SPECIAL FEATURE: Convergence Products

Camcorders, camphones go 8 meg

While Nikon and then Canon created a stir with DSLRs which capture high quality, high resolution moving images, the latest generation camera phones and camcorders are pushing back, converging on the digital compact camera in terms of still capture capabilities. 

Canon will join the ranks of suppliers offering 8-megapixel still capture in its camcorder range in March with the launch of the advanced Legria HF10.

A quick review of the spec sheets on some of the latest camcorders indicates they are very much still/video hybrids, with a full suite of advanced digital still camera features and functions. For example, the Sanyo Xacti VPC-CA8EXBK delivers still pictures to 8- megapixels, outputting 12 megabyte JPEG files at lowest compression. The (modest for a camcorder) 5x lens is equivalent to 38 – 190 mm on 35mm camera and has a widest aperture of f3.5-4.7 – better than many DSLR zoom lenses on the market! Shutter speeds are from 1/2 – 1/5000 sec (with flash, 1/30 – 1/1500 sec) with a long exposure (“Lamp mode”) of 2 seconds. It has a 9- point AF system; nine Scene modes; digital filters to produce soft focus, monochrome or sepia images; a choice of multi-, spot- or centre-weighted exposure; exposure compensation; ISO from 50 – 1600; red eye correction; and face detection functions.

It also offers macro shooting as close as 1cm! All this in a body which weighs in around 250grams. Oh, and it shoots video as well – but only at standard definition. There’s a HD version with similar still capabilities in other parts of the world.

There’s also a waterproof Sanyo DMX CA8 which adds underwater functionality to its 8-megapixel stills resolution.

Sony goes one better with the $1899 Handycam HDRSR11, with which you can capture 10.2 megapixel still images when in dedicated still mode – with flash! – or snap a 7.2 megapixel still image at the same time as recording full motion video. Main storage is a 60GB hard disk drive. It has red-eye reduction, face detection, etc, etc, a 12x Carl Zeiss Vario Sonnar T zoom lens (f1.8 – 3.1) optical image stabilisation, spot metering and a super-sharp touch-sensitive 3.2-inch, 921,600 LCD screen – superior to just about anything available on “conventional” digital cameras – backed up with something you can’t take for granted on a digicam these days – a viewfinder!

The sophisticated functionality of these devices cry out for equally sophisticated sales staff to do them justice, but so far photo specialists haven’t been seen as the “go to” destination to purchase camcorders.

“The camcorder market is challenging, and with the advent of the memory card models and HD more so. We have seen a increase in overall sales, but are not increasing our market share,” said Richard Robertson, managing director of Ted’s Cameras, which has been allocating a significant amount of advertising space to the category.

But perhaps the camcorder makers are catering to demand for still capture capabilities which doesn’t yet exist.

“It is certainly very convenient to have the ability to take some quality shots on the camcorder in between the movie sequences, but most people I serve say they aren’t really concerned about taking stills with their camcorder,” said John Ralph, Erina Camera House.

“The opportunity for the specialist, I suspect, comes in providing the advice to choose the models and provision of the accessories to improve both still and movie photography. “Polarising filters, all-weather covers, backpacks and tripods would be areas that could benefit from these new camera sales. Perhaps the art of movie making (story-telling rather than just letting the thing run for hours) would cross over into the still area and bring back the audiovisual show to our wide screen TVs.”

Camphones evolving fast

Meanwhile, camera phones pose another territorial challenge to the single purpose digital camera. While absolute image quality is sometimes questionable and ease of use not what it could be, camera phones deliver other advantages which are particularly appealing to the Facebook generation. In addition to showing people photos on the device display, people can share their pictures using multimedia messaging (MMS), Bluetooth connectivity and the internet.

Photos can be shared with friends and family without (like it or not) the need to print the image. Moreover, photos taken on a mobile phone can be shared on personal media sites such as Twitter, YouTube and MySpace with the click of a few buttons.

According to Lyra Research, an international market research firm, camera phone shipments will exceed one billion units per year in 2011. They also claim that by early this year, the cumulative number of camera phones shipped will surpass the cumulative number of both conventional and digital cameras shipped in the entire history of photography – and camera phones have been on the market for less than a decade! In 2007 Nokia sold almost 200 million camera phones and in 2006 made the cheeky claim that it was the largest manufacturer of cameras in the world.

Camera phones have evolved at a blistering pace. The first one-megapixel models were launched about 3 years ago. Today anything but the most basic $59 run-out model sports a one-megapixel sensor, and two megapixels are fairly standard. A 3.2-megapixel phone is pretty well compulsory for your average spec-conscious “urban phoney”.

Five-megapixel models are becoming common and at time of writing, three brands had released eight-megapixel models locally: the Sony Cyber-shot C905, the Samsung Innov8 and the LG Renoir. (It’s interesting to note that both Sony with “Cyber-shot” and Casio with “Exilim” have transferred the subbranding for their camera range to their camera phones.) Angela Ciliberto from CDirect, distributor to photo retailers for Telstra pre-paid phones, says that camphones are “very important to the imaging market now because they are an image capture device which everyone is carrying.”

She said that while C-Direct had been in the pre-paid phone business for five years, it has only been with the recent increase in image capture specifications in the latest models that photo retailers are beginning to show interest in the category. Richard Robertson from Ted’s says that they have limited their phone sales to pre-paid models.

“Writing up contracts in store takes 20 – 30 minutes and quite often at the end of that period the customer gets a knock back.”

To get an idea how camera phones have developed in the past three years, here are some of the features offered by the three current 8-meg models, in addition to their high-res sensors (although not all of these models offer each feature):

• Xenon or LCD flash;

• ISO up to 1600;

• Autofocus;

• Optical zoom (to 3x);

• Image stabilisation;

• Touch-screen assisted focus (LG Renoir: focus by touching the screen on that spot then take a photo by removing your finger);

• In-camera image enhancement (contrast, colour and sharpness adjustment);

• Macro-focusing;

• “Best Pic” function (takes a series and suggests the best one to save); • Red-eye removal; • Face Detection;

• Geo-tagging;

• Selectable Scene Modes;

• TV-resolution video recording.

One model which disappoints in its picture-taking capabilities is the muchvaunted Apple iPhone which, relatively speaking, is a picture-taking dud, according to early reviews. The anticipated upgrade to the original iPhone’s 2-megapixel sensor didn’t happen, leaving Apple’s mobile wonder near the bottom of the pile in terms of raw resolving power. Moreover, some reviewers say it doesn’t even perform that well compared to other 2-megapixel camphones; the iPhone software is flaky when it comes to image capture and processing; and there is little in the way of in-camera editing functions. Flash and zoom? Not in this version. There has also been no thought to enabling users to easily print from the iPhone in-store. The iPhone doesn’t have removable storage for images.

(In November Kodak released new software for the iPhone, the Kodak Gallery iPhone App. It gives Kodak Gallery subscribers access to their online galleries, supports uploading photos taken by the iPhone and iPod Touch – and of course encourages users to buy prints online from Kodak!)  

Discs for cameras 

While competing against the rest of the retailing world – from convenience stores to JB HiFi – in low-margin CD and DVD media is probably not the road to riches for photo specialists, there are some specialised storage products which could be a good fit in photo stores.

Kodak’s range of “Gold Preserving Media”, which offers archival life of up to 300 years for CDs and 100 years for DVDs addresses the issue of cheap media with poor archival properties. Kodak also has another product, Kodak AutoMagic CD-R, with built-in software which automatically copies photos, backs up key documents and creates portable storage for music. Users can preview, rotate and select photos and even record them directly from a digital camera. The discs also can be read on home video players.

“This is great news for all the people who want to store images on a CD but lack the computer skills,” said Rob Dessmann, managing director of Australian Photo Supplies, which distributes Kodak media. “Now they can avoid the hassle of downloading, installing and learning how to use a more complex software package.”

Photo Direct has released a somewhat similar product, HP SimpleSave Photo, a new DVDbased back-up system for digital image files.

SimpleSave Photo automatically searches and saves over 90 different photo, video and images formats.

The user simply inserts the SimpleSave disc into a drive capable of burning DVD-R discs and it immediately searches the hard disc drive for all image files. They are then displayed in thumbnail form on screen where the user can decide to save all or a selection. The back-up software automatically launches from the disc, with no installation on your computer, and finds the designated file types on your PC. Those files are then saved onto the very same SimpleSave disc. The software notifies you when the disc is full and prompts you to insert another disc to continue the storing process.

With SimpleSave there is no software to learn, install or configure on your PC.

There are advanced search options to designate or eliminate specific file types to find and save. Each SimpleSave disc stores approximately 2000 photos, based on an average file size of 2MB. A pack of 5 SimpleSave discs will carry an RRP of $24.95.