Topic devoted to CES 2012 coverage.
I still have some more photos to go through and get posted.
Couple of video clips:
This is some random product demos:
This one is some 3D printing - that is, one is the output of Casio's 3D printer, and others are lenticular-type printing.
The outside of the CES multi-building complex is ringed with storage crates, cranes and semi trucks. This photo is just one tiny pile of empty crates. There is no way to convey the immense size and scope of CES.
There were over 3,100 separate vendors occupying about 1.9 million square feet of space (or 176,515 sq meters) in separate locations: Las Vegas Hilton, North Hall, Central Hall, South Hall (two floors) and more rooms and floors at The Venetian Hotel conference center.
This was my 3rd or 4th time attending CES. Previously I went for only 2 days but this time was there for 3 1/2, yet felt I saw much less than in past years. That was mostly because I spent my first two days working on business related conversations with selected vendors, and that was time consuming. (I built a prototype product that I showed to some vendors seeking their feedback - the feedback I received was positive and that was what I needed to hear to move onto the next step. Sorry, can't say what it is yet.)
Another non-photo related item. I turned into the Samsung booth just as a hit Korean "all girl music group" showed up as part of Samsung's promotional efforts. I never did see them - the mob of people and the wall of cameras, shown in the photo, was amusing, though.
A lot of the vendors - not just big ones - hire celebrities to attract attention to their booth. This works okay for them, I guess. I heard of a robot vendor that brought in Justin Bieber, oddly enough. Good for them, but the other vendors in the area were not happy, complaining that they had few visitors for two hours, and some were talking about asking for a partial refund from CES.
StreamTV is, from what the person there told me, an R&D business that has a group focused entirely on 3D technology. They do not build the tablets or TVs themselves but license their technology to others. They were demonstrating glasses free 3D tablet screens and 3D television. I am a fan of 3D, so I am biased - but I thought this was some of the nicest looking glass free 3D that I saw at CES. The company has also developed a real time 2D to 3D conversion system that works very well. I understand they also have a non-real time converter that is intended for higher quality conversion of old TV shows and movies to 3D. I watched a demo reel on the glass free TV and the quality was excellent.
This is a photo of their demo 10" tablet computer screen.
The next item is not a camera item - but I am interested in seeing how embedded systems are being put into many kinds of appliances and devices. While having processing power enables many new features, I find the user interfaces tend to get more complex - and just doing something simple becomes difficult. For example, on old ovens, we had an analog timer that was set just by rotating the dial to the number of minutes. On digital ovens, we have to press up and down buttons and hold them down for a while until reaching the number of minutes. Clumsy!
This particular unit is an appliance made by Samsung (Samsung makes everything). I suspect the user interface on this is pretty good, in spite of my comments above. I say that because I thought Samsung did a very good job with the NX200 camera interface.
I did not take many photos of whole booths; wish I had as it would help to see the scope of CES. This is a decent shot of part of the Nikon booth. Nikon had models up on a stage, giving you something to shoot while checking out the Nikon cameras.
On my flight to Las Vegas, NV, I read through a couple of Nikon manuals, and also the Samsung NX200 manual. Samsung has everyone beat with the best camera manual I have ever seen. But Nikon manuals are also really good. The other camera manufacturers need to step up and produce better manual and the should look to Nikon and Samsung to see how they could do a much better job.
This next item is not camera oriented, exactly. It's the Nokia Lumia 900 which I guess is likely to ship in March. It is my understanding that Nokia is putting a lot into the cameras built into these phones with 8 megapixel sensors and Carl Zeiss lenses. I have an Android phone myself, but I found the Windows Phone interface very nice - its definitely worth checking these out.
I have more things to post but I got really sick last week and am still just getting over this - plus I am now behind in everything. Oh well.
This is the back of the Canon "booth" at the 2012 CES where you can check out Canon's telephoto and zoom lenses on actual cameras. Directly behind me is the Sony "booth" (I put that in quotes because these are enormous "booths") and when I took this photo, Sony had the music group "Earth, Wind & Fire" performing on the Sony stage. Guess where everyone had those Canon lenses pointed?
This next item is a very cool mount from Manfrotto. As we all want to mount extra stuff on our tripods (lights, mics, 2nd camera), lots of vendors have come up with various mounting brackets. This little ball mount has holes all over it, in to which you can insert extender tubes. Using this, you can mount just about anything, anyway you want.
Fuji X Pro 1 manual available http://www.fujifilm.com/support/digital_cameras/manuals/pdf/index/x/lens_fx18_fx35_fx60_manual_01.pdf
To add to point about 1080/24p above. There is sadly no manual control in video mode.
Thanks for the write up on the SnapitHD Cam. It was good to meet you! See: www.snapithd.com for more information which is coming on the 360 Cam ;)
Nikon = Cylon
SnapitHD has this interesting fish eye lens, all weather camera, with a huge field of view. They've got software that processes the images so you don't see the gigantic fish eye view but only a perspective corrected section. You can then scroll around the view - without having to move the camera. Since this camera sees everything, I ended up in a self portrait all bent out of shape.
The image can be sent via WiFi or wired networks or even cellular.
This is a slick camera rig out of startup business, being shown in the Eureka Tech Hall at CES/Venetian. The product is a machined light weight bar, with handles, that is holding the two cameras and accessories. Comes in different sizes.
Several cameras can be mounted at any position along the bar. As a new 3D enthusiast, this set up caught my eye since it makes for simple adjustment of the interaxial distance (in English, the horizontal distance between the dual camera lenses for stereoscopic 3D).
The mount is also used to hold say, a still camera and a real video camera, for event photographers who need to shoot both; or, can be used for multi-camera panorama shots and perhaps even a 360 degree set up. More info at www.parazzio.com
Nikon D4 skeleton.
Nikon D4 sensor.
Nikon D4 ASIC.
Photo of sample lens next to JVC 4K camcorder, plus the electronic sign on the wall.
There was one more question about the ASA/ISO rating for low light on the X Pro 1. I did not get specifics but I heard from someone who said that the X Pro 1 has lower noise than the 5D at some of the very high ISO settings (don't know which settings though). Anyway, that would be an impressive achievement in a much smaller camera than the 5D!
Personally, I like small cameras. I completely understand why people like their 5Ds and soon, their Nikon D4s, but I now have a bias towards small, having carried my Canon XH A1, with two shot gun mics, on many a trip!
Some answers to earlier questions
I will probably post more photos later. Time for a late dinner now!
Thank you edwardm
The JVC 4k is a "reference exhibit" which means no price info. What they did say is that it has a 1.25" (about 32mm) 8.9 megapixel sensor. I assume they mean 1/1.25 sq in but that is not what the display said.
@Edwardm Could you add some information about JVC 4K camcorder with intercheangable lens? Price, settings, etc.. Thank you
@edwardm - if possible ask how video is achieved - how the camera downscales it's image for video.. Though quite possibly they have no idea about that. It would also be good to know if they have incremental stops of shutter speeds aswell (adjustable from menu or something like that?).
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