Video accessories manufacturer Edelkrone has launched a new dolly for DSLRs that’s designed to fold up and fit in your pocket. The PocketSkater 2 features three wheels and a tilting Flextilt head so photographers can shoot moving footage with the camera angled upwards or down. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
A lot of you who follow my photography and blog know that I’ve been super excited about Ello, my favorite new social network on the web. Today Ello gets even a little bit better with the official launch of their iOS app. They just launched the iOS app about 10 minutes ago, but it may take a little bit of time to propagate in the app store before you will be able to download it.
I’ve been testing a beta version of the app for the past few weeks and absolutely love it.
If you are a photographer and are not using Ello, I’d encourage you to give it a spin. Put simply, your photos will look better on Ello than on any other social sharing site on the web today. Looking at my photos on a 5k iMac in extra large, full, high res glory just can’t be compared with any other photo network out there. Ello shows your photos huge, as they are meant to be seen.
I love that Ello was designed for the web first and foremost, but one is not always at one’s computer and so having a mobile app these days is really important. Ello’s initial release is for iOS and the iPhone, but they have plans to ship an Android version later on in the future.
Like the web version of Ello, what I love about the iOS app is the elegance of its design and its simplicity.
Basically the app does six things for you really well.
1. Ello’s iOS app allows you to browse content by the people you follow. You get two buckets for your contacts at Ello, friends and noise. You can browse either stream and easily love and comment on content that you find interesting and engaging directly from your iOS device.
2. Ello’s iOs app allows you to look at your own content stream. You can go to your own stream and expand comments as well as scroll through your entire stream of posts from most recent to oldest.
3. Ello’s iOs app allows you to look at your notifications page. Here you can see when someone adds you, or when someone specifically mentions you in a post by name, or when someone loves or comments on a photo of yours. This is a great tool to stay on top of the interaction on your content.
4. Ello’s iOS app allows you to discover new content on Ello’s discover page. I’m not sure how content is selected for Ello’s discover page, but there is some super cool stuff. If you run out of photos to look at by your friends, check out discover too.
5. Ello’s iOS app allows you to post your own content with or without a photo. Like Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and other sites, you can post messages, status updates, and photos directly from the app. Unlike Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and others, Ello does not mix advertisements or promoted posts in with your content or sell your data to advertisers.
6. Ello’s iOs app allows you to easily search content on Ello. You can search for posts or for specific users.
Overall I’ve found the beta version of Ello’s iOs app to be super smooth. I love the animations that come with the app. When you first load the app up, you get this cool spinning Ello logo while it loads content for you. As content streams in you get a sort of pulsating gray ball letting you know that an individual post is loading. It’s obvious that a lot of thought went into how to make Ello’s app simple, elegant and intuitive.
I’ve been using the beta version of the Ello iOS app every single day since I’ve installed it and even though it’s beta it has not crashed or locked up on me once. The app is super stable.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with Ello, Ello is structured as a public benefit corporation. There will never be any advertisements on Ello and they will never sell your data. Ello takes your privacy very seriously and in my opinion is the most user centered social network on the web/iOS today.
The people that run Ello are very solid. They are community focused and driven. One of the big reasons why I’m so high on Ello is because I’ve spent some time familiarizing myself with the founders and I think they represent some of the most sincere integrity in the social networking space today. They can definitely be trusted with your content and my content and they deserve our support.
In addition to a great team running Ello, the community itself is one of the most creative communities on the web. I’m continuously blown away at the talent and artistic vision of the artists, designers, photographers and thinkers that are part of the early Ello community. Not only will you find some of the most awe inspiring visual work on the web today, you will find that behind that work is one of the most inclusive, friendly and welcoming communities to date. While you can block people on Ello, fortunately there has been very little abuse thus far and people seem to get along really well.
For those of my friends who are already there, I’m really digging your work. For those of my friends who are not there yet, I hope you take a few seconds out today to download Ello’s new iOS app and I’d love to know what you think about it and see more of your work there in the future. If you want to connect on Ello you can find me here.
If you want to learn a little bit more about Ello, check out this great video below by Lucian and Todd where they talk a little more about what Ello is all about.
More from: The Verge, TechCrunch, readwrite, Los Angeles Times, Engadget.
Thomas Hawk Digital Connection
Think Tank Photo has launched two new bags, the Trifecta 10 DSLR Backpack and Trifecta 8 Mirrorless Backpack. Both backpacks are designed to hold a photographer’s ‘workhorse’ lenses, including ultra-wide, mid-range, and telephoto zoom lenses. As the names indicate, the bags are designed to accommodate DSLR and mirrorless systems. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Today Adobe is announcing updates for their Creative Cloud 2015 Photography package as well as the launch of their new stock photography offering Adobe Stock.
I saw a demo last week of the new Creative Cloud enhancements. The enhancement that I liked the most was a new slider in Lightroom for haze and dehaze. With the haze slider you can now reduce unwanted haze in photos or add haze back in if you want more of an ethereal foggy type mood. I think that this tool will be especially dramatic when working with long exposure photography where you have clouds or low fog and want to get the mix of fog to subject just perfect.
Photoshop is also adding in an additive noise function where you can produce more camera like realistic bokeh and blur noise when desired, making the transition in blur more natural. The Photoshop healing brush also now heals in real time and is faster than previous versions.
These feature enhancements and updates will not be available to the current desktop versions of Lightroom and Photoshop, they will only be available for Adobe Creative Cloud subscribers. This is in line with Adobe’s previous stated goal of providing fast and rapid real time updates and upgrades to their subscription customers. I’m assuming that eventually these new enhancements will make their way to desktop upgrades/updates, but at present Adobe seems to be focused on providing the best and most current features available to their subscription customers.
There are also additional features being launched for the mobile versions of Adobe products including better tone and vignette adjustment for Lightroom mobile and an Android version of Photoshop Mix.
Adobe’s Creative Cloud photography package costs $ 9.99/month and you can subscribe to it here. They also offer a 30 day trial for you to try out Creative Cloud to see if it is right for you.
In addition to the improvements in Lightroom CC and Photoshop CC, Adobe is also announcing the launch of their new stock photography service simply called Adobe Stock.
Because Adobe is so widely used by creatives in general, leveraging their software products to sell an Adobe labeled stock photography library seems to make a lot of sense. Adobe’s stock photography service will be featured as a menu item in Photoshop and will allow stock buyers to use watermarked versions of stock photos to create mockups and test design/layout ideas. Once a stock buyer is ready to license an image they can license it directly from Photoshop and download the unwatermarked version of the image.
Images will cost $ 9.99 each to license or Creative Cloud subscribers can purchase one of two different subscription plans. The first plan costs $ 29.99/month and allows a subscriber to license up to 10 images a month and a second plan will cost $ 199.99 per month and will allow a subscriber up to 750 images per month.
Adobe will pay out 33% of their sales proceeds to photographers — photographers interested in applying can apply here.
Because so many stock photography buyers are connected into Adobe’s ecosystem, I think this stock photography offering will end up being very successful and represents formidable competition to the current stock photography giant Getty Images. Earlier this year Adobe purchased the stock photography agency Fotolia, but this new stock offering appears to be a different offering marketed directly under the Adobe brand and available through Adobe’s flagship Photoshop product.
More: MacRumors, The Verge, Engadget, Techmeme.
Thomas Hawk Digital Connection
Samsung has launched a rugged version of its flagship Galaxy S6, the S6 Active. The device is exclusively available from AT&T in the US and has a similar specification to the standard S6. In the camera department the S6 Active comes with the same 16MP resolution on the back and 5MP at the front as the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge, but there is no talk of an optical image stabilization system. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
When Sony launched its new Xperia Z4 flagship a few weeks back it was a Japan-only release. Today the Japanese manufacturer has announced the Xperia Z3+, which is essentially identical to the Z4 but will be available globally. It includes a 1/2.3-inch 20.7MP Sony Exmor sensor coupled with an F2.0 lens offering an equivalent focal length of 25mm. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Chinese manufacturer Oppo has today launched its new duo of flagship phones, the R7 and R7 Plus. The R7 features a 5″ 1080p screen, while a 6″ screen with the same resolution places the Plus model firmly into phablet territory. In the camera department both smartphones combine a 13MP sensor with an F2.2 lens but the R7 Plus chip is, like the Huawei P8, of the RGBW variant and supported by laser-AF and a dual-LED flash. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Last year, Microsoft introduced its hyperlapse algorithm for stabilizing camera footage into smooth timelapses. Now, the technology comes to life as the company has released the product as an app for Windows Phone, and as a beta app for Android devices as well as other Microsoft platforms. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
ZTE, one of the big Chinese device manufacturers, has launched its new flagship phone, the Nubia Z9. On paper the new model looks like quite a high-end device and that’s especially true for the camera. The 16MP Sony CMOS sensor appears to be the same as in the recently announced LG G4, and is combined with an F2.0 lens and optical image stabilization. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Printer manufacturer Epson has announced it will introduce an A2 printer that uses its new extended-life UltraChrome ink-set and will accept roll-fed paper via an optional roll holder. The professional photo printer will be able to produce prints of up to 17in high in panoramic formats as long as 1.1m/43.3in, as well as printing on thick art paper via a front media loader. Read more
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)