Yesterday, April 3rd 2012, Canon announced their latest DSLR, the EOS 60Da which is a camera designed especially for astrophotography. If you’re curious, astrophotography is the photographing of stars. This is the first upgrade to Canon’s astrophotography lineup since the release of the EOS 20Da, which featured an 8.2-megapixel sensor.

The Canon 60Da is essentially the same camera as the original 60D using the same 18-megapixel APS-c sensor. The only major change that has been made to the sensor is that it has been finely tuned for extra-sensitivity to the hydrogen-alpha wavelength by using a modified infrared sensor.

The 60Da also brings an improved version of Canon’s ClearView screen by jamming 1-million dots into the same 3-inch screen. Canon has also stated that they will be including an output cable to monitor the 60Da’s live view on a TV. This will be extremely helpful when your camera is tethered to a telescope. Unfortunately, the 60Da will not include a t-ring adapter for attachment to a telescope so you will have to buy this separately.

If you want to pick up the 60Da for yourself, it’ll run you $1499 for the body, $500 more than the standard 60D. Kit pricing and availability have not yet been announced. The 60Da will only be available at select Canon authorized resellers.

In a somewhat surprising move, Polaroid has announced a new Android powered camera phone – the Polaroid SC1630. The SC1630 will feature a whopping 16 MP camera with 3x optical zoom and 5x digital zoom. On paper at least, it will boast of the most competent camera to grace an Android smartphone. According to Engadget, the shutter speed maxes out at 1/1400 second, aperture is between F3.1 – F5.6, and ISO can be dialed up to 3200.

The phone itself runs an unknown version of Android, powered by an unknown processor. However, we do know that it will have an 800 x 400 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen, 512 MB internal storage, upto 32 GB expandable memory (microSD), and 512 MB RAM. All the standard features such as accelerometer, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS are present, in addition to some additional options like FM. The handset supports 850/1900/2100MHz WCDMA and 850/900/1800/1900 GSM.

Unfortunately, the heavy duty camera has its own disadvantages. Polaroid SC1630 is rather bulky and heavy with maximum thickness being 18.5 mm. In fact, Polaroid even had to opt for a smaller battery (1020 mAh) due to space constraints. This might turn out to be a major area of concern as Android is known to be a battery hungry operating system.

The SC1630 is expected to retail in April for a very reasonable price tag of $299. However, Polaroid once again had to compromise on multiple aspects, including build quality and design, in order to achieve this. The SC1630 has too many unknown factors and shortcomings for us to recommend it as a smartphone. Hopefully, Polaroid has done a damn good job with the camera, as otherwise this Android device is going to sink without a trace.

Your point and shoot camera may not come handy when it comes to shooting professional quality photographs, since it may be lacking few features that you require to explore your creativity. To enhance the level of customization and enrich the quality of your photographs, you require a good DSLR camera.

Initially, DSLR cameras were not as popular as conventional SLR cameras, but today, DSLRs have taken a huge step in photography. Most professional photographers prefer using DSLRs, and recommend them to amateurs. However, if you are a beginner, you should start shooting with a point and shoot while exploring its various features. Once you have learned all its features, you can make a choice to go for either a DSLR or a semi-DSLR camera.

Here are 5 Reasons to why you need to upgrade to a DSLR:

#1. Speed – Fast and Continuous Shooting

DSLRs are conveniently faster when it comes to capturing photos. If you are using a point and shoot camera, it is quite frustrating to wait for the camera to process the image after you have clicked the shutter button. Well, DSLRs react faster when it comes to processing of photos. With a DSLR camera, there is virtually no delay between the time that you click the shutter button and the image takes to process.

Image Credits: Prashant

DSLRs have faster power-up time, the capability of focusing quickly, faster shutter speed, negligent shutter lag and higher processing ability.

#2. Image Quality and Superior Sensors

DSLR cameras have large image sensors, and it is one of the main reasons why one should consider upgrading to a DSLR. Sensors are made up of photodiodes which are also called as pixels. A photodiode is a type of photo detector that is capable of converting light into photons, which are then translated to a brighter image to enhance the quality of the image.

Image sensors allow you to capture photos with larger pixel sizes that produce higher quality images. A larger sensor allows a larger number of photodiodes, and the higher the number of photodiodes, the better the quality of the image.

FYI: Image sensor used in a point and shoot camera is 25 times smaller than the ones used in DSLRs, and that is why they produce a low/medium quality photos.

#3. Multiple Lens Usability

One of the biggest reasons to upgrade to a DSLR camera is that it provides you with a wide range of shooting styles. Unlike point and shoot cameras that have a fixed optical zoom, DSLRs can be fitted with a variety of interchangeable quality lenses depending on what you are photographing.

For instance, if you were shooting landscape photographs, you would be using a wide-angle lens. But if you suddenly have to shoot a macro shot, then you can easily change to a macro lens without any difficulties.

DSLRs are not just compatible with lenses. They can also be fitted with things like special effect filters, remote flashes, lens hoods, flash diffusers, lens extenders and strobe lights.

#4. Manual Controls

DSLRs offer manual settings for more control over your image. The manual mode allows you to control aperture, shutter speed and ISO speed. Here’s an example of the Canon 60D’s manual settings -

Image Credits: Daniel Straus

As you can see, you have the option to set shutter speed, aperture, ISO, white balance, exposure compensation, metering, resolution and focus points. Being able to manually control all of these things lets you get really specific and precise with your images.

FYI: Although point and shoot cameras also come with manual settings, DSLRs offer more precise settings.

#5. Shooting in RAW

Point and shoot cameras process and compress your photographs as JPEGs. However, DSLRs provide you an option to shoot in RAW (NEF in Nikon). RAW image files contain minimally processed data from the image sensor – the output from each of the original red, green and blue pixels. In simple words, RAW image files are straight out of the sensor.

The diagram below will help you understand the difference between RAW and JPEG -

However, there are a few drawbacks of RAW images. Capturing photos in RAW will slow down your camera. Try shooting RAW images without leaving the shutter button. You camera appears to slog, but if you try the same without RAW, it will effortlessly capture the photos. Also, RAW files are extremely large in size which will hog up your memory card. On an average, a RAW file comes up to 18MB in size.

Useful articles that you might be interested in reading -

• How It’s Made Camera Lenses [Video]
• Creating HDR Images with Photoshop, Quick and Easy
• Protect Your Photographs from Being Stolen on the Internet
• Stunning and Inspiring Macro Photography
• Speeding Up Things with Time-lapse Photography

Microsoft has released Microsoft Camera Codec Pack that enables the viewing of a variety of device-specific file formats. The codec pack allows you to import, organize, and edit RAW files without using third-party plugins or applications.

A RAW file is the uncompressed output from each of the original pixels on the camera’s image sensors. RAW files have higher image quality than JPEG files and have more image information. Microsoft Camera Codec Pack lets you view RAW files from over 120 digital SLR devices in Windows Live Photo Gallery as well as in Windows Explorer. The files can also be viewed in other applications that are based on Windows Imaging Codecs (WIC). This pack is available in both the x86 and x64 versions for Windows Vista Service Pack 2 and Windows 7.

Once the codec pack is installed, you can edit copies of your RAW images in Windows Live Photo Gallery. Within Photo Gallery, make a JPEG or JPEG-XR (or HD-photo) copy of the original photo, and then apply different editing effects available. You can even use the RAW files to stitch panoramas using Photo Gallery.

The Microsoft Camera Codec Pack provides support for the following device formats:

• Canon: EOS 1000D (EOS Kiss F in Japan and the EOS Rebel XS in North America), EOS 10D, EOS 1D Mk2, EOS 1D Mk3, EOS 1D Mk4, EOS 1D Mk2 N, EOS 1Ds Mk2, EOS 1Ds Mk3, EOS 20D, EOS 300D (the Kiss Digital in Japan and the Digital Rebel in North America) , EOS 30D, EOS 350D (the Canon EOS Kiss Digital N in Japan and EOS Digital Rebel XT in North America), EOS 400D (the Kiss Digital X in Japan and the Digital Rebel XTi in North America), EOS 40D, EOS 450D (EOS Kiss X2 in Japan and the EOS Rebel XSi in North America), EOS 500D (EOS Kiss X3 in Japan and the EOS Rebel T1i in North America), EOS 550D (EOS Kiss X4 in Japan, and as the EOS Rebel T2i in North America), EOS 50D, EOS 5D, EOS 5D Mk2, EOS 7D, EOS D30, EOS D60, G2, G3, G5, G6, G9, G10, G11, Pro1, S90
• Nikon: D100, D1H, D200, D2H, D2Hs, D2X, D2Xs, D3, D3s, D300, D3000, D300s, D3X, D40, D40x, D50, D5000, D60, D70, D700, D70s, D80, D90, P6000
• Sony: A100, A200, A230, A300, A330, A350, A380, A700, A850, A900, DSC-R1
• Olympus: C7070, C8080, E1, E10, E20, E3, E30, E300, E330, E400, E410, E420, E450, E500, E510, E520, E620, EP1
• Pentax (PEF formats only): K100D, K100D Super, K10D, K110D, K200D, K20D, K7, K-x, *ist D, *ist DL, *ist DS
• Leica: Digilux 3, D-LUX4, M8, M9
• Minolta: DiMage A1, DiMage A2, Maxxum 7D (Dynax 7D in Europe, α-7 Digital in Japan)
• Epson: RD1
• Panasonic: G1, GH1, GF1, LX3

There has never been a doubt in my mind that Nokia makes phones with great cameras. They had this ability since quite early when they fitted the Nokia N95 with a 5MP camera with Carl Zeiss lens. Even Nokia N8 had a beast of a 12MP camera which was simply awesome.

The newly launched Nokia N9 which runs on Meego sports a 8MP auto focus camera with Carl Zeiss optics. Compared to the Nokia N8, this is an inferior camera but it does take some beautiful pictures.

The Nokia Conversations blog recently shared some images taken with the Nokia N9′s camera and posted the images. Most of them are brilliant and look stunning. The images have not been altered from their original form. Here are some of the image samples taken from the camera.

[salbumphotos=13,160,3,y,n,uploaded_timestamp,center,]

What do you think? You can view the entire gallery on the Nokia Conversations blog.

Being able to zoom with a flick of the finger is a luxury we’ve gotten quite accustomed to. The problem is that quality photos taken at ultra zoom tend to come from larger, heavier cameras. Luckily, prayers of convenience have been answered by the digital camera gods and quality, compact, ultra zoom cameras have been produced. Check out these leading models:

Canon PowerShot SX230 HS Digital Camera

The Canon PowerShot SX230 features a versatile 14x lens paired with a 12.1-megapixel image sensor for sharp images from sizeable distances. The lens zooms out to 28mm for wider shots and captures 1080p HD video in several settings. This camera features the GPS-tracking function for tagging photos with the location where they were taken. One drawback is the pop-up flash which is located where the left hand would normally rest. It is a little pricey, but this is a full-featured camera that leaves little to be desired.

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX5V Point & Shoot Digital Camera

The lens on the Sony Cyber-shot isn’t quite as powerful as the Canon, but the 10x optical zoom lens and 10.2 megapixel CMOS sensor consistently produce quality images. Features like GPS-tagging and settings like Intelligent Auto mode, Intelligent Sweep Panorama mode and continuous shooting making capturing images near effortless. However, there are a few manual controls for devoted enthusiasts. The movie mode is top-notch and the camera detects faces and moving objects then auto adjusts to avoid distortion. Heavy sound reduction results in a slight decrease of image sharpness, but it’s a top performing camera overall.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS8 Digital Camera

Though the Lumix ZS10 may pack more features, this camera is the better all-around choice. The 16x optical zoom Leica lens works with Panasonic’s Venus Engine VI for amazing image quality. Though not feature-packed, it still has a high-resolution touchscreen, geotagging, 1080i video capturing and good battery life. Like other cameras in this class, it has average low light performance, but this camera also has a 14.1 megapixel image sensor for photos that are amazingly sharp.

==== About the author ====

Katie Campbell is and editor for Bestcovery.com where she writes electronics and camera reviews. Her fascination with photography and cameras comes from her mother who lugged around an old Nikon on a neck strap for years after it stopped being cool.

Buying a new camera is like deciding on a single chocolate when you have a bag full of one from every brand. Just like cocoa, sugar, taste, almonds spoil you for choice, so does ISO, shutter speed, aperture, lenses, megapixels and other camera jargon. Snapsort helps you sort your snapping equipment. It helps you compare different models and gives recommendations on what camera you should buy.

Snapsort is build in such a way, that it functions as a rating site as well as a guide. Every camera is given a score, depending on what camera you compare it with. You can browse cameras by type (say, point and shoots, DSLRs, ultra zooms etc.), features, brands and various other parameters. Based on scores, there are also lists of  popular brands, top digicams, top super zooms, top entry-level DSLRs and so on. Another great feature provided by Snapsort is Just tell me!where you enter a price, say like $300 on a point and shoot, and it lists out cameras under that range, neatly categorized into different utilities, like Best compact for under $300and Best travel under $300

Snapsort is certainly a site you should keep in mind if you’re on the hunt for a new camera, a new camera that you’re gonna like.

As many of you know, the Internet is sometimes called the Information Superhighway. What most of you have not heard, is that the destination of this superhighway may not be what you had hoped. Where is it leading us?

What do you consider as threats to our privacy today?

• Cookie tracking
• Shopping data
• Search data
• Personal info from registrations
• Business info from credit agencies
• Medical data
• Government data
• Comments, Forums, Social sites
• GPS location tracking
• Cameras in Streets and Stoplights
• Cameras in Stores
• Cameras in Public Areas
• Nanny Cameras
• Home Security Cameras
• Satellite tracking cameras
• and more …

Doesn’t it make sense that someday, these will all be linked into the net and someone or something will be tracking your every movement? Who’s going to be watching? Governments are the obvious answer. For an example of this idea, watch “Enemy of the State“.

Another group to consider is the hacker community. They’ve discovered the profit in stealing your personal data.

If the governments and the hackers aren’t enough for you, let’s add more for you to worry about.

Your personal information is already a valuable commodity to businesses wanting to sell you products. What’s going to happen as those companies get access to ever more increasing amounts of data about you, where you are and what you are doing? Stephen Saunders at InformationWeek thinks the Internet will become:

… a sophisticated targeting system for companies to sell “stuff” to consumers, for governments to keep track of citizens, and for law enforcement to track illicit activity. In commercial terms, it will be an Internet where the user becomes the used.

I think Stephen may not be paranoid enough. After all, many are predicting the introduction of true machine intelligence by 2025. What could super-intelligent computers could do with all that information about us? I’m not afraid that Skynet will nuke us, but how long can we retain any illusion of freedom when our machines know everything about us and they’re smarter than we are? Watch the movie Eagle Eyefor a hint.

Bill Joy, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, expressed the same concerns ten years ago, in his post “Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us“. I remember his question:

Can we doubt that knowledge has become a weapon we wield against ourselves?

Now you might understand why I’m a little paranoid about the future. I think we’ll have a choice to become “one with the machine”, like the Borg, or become useless slaves to our technology. The governments, corporations and hackers will be the least of our worries. Welcome to the machine.

The folks at Nikon were apparently very happy last week, because NASA had ordered some photographic equipment from them for use at the International Space Station. I bet it must be thrilling to hear that your product will be used in space, in the ISS, by astronauts taking pictures of their drinks flowing out of their esophagus, up in the air. OK, cut that esophagus part.

So apparently, NASA made an order for eleven Nikon D3s cameras and seven AF-S NIKKOR 14-24mm f/2.8G ED lenses to be used for photographic documentation. Nikon reported that no modifications will be made to the equipment and they will be used as-is like consumer products sold to any one else. This is perhaps not the first time when NASA has done shopping with Nikon. Nikon made their first sale to NASA in 1971by selling them Nikon Photomic FTN which was used on Apollo 15. Just last year, NASA also bought Six D2XS cameras for shooting inspection and maintenance activities in the space. Moreover,

Already about 15 types of NIKKOR lenses (more than 35 lenses all together) are kept aboard the International Space Station for intravehicular and extravehicular photography to provide continued support for NASA’s space activities.

Nikon certainly feels so cool about it’s top-class regular customer.

The Nikon D3s is a 12.1 mega pixel full-frame camera. It was announced in October this year and also features HD video recording. It would probably be used by astronauts to shoot amazing Discovery Channel like pictures of earth, if not pictures of Transformers or aliens.

Casio today announced two new digital cameras that supersede their previous models. The announcement was made in Japanese so we have to rely on Google Translator’s clemency to understand the press report. Thanks Google.

The EX-FC150, apart from the befuddling name, is a pretty good point and shoot compact. It is a successor to the equally wickedly-named EX-FC100 and features a new backlit CMOS sensor with 10 million pixels. The EX-FC150 retains  the 5x optical zoom and sensor-shift image stabilization from its predecessor. With a 2.7 inch LCD screen, the camera will also sport 720p video recording at 30 frames a second.

On the other hand, the EX-FC150′s big brother EX-FH25 is a superzoom camera. (Do you notice the similarity of names of these brothers? I assume their whole family has such out of the world names.) With a similar backlit CMOS sensor, the EX-FH25 can zoom upto 20x at 10MP. Like its younger sibling, it can also shoot 720p HD video at 30fps and both cameras can shoot video at a mouth-staggering frame rate of 1000fps at a mouth-shut resolution of 224×34.

You can find both of these cameras in the stores on November 27. We can’t tell you about the prices though, because that’s supposed to be surprise. Oh, no wait. Even Google Translator didn’t know that, so how can we?

Thanks Engadget and 1001NoisyCameras