Roger Cicala from Lensrentals posted some thoughts about Sony’s sensor strategy based on the latest news that also the new Olympus E-M5 is actually using a Sony made sensor. Robert compared the Sony situation with that from Kodak ages ago: “They were cutting edge developing first dry plates and then film, releasing ‘consumer’ cameras that brought photography to the masses, and making everyone’s prints. They dominated the photographic and movie industries for nearly 100 years.”

I don’t know, on one side I am happy to see Sony ruling the sensor technology and business, on the other side it’s a bit pity that they are not really pushing their own camera business. Things are going a bit slow there and it almost looks like their focus is on selling sensors instead of cameras. Anyway, we are close to Photokina and Sony may show us the exact contrary!

One more thing: Lexar announced that it will join the Sony XQD technology (via ThePhoBlographer).

Richard Gale made the cinema housing for the NEX 5N you can see here on top. EosHD posted the news and writes: “It essentially turns the tiny toy-like NEX 5N into a mini Red. Advantages include a secure full sized HDMI port, cooling system, integrated Sony monitor, robust build quality, better handling and protection for the camera itself from drops, etc. As you can see, looks wise it is quite an eye opener too, turning the NEX 5N into something much closer to a digital cinema camera.”

It transform your NEX-5n in a sort of small RED camera. Existing owners of the NEX 5N can buy the kit sub £1000. As soon we find more info and first preorder options I will post them here on SAR!

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Sony NEX-5n shop links at [shopcountry 8452].

Via 43rumors I found a way to control SLT and DSLR cameras with an iPhone remote controller APP. You need these two things: A Triggertrap Mobile Dongle (Click here) and a Triggertrap connction cable (Click here). The Triggertrap APP (here on iTunes) allows you to control the camera with the following features:

* Time Lapse
* Eased Timelapse (timelapses with acceleration!)
* Distance-lapse (take a photo every 30 ft/m)
* Vibration and shock sensors
* Sound detection (Clap to take a photo!)
* Facial Recognition sensor
* Motion detection
* Magnetic & metallic detectors
* Long-Exposure HDR**
* Long-Exposure HDR Timelapse
* Star Trail mode
* Cable Release (press to take a photo) which also supports Long-exposure shots (exposures of up to 24 hours!)

The Triggertraps website shows the supported cameras. No NEX camera is included for now.

I am pretty sure Nikon, Canon, Sony and maybe Pentax will bring us plenty of new Full Frame cameras at Photokina. And the battle will be particularly tuff in the FF entry-level segment. While Sony will price the A99 (or A88) somewhere between $2.500 and $2.800 Nikon and Canon are “rumored” to price it at $2.000 and maybe even lower. Reminder, the Sony FF camera will have much more advanced features!

Falk Lumo (Click here) is a well known Pentax user but it’s worth to read his latest post about the Full Frame future. According to him APS-C DSLR/SLT have no more sense to exist. Photokina will focus on cheaper FF models and he says “Photokina 2012 may start a trend for dSLRs to be full frame (only).”

And for Photokina 2014 (yes in two years) he says that FF will “become mainstream above $1,000, in a more compact form factor” while “Mirrorless SLDs and large sensor compact cameras dominate the segment between $500 and $1,000, mobile phones below.”

I don’t think that APS-C DSLR will disappear any time sure but in my opinion Sony should also think to introduce a FF Mirrorless model. That would be something that finally could convince Canon and Nikon pro’s to switch over to Sony or not?

Yesterday Sony announced the new faster XQD cards (Press release here). The first generation XQD cards had a write speed of 125MB/s and the only camera capable of using them is the Nikon D4. This is the kind of super speedy cards you will be able to use on the next Full Frame SLT camera from Sony. The 24 Megapixel FF sensor is rumored to have a 10-12fps speed and you will need those cards to get the best out of it! And it comes for a price. The current 125MB/s cards are priced at $120 for the 16GB version (here at Amazon) and $230 for the 32GB version (here at Amazon). The newer faster cards will cost ¥60,000 (around $754) for the 64GB card and ¥40,000 ($503) for the 32GB model.

Yep, cute prices :(

The E-M5 sensor…from Sony!

Back in February Olympus announced the popular Olympus E-M5 camera. They didn’t unveil the sensor manufacturer that they said was not Panasonic. Yesterday Olympus President Hiroyuki Sasa “confessed” that the sensor has been made by Sony (Source: Yahoo Japan).

So after Nikon (for example the D800), Pentax (K-5) and Ricoh (See some GXR modules) we now have Olympus on board. Sony is far away from becoming the DSLR and Mirrorless camera market leader but they are now close to dominate the global sensor market!

RX100 rules the rankings and shipping in two weeks:
BHphoto (Click here) finally reported a shipping date for the new Sony RX100. Ant the RX100 remains the most sold overall(!) digital camera at Amazon US (click here to see the ranking).

That said I have to report something interesting about the sensor size definition:
Like him or not his blog is many times more popular than SAR. And on his website (Click here and scroll down) he just launched a heavy Sony attack he launched on he website. He writes about the RX100: “Sony is deceptive when claiming a “1 inch” sensor. Its image area is only 8.8 x 13.2 millimeters (0.34″ x 0.52″), so where is the FTC when you need them to stop this baloney?”
Let’s start with the naked truth, he is certainly RIGHT by saying that it’s not exactly an 1 inch sensor. But there are a few things he didn’t mention.

1) First, the sensor of the RX100 has the same size of that of the Nikon 1 and I found it weird that he didn’t attack Nikon before. Nikon itself also says it’s a 1 inch sensor (press release here at dpreview) and on Ken’s Nikon 1 preview he didn’t deserve Nikon the same critic. Maybe I missed it to find it or he forgot to mention it.

2) Wikipedia reports that “Sensor formats of digital cameras are mostly expressed in the non-standardized “inch” system as approximately 1.5 times the length of the diagonal of the sensor“. And David Pogue of the New York Times states that “the actual sensor size is much smaller than what the camera companies publish – about one-third smaller.”
In short…EVERYONE is cheating :)

This is just to say that Ken is right when saying that there is a need for a clear standard, but it’s pretty unfair to attack Sony on that matter when actually everybody (Nikon, Canon and others) do the same. Please do not transform this in a pro or against KEN debate. My only intention was to make it clear for you how this sensor size definition actually works.

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RX100 Preorders at Amazon US, Adorama, BHphoto, Amazon Germany, Amazon France and Jessops.