Show Reports

Phew, what a busy month it’s been for new photo gear! While the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas has not, traditionally, been a major event to debut high-end photography equipment, CES 2016 was definitely an exception with dozens of interesting imaging releases. (And hopefully this is a trend that continues at future CES events, which, in recent years have been rather ho-hum for photography gear.)

The big news from Olympus this morning was the introduction of their new flagship mirrorless camera, the OM-D EM-1 Mark II. But the company had more in store with the launch of the compact Pen E-PL8 mirrorless camera and three new lenses.

Small is big--at least among PSDs (Portable Storage Devices). That can be the defining motif for the strong emergence at this year's PMA of smaller and smaller digital portable storage devices with higher and higher capacities and enhanced feature sets. These devices cropped up at every turn, never failing to grab my attention.

They include hard...

Panasonic announced today that it’s developing the new Lumix GH5 mirrorless camera, which will be capable of recording smooth, high-precision 4K 60p/50p and faithful 4:2:2 10-bit 4K video “for the first time in the world.” The Panasonic Lumix GH5 will also features “6K PHOTO,” which extracts approximately 18-megapixel still images from ultra-high-quality video with approximately nine times the pixel count of Full-HD. 

Phase One kept pushing the megapixels at the photokina show in Cologne, Germany this morning, announcing the new IQ1 100MP medium format digital back. Phase One also announced two new Schneider Kreuznach Blue Ring lenses today: the 150mm f/2.8 IF and 45mm f/3.5.

Countless things appear at photokina that are not cameras, lenses, tripods, bags, materials, or lighting and studio. It’s part of the magic of the place. Calling this category “accessories” won’t do, because for most of us, “accessories” consist mostly of small things in blister packs: cable releases, lens caps, that sort of thing. At photokina, it can...

Photokina 2014 in Germany has been covered widely on the Internet already—including our own extensive reporting on the show on Shutterbug.com—so there’s no need for me to rehash the major announcements from the event, such as the latest full-frame cameras from Canon and Nikon and the like. My photo report here is aimed at sharing some wider ranging thoughts and perspectives on this important biennial show and what it told us about photography today and where it might be heading tomorrow.