Digital Detaill Enhancement

DP Review has published an interesting how-to article, "It's All In The Details," on enhancing the level of details in your digital images and compares how different software programs and plug-ins perform this job. It should be noted that the author of the article works for one of the companies she talks about in the piece, Nik. Otherwise, good and informative reading.

New EOS Camera From Canon

Canon has just announced a new model of the EOS-1D, with the designation: EOS-1D X. Canon claims this is the latest flagship model for their line of professional digital cameras, superseding both the EOS-1Ds Mark III and the EOS-1D Mark IV. The specifications are impressive and seem to be targeted at laying their own claim as the high ISO champions. In the last few years, Nikon has firmly led the pack in that regard.

Here are the new features of the EOS-1D X:

• 18.1 MP full frame CMOS sensor
• Up to 12fps and 14fps shooting
• 100-51,200 ISO, up to 204,800 ISO
• 61 point AF system
• 100,000 pixel RGB AE metering with DIGIC 4
• Full HD 1080p EOS movie
• Dual “DIGIC 5+” processors
• Clear View II 8.11 cm (3.2”) 1040K-dot LCD
• Ethernet port

All this just screams “speed” to me. The blazing fast 14 frames per second continuous drive, dual processors to handle the image processing, 61 autofocus spots, and ISO settings up to 204,800. This will be the photojournalist and sports photographer’s dream camera. And there are other advances: full color metering and full HD movie modes. This camera may become the first choice for documentary filmmakers, with that kind of low light performance.

But the curious thing is the size of the sensor. It’s only an 18.1 MP sensor, although it is full-frame. The EOS-1Ds Mark III and the 5D Mark II both have 21.1 MP full-frame sensors. Going backwards in resolution will benefit the high ISO performance, without a doubt—lower resolution means bigger photosites on the sensor which means lower noise—but what about commercial, studio, and architectural photographers, not to mention fine art and landscape photographers. They are all going to want a camera with more resolution, not less. So while the EOS-1D X may be the current king of the Canon hill, I suspect they will announce another model with substantially higher resolution. The rumors floating around the web point to a model with somewhere between 39 and 58 MP resolution, which will be a major change for handheld digital cameras.