Category Archives: Cameras

Business, Cameras, Technical

Panasonic’s newest cameras to interface with iPhone and Android phones

BUT:

Panasonic currently doesn’t have plans to allow developers to create apps for its cameras but it does not rule anything for the future and will continue to evaluate the development of the connected camera market.

via photokina 2012: Interview with Panasonic • MegaPixel.

Arghhhhh. As a software engineer, I would really like to see software development kits for these embedded systems. Why not?

At the 2012 CES, a Nikon Field Engineer told me Nikon would not provide an SDK as it would enable 3rd party apps to potentially tarnish the Nikon camera’s quality. I said, “You mean like how iPhone apps have tarnished the iPhone?” Heh.

I couldn’t resist. He understood what I meant but said Nikon’s executive management was then opposed to opening up their cameras.

Which is funny because in August, Nikon announced an Android powered camera! And its a nice camera too!

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3D, Cameras, Editing

Using a hybrid video frame rate for 3D (or 2D)

Is Variable Frame Rate Better than High Frame Rate for 3D?.

There are times, in video, where we want 30 fps – but that can result in jittery motion if the shutter speed is fast. We can either use a longer shutter speed (e.g. 1/30th of a second) to blur motion, or we could shoot at higher frame rates (60 fps).

The authors propose shooting subjects that have fast action in 60 fps but continuing to shoot slower moving subjects in 30 fps. In post production, the entire production can be rendered as 60 fps by doubling up the 30 fps frame.

They did their tests, by the way, for 3D video. 3D likes good detail and does not like lots of motion blur, complicated the decision: how to render detailed 3D without ending up with motion blur problems.

(Actually, the link is to a PAL world discussion where they do thinks in 25 or 50 fps. I translated to 30/60 fps for the North American audience. Also, I did some similar tests sort of along the lines of the authors, but was just playing around with 720p/60 for 3D and found the results were much better than I had expected. But that also may have depended on the inexpensive cameras I was using.)

Cameras, Lighting, Still photography, Techniques

Question on how to expose for greatest dynamic range on GH2

Question on how to expose for greatest dynamic range on GH2 – Personal View Talks.

This question was posted on Personal-View.com, the web site for micro four thirds (run by the author of the GH-1 and GH-2 hacks) and specifically the high end Lumix cameras.

Suggestion is made to consider using graduated neutral density filters or polarizing filters to help reduce the highlights in photographs. The same could be said for video, and that this tip applies not just to Lumix cameras but all kinds of still and video cameras.

I shot something recently, on video, using a Canon camera, where the subjects were in the shade but enough else was in direct sunlight. There was nothing I could do but allow the highlights to blow out on the limited dynamic range of 4:2:0 HDV video. But the suggestion to use a graduated ND is a good one that I thought worth sharing with others.