The interface used...
Apple iCam: A Modular Concept Camera That Uses an iPhone for Brains
The Apple iCam is a concept camera by Italian designer Antonio DeRosa that imagines a future where cameras are modular and powered by smartphones. Smartphones have already invaded the compact camera market in recent years, but their small lenses and sensors keep them from being seen as suitable alternatives to more advanced cameras. The iCam...
Xerox Working on Algorithm That Can Judge the Aesthetics of Photos
Xerox is showing off a new tool called Aesthetic Image Search over on Open Xerox (the Xerox equivalent of Google Labs). It’s an algorithm being developed at one of the company’s labs that aims to make judging a photograph’s aesthetics something a computer can do. Many methods for image classification are based on recognition of...
Coming to a Camera Near You: Autofocus As Fast as the Human Eye
Contrast detection is one of the two main techniques used in camera autofocus systems. Although focusing speeds continue to improve, the method uses an inefficient “guess and check” method of figuring out a subject’s distance — it doesn’t initially know whether to move focus backward or forward. UT Austin vision researcher Johannes Burge wondered why...
‘Invisible Glass’ Announced: So Amazing You’ll Have to Not See It to Believe It
Japanese company Nippon Electric Glass has developed a new type of ‘invisible glass’ that drastically reduces reflections, rendering the glass almost invisible to human eyes. The secret is a special anti-reflection film that is formed on each side of the glass, which allows more light to pass through rather than bounce off. In ordinary glass,...
Focus Stacking for Speed: Researcher Invents Light-Efficient Photography
Google scientist Sam Hasinoff has come up with a technique called “light-efficient photography” that uses focus-stacking to reduce the amount of time exposures require. In traditional photography, increasing the depth of field in a scene requires reducing the size of the aperture, which reduces the amount of light hitting the sensor and increases the amount...
Think You Don’t Need to Focus? Think Again.
Been tons of chatter online about the Lytro camera the last few weeks. In case you’ve been living under a rock or too busy to notice, then you’ll be happy to know that the new Lytro camera allows you to select focus AFTER you shoot the photograph. AMAZING technology developed at Stanford by Ren Ng....
