Sony unveils next HD camcorder for consumers
www.zdnet.com
The high-definition camcorder, which was pretty space-age in 2005, will become more common over the next two years.
Sony showed off in Tokyo this week an HD camcorder that’s lighter and smaller than the company’s first consumer HD camcorder and, perhaps more importantly, costs less. The HDR-HC3 will sell for 160,000 yen, or $1,400, less than the $1,800 price tag on Sony’s HD-HC1, its current HD camcorder for consumers.
Japanese consumers will be able to buy the HDR-HC3 starting March 3. Although Sony did not specify a U.S. release date, the company typically follows through with U.S. versions anywhere from six to 12 months later.
So far, only a token number of HD camcorders have hit the market, and most of them cost $2,000 or more. But that will change over the course of 2006 and 2007. Prices are coming down, and more people have digital TVs that can play HD content.
Sanyo grabbed attention at the January Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas with its Xacti HD1 camcorder. That product doesn’t have nearly as many features as the other HD camcorders, but it costs around $800.
Panasonic, which already has a high-end HD camcorder, plans on coming out with an HD camcorder that will be about the same size or smaller than today’s mini-DV cameras in 2007. These systems will likely sell for less than $1,000.
Silicon Valley start-up Ambarella, meanwhile, has come out with a chipset that will let manufacturers produce HD cameras for around $800. Cameras with Ambarella’s chips could come out toward the middle of this year, according to Ambarella executives.
The Sony HDR-HC3 weighs 500 grams (a little over a pound), making it 26 percent smaller and 30 percent lighter than the HDR-HC1. Like the current model, the new HDR-HC3 supports HDV1080i video.
The new camera will also support HMDI output, which means it can be connected directly to an HDTV, something the current camera doesn’t do.
Along with shooting videos, the HDR-HC3 will take 4-megapixel still photos, similar to other hybrid cameras.
Although many camera manufacturers are moving toward hard drives and flash memory, Sony’s new camera relies on mini-DV tape.
Hayashi Sakawa of CNET Japan reported from Tokyo. CNET News.com’s Michael Kanellos reported from San Francisco.
February 22nd, 2006
Photo finish in the digital world
By MELISSA LEE/For the Lincoln Journal Star
Not too long ago, customers would walk into Rockbrook Camera & Video and ask sales associate John Keller whether it was possible to develop film without a darkroom.
Today, the question takes a new form:Â Can digital film be developed and printed without a computer?
The answer is still yes, but to Keller, this new query is a sign of an evolving photographic market.
“Film photography is finding a smaller and smaller niche,†he said. “Everything’s better and quicker with digital.â€
Customers clearly agree. Drawn by the convenience and speed that digital cameras offer, they’ve seen to it that films and darkrooms are nearly things of the past.
For many photography businesses, it’s digital or bust.
Photo giant Kodak announced in 2004 that it would stop selling its film camera; Nikon has followed a similar path.
In Lincoln, too, business owners say they’ve had to adapt to digital or risk closing their doors as the film market dwindles.
“If you don’t embrace digital, you’re going to go out of business,†said Jeff White, general manager of The Photo Shoppe, which has locations at 301 N. Cotner Blvd. and 40th Street and Old Cheney Road.
White estimates he develops only half as much film as he did just a few years ago. Customers now demand digital prints, a demand he’s accommodated to keep thriving.
At Rockbrook, 70th Street and Pioneers Blvd., digital cameras now outsell film cameras by a 300-to-1 margin, Keller said.
Rockbrook still offers professional film developing and printing but in the decade the store has been in Lincoln, it’s had to adapt to digital to stay afloat, he said.
Now, the business even offers a digital photography class, taught by Keller, that offers customers the chance to learn how to use high-tech digital equipment.
“We’re still successful,†he said.
Not all photography businesses have been so fortunate. Harman’s Camera Center, for example, closed in January 2004 after 30 years selling and processing film in downtown Lincoln.
At the time, owner Jim Harman blamed the closing partially on the rapid rise of digital photography.
It’s a trend that hasn’t always been friendly, according to University of Nebraska-Lincoln photojournalism lecturer Luis Peon-Casanova.
“We’re seeing a brutal change of technology,†he said. “It’s an amazing shift. Companies are re-inventing the way they do business.â€
Today’s customers seek instant gratification, Peon-Casanova said, and digital photography offers them just that: They can shoot and re-shoot until they like the results, then get their prints the same afternoon.
In the past couple of years, the College of Journalism and Mass Communications at UNL has switched almost entirely to digital, Peon-Casanova said, and photographers at the student newspaper no longer need a darkroom.
Art students, though, continue to work with film.
White worries they may have increasing difficulty finding suppliers and developers.
“There’s so much competition. The small labs are closing up,†he said. “Digital has made the difference.â€
February 22nd, 2006