PRODUCT REVIEWS

What's New in Photo and Imaging Tools

PUBLISHED WINTER 2004

Hasselblad Distagon 40mm

In Hasselblad's classic 6 x 6 cm format, 40mm is a much-coveted focal length. Its angle of view, which is close to 21mm on a 35mm camera, is ideal for interiors, architecture, landscapes, and environmental portraiture. The Zeiss-made Hasselblad Distagon 40mm f/4 CFE IF offers this feature. The lens's electronic interface can transfer data to 203FE and 205FCC models, thus permitting aperture-priority autoexposure. Other upgrades include improved multiple coatings and internal focusing via a floating element, which enhances sharpness all the way down to the closest focusing distance of 20 inches. This valuable redesign also optimizes the lens for digital capture.

Adobe Photoshop CS

Part of the new Adobe Creative Suite (which also includes Adobe Illustrator, InDesign, GoLive, and Acrobat Pro), the latest revision of Photoshop is so much enhanced that Adobe couldn't just call it Photoshop 8.0. For starters, it allows you to manage your images, not just view them. You can display previews at any size; sort, rearrange, catalog, and search; and assign images keywords and customize their metadata. You can even perform batch functions straight from the browser. The application's built-in Adobe Camera RAW utility lets you open and edit nearly any camera's RAW file format without third-party software. With the Lens Blur filter you can alter a picture’s apparent depth of field, while Shadow/Highlight correction offers a sort of automated dodging and burning-in. Most major tools, including layers, now operate in 16-bit mode.

Phase One C1

The best RAW file converter for digital SLRs has become more accessible with this new release. Formerly called Capture One D-SLR, the software has blossomed into six versions catering to a variety of budgets. All function identically and share three essential workflow advantages: instant screen redraws, courtesy of stored image previews; the ability to apply different settings to separate photos in a single batch; and a processing engine that works in the background, allowing you to edit and process images at the same time. Other high-end features include the gray balance tool for correcting color cast; totally customizable color space and profile management; batch capture from a tethered camera (in some versions); and a variety of export formats and sizes. C1 is available for both Mac OSX and Windows.

MatchLight Pro

The hardest part of digitally compositing photos is making the foreground and background look like they've been shot from the same angle and in the same light. Enter the MatchLight Pro Photoshop plug-in, part of the MatchLight Digital Photography Toolkit 3.0. This very sophisticated cross-platform program accurately measures camera and light elevation, shooting position relative to the subject, and quality of light (from hard to diffused). How? With its multicolored Light Targets, which look like mini flying saucers. Here's how it works: While shooting your background images (whether by existing or controlled light), you make a test exposure with the Light Targets strategically placed in the scene. Back at your computer you run this calibration image through MatchLight. The software reads the geometry, shadows, and reflections of the Light Targets. Then it generates a "LightMap" diagram for your main (foreground) subject, with exact instructions for arranging and adjusting the lighting and positioning of both camera and subject, so they match the background.

Epson Perfection 3170

This new flatbed scanner offers the Perfection 3200's 48-bit color and 3200 pixels-per-inch (the most in its class). That high optical resolution lets the Perfection 3170 do double duty as a film scanner, for which both 35mm and medium-format adapters are available. (The big files are sped to your computer via its USB 2.0 connection.) You will need to spring for a transparency adapter that covers film sizes up to 4" x 5", but the 3170 has integrated color restoration and dust removal capabilities. Its "Smart Panel" interface provides pushbutton scan-to-e-mail, scan-to-Web, scan-to-OCR, and scan-to-print operations; a choice of "full auto," "home," and "professional" modes lets you match the level of control to your abilities and needs.

HP Photosmart 7760

HP got back into the six-color inkjet printing business with its Photosmart 7550, and this dramatically restyled successor carries on, offering up to 4800 dpi output. But there’s more to the Photosmart 7760 than photo quality. It has slots for all standard memory cards—no computer needed to print from a digital point-and-shoot—and you preview and select shots with a 1.8" integrated color LCD screen. You can make borderless prints up to a full 8 1/2" x 11" size. Display life with new HP Premium Plus photo paper (glossy or matte) is up to 73 years, a great improvement over HP's previous four-color models. Our favorite feature: The 7760 accepts an optional gray cartridge for richer black-and-white prints.

Epson Stylus Pro 4000

Don't let the name of this new printer fool you: It isn't just an upgrade of the Stylus Color 3000. The Stylus Pro 4000 is what size-conscious photographers have been waiting for, not only improving image quality, but filling in the considerable gap between the 13"-wide Stylus Photo 2200 and the 24"-wide Stylus Pro 7600. Its 17"-wide carriage is tailor-made for 16" x 24" prints from scanned 35mm film (though borderless printing is possible at a full 17"). Sound big and slow? The 4000 reportedly has the fastest print engine Epson has ever made, producing the longed-for 16" x 20" format at 1440 dpi in just over 10 minutes. You’d expect the new model to handle nearly any roll or cut-sheet media, but you wouldn’t expect its eight-channel print head. The extra channel means you can now load both photo black and matte black Epson Ultrachrome pigment-based inks—and the printer switches back and forth automatically, depending on the paper you’re using. Even better, the 4000 accepts the same double-size 220ml ink cartridges as the 7600. Other new features include automatic head alignment, nozzle check, and as-needed cleaning; and thousands of built-in ICC profiles.

Canon EOS Digital Rebel

Canon's stylish new EOS Digital Rebel gives you top-notch image quality, a choice of pro features, and compatibility with more than 50 Canon EF-mount autofocus lenses. If you’ve been waiting for the right moment to take the leap into digital, this could be it. The Digital Rebel is smaller and lighter than any other D-SLR out there. Dedicated buttons on the camera control ISO, white balance, AF point, aperture/exposure compensation, and drive mode. By turning the main dial you can set twelve different exposure modes, from full manual to full auto.

The Digital Rebel's optical viewfinder is bright and sharp, and images are displayed on its 1.8" color LCD monitor. You can zoom the image up to 10X to check details and sharpness, using four-way thumb keys to scroll up, down, or to the sides. The monitor is also where you access the camera’s tabbed menu system. A separate monochrome LCD panel displays camera settings and status, such as image quality, battery power, and the number of shots remaining.

The Digital Rebel has the same 6.3-megapixel CMOS sensor as the EOS-10D, and its DIGIC image-processing engine provides the same super-smoothness and low noise, maintaining good quality even at the top effective speed of ISO 1600. The camera provides autoexposure bracketing, custom white balance, and white-balance autobracketing, which gives you an after-the-fact choice between images with slight differences in overall warmth. You can pick two preset RGB processing parameters (normal and "more vivid") or program up to three RGB parameter sets with custom combinations of contrast, saturation, sharpness, and color tone. Or you can use the wider-gamut Adobe RGB 1998 color space.

The Digital Rebel lets you shoot universally readable JPEG images in three different sizes (large, medium, and small) and two quality settings (standard and fine). You can also save pictures in the RAW format. Unlike JPEG, the RAW format lets you change shooting parameters in your computer—yielding good output even from difficult exposures. Better yet, embedded in each RAW file is a medium-size (2.8-megapixel) JPEG that you can extract for editing and viewing purposes.

The Digital Rebel operates at 2.5 frames per second. The camera uses standard CompactFlash Type I/II or MicroDrive memory cards, including newly-available capacities of up to four gigabytes. Its seven-point AF system bests many SLRs in both speed and coverage. A 35-point evaluative metering system gives you dead-on exposures in just about every situation. The pop-up flash is taller than most built-in units, which makes it less likely that large lenses will cast a shadow into the subject area. When you need more power and/or control, you can mount accessory EOS Speedlites and take advantage of Canon’s wireless E-TTL flash system.

The camera is sold with the all-new 18–55mm EF-S lens (28–90mm equivalent in 35mm), the first of a new lens system optimized for the Digital Rebel’s smaller-than-35mm sensor. EF-S advantages: Optics will be smaller, lighter, cheaper, and available in wider effective focal lengths.