The Phoblographer

Today, Canon announced the long awaited and long rumored 60D DSLR camera along with the 400mm F2.8 L IS II, 300mm F2.8 L IS II, a new 1.4x extender, 2x extender, 70-300 4.5-5.6 L IS USM, and an 8-15mm f4 L fisheye zoom. The 60D is placed between the T2i(reviewed here) and the 7D(reviewed here) and replaces the current 50D. Unfortunately, no details or predicted features on the 1Ds Mk IV were spilled, which is a camera that everyone is still waiting for. I’ve had hands-on time with the 60D for the PDN Gear Guide, which I’m writing, to be released at Photo Plus. For a full-report, stay tuned to PDN.

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I stated that the Sony NEX 5 would be a great camera for vacationing in my previous posting. And so, I headed into the more touristy parts of NYC to do touristy things. The Sony NEX 5 went into the Ripley’s Museum in Times Square and then to Central Park. How did it do? Pretty darn well, actually.

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Sony announced the new A55, A560 and 24mm F2 lens and earlier this evening, I got to play with those items at a private Sony event at the Alvin Ailey Dance Studio in NYC. Impressions, findings and images are after the jump. Please do note that I handled pre-production units and that all these photos were shot in JPEG mode.

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At the time of writing this posting, despite it performing very admirably, there have been technical problems with the Sony NEX 5. Because of said problems, this posting will talk about the sweep panorama feature and the image quality delivered from the camera using this feature. Once again, the RAW files cannot be processed in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3and the provided program did not work on my Macbook laptop at the time of writing this piece. Editor’s note: once again making a note that Lightroom 3.2 can process the files and that this review is being written as it happened in chronological order for accuracy. On my PC, the program works, but it is quite cumbersome and slow to use. In a couple of days, all images recorded from the camera will be shot in JPEG unless otherwise stated.

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Today, Sony announced their A55 and A33 DSLR cameras that use translucent mirror technology and that get rid of the optical viewfinder. For those that don’t like EVFs, the A560 is the A550 but adds full HD video amongst other features like continuous Phase Detect AF in video mode. Also announced were a bunch of lenses announced earlier on in Europe this year. While you’re at it, be sure to check out our Sony NEX-5review so far that includes some of the features in these DSLRs.

Editor’s Note: I’ve now had hands-on time with the cameras.

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As the biggest current threat to Micro Four Thirds according to reviewers, and with a company like Sony with lots of resources to back the new system, the flagship Sony NEX 5 camera is one that I’ve been finding so far to be more reasonable than intuitive. It has quickly become my companion camera with me leaving my 7D and 5D Mk II at home in favor of its smaller size and terrific image quality. However, it has its flaws that I feel can perhaps cripple the budding system with so much potential. Please note that this will be a duel field review. I, Chris Gampat, will be testing the camera out myself on many occasions as will Copy Editor Julius Motal. Julius is currently a Minolta film shooter and his sister owns a Sony a230. His family has been with that system for years.

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