Blackmagic Designs has announced it is shipping its Raw-video-shooting Pocket Cinema Camera and is reducing the price of its original, larger Cinema Camera. The Pocket Cinema Camera is built around a ‘Super 16mm’ sized sensor (12.5 x 7mm) and can shoot Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) or lossless compressed CinemaDNG 1080 footage at 23.99, 24, 25, 29.97 or 30p. Meanwhile the company has knocked $ 1,000 off the price of its original, 2.5K resolution Raw-shooting Cinema Camera model.
The middle of 2013 is fast approaching (can you believe it!?) and it has been a fun year here on dPS so far.
We know that many of our northern hemisphere readers are out and about enjoying your summer (while the rest of us freeze) and so we thought that we’d offer a little extra incentive to take your camera along that we’d put together a great deal on some of our popular photography training eBooks.
For the next week we’re offering you as a dPS reader the chance to pick up two dPS eBooks for the price of one.
That’s right – if you pick up one of our eBooks this week you can select any other eBook from our range that is either equal to or less than the value of the eBook that you’re paying for and we’ll give it to you for free.
So you can effectively bundle any two of our eBooks and save up to 50%!
For example
Choose the eBooks you wish to bundle here.
The choice is yours as to the combination you choose to bundle together – the possibilities are endless!
But don’t delay – this deal ends in just one week.
Post originally from: Digital Photography Tips.
Check out our more Photography Tips at Photography Tips for Beginners, Portrait Photography Tips and Wedding Photography Tips.
Get 2 dPS eBooks For the Price of 1: This Week Only!
ACD Systems has announced the latest version of its ACDSee photo management and editing software for Windows. ACDSee16 gains a range of editing and organizational tools, including features that simulate out-of-focus regions and tilt-shift lens effects. The latest version is available at a reduced price ($ 50), for a limited time, with existing users being about to upgrade for $ 30. A 15-day free trial is available from the company’s website.
Samsung has announced that its NX300 mirrorless camera will be available in both US and European markets by the end of this month as a kit with the 20-50mm lens for $ 749.99 and £599 respectively. The 3D-capable camera is built around a 20MP sensor, 3.3″ OLED screen and built-in Wi-Fi. The kit will also include a free copy of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4 editing software. The company has also announced that the 45mm F1.8 2D/3D lens will be available at the same time for $ 499.99. There is currently no information about its European price.
Sigma USA has announced the price and availability of its DP3 Merrill large sensor, fixed lens compact. The camera will be available from March 2013 at an estimated street price of $ 999. It is nearly identical to the earlier DP Merrill models featuring the familiar 15x3MP APS-C Foveon X3 sensor, but with a 50mm (75mm equiv.) F2.8 lens. Click through for the press release.
www.artoftheimage.com – Reviewing the Nikon 18-105mm VR, a lot more lens than you’d expect considering the price.
Video Rating: 4 / 5
This is my entire Supra collection to date, all 20 pairs! Still buying more as we speak! FOR DOPE STREETWEAR CHECK OUT… www.martiangang.com
Olympus USA has announced its M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f1.8 for Micro Four Thirds will be available in December for around $ 500. The lens features the same premium build quality and snap-focus manual focus mode as the company’s 12mm F2.0. The snap-focus mode is engaged by pulling the focus ring on the lens back, which reveals a distance scale and engages end-stops on the focus travel, applies firmer damping and switches the camera to manual focus mode.
Sigma USA has announced the price and availability details of the 35mm F1.4 DG HSM it unveiled at Photokina 2012. The 35mm F1.4, which will be available for Nikon, Canon, Sony, Pentax and Sigma DSLRs, is compatible with both full-frame and APS-C cameras. It will have an estimated street price of $ 899, making it significantly less expensive than the big-brand competition. The lens is the first of Sigma’s ‘Global Vision’ lineup, representing the ‘Art’ category of enthusiast-grade lenses.
Tune in every other Monday to learn firsthand how to film, edit and shoot like the pros, from your favorite videographers and photographers in skateboarding! What’s inside Matt Price’s camera bag: Canon 1DS MK2 Canon 7D with battery Grip Canon 50mm F1.4 Lens Canon 15mm F2.8 Fisheye Lens Rokinon 8mm F3.5 Fisheye Lens Pentax 70-210mm f4 Lens 2 Nikon SB-25 Flashes 1 Nikon SB-800 Flash 4 Pocket Wizard plus radio slaves assorted sync cords and adapters as needed, and of course lots of shoe laces. Subscribe to Ride: www.youtube.com facebook.com twitter.com instagram @ridechannel
Part 7 takes you on the journey of the full wedding shoot, including images, tips and tricks. This wedding was all at one venue for the wedding and reception. Matt takes you along for the entire process, showing scene selection, planning, and execution. See the Lowepro S&F gear here: goo.gl In this series ThatNikonGuy Matt Granger will show you all you need to know to get started in wedding photography. From planning, to gear, to shooting and editing tips, Matt will walk you through the process and help you avoid common pitfalls. Whether you are going in full time, or have been asked to shoot at a friends wedding – take the time to research and plan – it will avoid a lot of headaches down the track! GEAR: Lowepro S&F gear – products.lowepro.com Tamron 70-200 f2.8 – www.tamron.com.au Expo disc portrait – www.expoimaging.com KATA Pro Light 220 Bumblebee backpack – www.kata-bags.com Nikon gear – www.nikon.com.au Join our facebook and flickr groups to stay up to date with what’s going on: Join our facebook group HERE: www.facebook.com Flickr group HERE: www.flickr.com www.mattgranger.com
Video Rating: 4 / 5
A lot of people have asked me over the weekend what I think about SmugMug’s price increase. On Friday SmugMug co-founder Chris “Baldy” MacAskill presented a video outlining why SmugMug needed to raise prices. Basically it comes down to the fact that Pros really do use a TON of storage and now more than ever. SmugMug (like everybody these days) uses cloud storage and replicated storage for terabytes of data (possible for a single customer with today’s DSLRs and fast bandwidth speeds) is EXPENSIVE.
Back in 2005, when SmugMug last changed their pricing, it was harder to really flood a site with with serious storage. Bandwidth speeds were slower, file sizes were smaller, processing technology wasn’t as fast. Today Nikon’s D800 has a whopping 36.3 megapixel image. We’ve grown used to super fast bandwidth and now with my new MacBook Pro the only thing slowing me down in Lightroom is me. I can process so many more images today in Lightroom than I could with Photoshop back in 2005.
So SmugMug was faced with a tough decision — continue losing money on many of their best customers, or raise prices. Well, they had other choices as well, but none of them fun. They could start charging based on how much storage you use, but this would hit their highest grossing Pros even harder in many cases. They could start throttling your upload speeds to slow you down. Can you imagine how frustrating that would be (that’s how most of the cheapo cloud storage backup providers do it for dollars a month). They could take a higher percentage of your photo sales, but again this would cost many working photographers even more money.
What SmugMug decided to do is to ask their business customers (the ones who use the most storage and make the most *money* off the site btw) to pay $ 100 more.
Nobody likes to see prices raised — especially the working Pro photographer. Times are tough and every penny counts. It bothers me though to see SmugMug being attacked online. If Canon charges $ 100 more for a lens do Pros complain? Sure, but not like some of the comments I’ve read regarding SmugMug’s price increase. If Canon raises the price of a lens $ 100 does David Pogue from the NY Times feel the need to tweet about it? Canon, a huge nameless faceless corporation can raise prices and people don’t even notice, but SmugMug an accessible family run business does it and people take it out on them.
I pay Canon $ 500/year for their platinum CPS service. This is a service that gets me things that are valuable to me (discounted repairs, expedited shipping, loaner lenses), things that ultimately help me make money. It’s a cost to me but I justify it because I make money off my photography. I bet a lot of the other Pros on SmugMug use this service too. It’s part of the cost of doing business.
It’s odd for me to see people trying to compare this move by SmugMug as Netflix like. Huh? A consumer DVD rental company vs. a professional services company used to sell your photos? Let’s compare the situation to something a little more similar. Last year I made about $ 3,600 off my Flickr photos. I made this money through the Getty/Flickr deal. Flickr charges me $ 25/year to store my photos and won’t let me sell my photos myself on Flickr. Do you know how much Flickr/Getty grossed with my photos? About $ 18,000.
If people want to complain about high fees, how about complaining about Getty/Flickr payouts. Last year they took around $ 14,400 of the money made by *my* photos. You see Getty pays photographers 20% and keeps 80%. SmugMug on the other hand gives Pros an ecommerce engine that can sell both stock and prints and they pay out 85% of mark ups and keep 15%.
Yesterday a client contacted me about using a photo for stock that I own. I had to redirect them to Getty because Getty also demands an exclusive right on my images that they represent. Bummer! 20% instead of 100% sucks. I still use Getty/Flickr though. It’s a cost of doing business. SmugMug likewise is a cost of doing business for a photographer. If you don’t want to do it for business then just use the cheaper plan without the ecommerce engine.
The fact of the matter is that Pros have flocked to SmugMug because it gives them a very valuable tool that they need. Unlimited storage, an ecommerce engine with a high payout and really some of the most amazing customer service on the planet. They are a truly wonderful unique family run business operating in the photography space. What they are not, however, is a charity. They are in business to make money and they can’t continue losing money on their most active customers year in and year out. If someone doesn’t need the ecommerce engine the price is the same. If someone DOES use the ecommerce engine though (the biggest storage users and the ones making money off the site) then they will have to pay more. This sounds fair to me.
So those are my thoughts on SmugMug’s price increase. I support the company, one that has done so much for the photography community, and hope that this tough business decision is something that people can come to terms with and move on beyond.
[Disclosure: SmugMug is a former sponsor of my former photography show Photo Talk Plus, they are not a current sponsor of anything I’m doing though as we’re taking a break with the show. I also consider many of the wonderful people who work there personal friends.]