Happy Travails

CES 2012: The Biggest Camera Innovation Came From Polaroid's Android Camera

The biggest advance in cameras came not from the mainstream camera makers, but from a defunct company whose storied brand is being revitalized: Polaroid. It took an ODM phone out of Taiwan which had married Android and a touch screen to a larger telephoto lens normally seen on point & shoots, slapped its brand on it, and voila! the phone of the future is emerging.

You can read about it in the New York Times (which provided the photo above) and in my favorite camera site, Digital Photography Review. More photos here, and below, where I share a few I took.  

The camera is small and thin enough for pocketable use. I really like the Android inside, an interface I find familiar. It is WiFi only, not 3G, which somewhat limits its usefulness, but makes it much less expensive to travel with overseas and own as an occassional passion. Unfortunately it is a bit slow, and cheaper Android devices like this one are notorious for less precise touch screens than the iPhone. So: a good first shot, more to do to make it commercially successful.  

The implications, however, are huge: camera innovation will now pass from the mainstream makers to a new breed.

Every year the mainstream TV and camera companies hawk their wares, to general disappointment. Two years ago I wrote about 3DTV and why it would be a bust.  It has been. Even the glasses-free 3DTV is too nascent to win, yet. Last year I wrote about Android tablets as e-readers and concluded that Kindle was safe. It sure was, and now has become the second most popular tablet via its own Android version, the Kindle Fire. 

This year all lot of action was around cameras. Nikon had their new mirrorless entrants, annoyingly not in a common format like APS-C or 4/3, but a new 1" sensor. (Canon later launched their entrant, in yet another sensor size, 1.5". Such is their view of "innovation.") Sony is finally shipping its mirrorless NEX7, part of their NEX line, which I have reviewed.

The iPhone has crushed the point & shoot market, and the camera makers are making a retreat to larger sensors and higher prices. They still do not get it.

I talked to camera insiders of why Canon and Nikon don't seem to get it, and they replied that they still believe their proprietary processing and coloration are their special sauce. What makes the iPhone 4S exceptional is not its 8 megapixel camera with decent color processing, but all the apps to enhance the photos and connectivity to share them. 

It is a general theme that "software is cannibalizing everything", and photo processing is no exception. Free apps like Instagram have popularized filters, and apps like Camera+ (for a mere $1) add a whole Photoshop of filters to modify photos. Now crappy photos can be made to look incredible on a few clicks, and then shared. The color schemes of the high-end cameras matter little in the mass market. The iPod showed how crappier, compressed digital music crushes high-fidelity when it adds mobility and ease of play. Simply put:

Filters are the new Photoshop

There is a way for them to fight back, but involves software not hardware. It may be too late. That software is now more likely to emerge in the smartphone ecosystem, not the camera world.  

In Search of the Killer Data SIM in Japan

Japan is considered a black hole for global travelers since their mobile standards are different. GSM phones need not apply. But there is a way to go: get a 3G data SIM and use VoIP. Can it be done?

Before flying over I found that SoftBank Mobile would "rent" a 3G SIM for a combined price of ¥1575/day for unlimited data. With the current exchange rate, that prices out over $20/day, a bit pricey, but often a better bargain than for broadband in a hotel. Also, I was to stay at the Imperial - a great hotel, with good broadband, but one which paradoxically did not have WiFi in the rooms. What to do with my iPad, iPhone and NexusOne travel phone? (For that problem, I brought along an Apple Airport Express, which is working great to connect everything; my business partner in the next room over is using it, as the signal seeps to surrounding rooms.)

The SoftBank SIM is something you need to reserve in advance or pick up a the airport. My travel companions were too anxious to spend much time finding the SoftBank booth, and twice when I asked locals at the airport where it was, they sent me to generic phone rental booths, neither of which had the SoftBank SIM deal. In the end we caught the next train to Tokyo, with the Japanese of us assuring me I could find what I needed in the city. It turns out you can, but only at the SoftBank HQ in the Roponggi district, a bit inconvenient.

Chagrined, they lent me one of their MiFi-type units, which cost the same per day and had the benefit of creating a little hotspot for all my devices. (I had planned instead to turn on the WiFi hotspot feature in the Nexus phone to connect my iPad remotely.) You can pick these up at the generic phone booths at the airport. Problem solved, if a bit inelegantly. Next time I will find the SoftBank booth and "rent" their 3G SIM and avoid lugging the extra MiFi unit around.

Re-Thinking the Travel Camera

Good news: Sony is now shipping their top-of-the-line NEX 7. It integrates all the various bits around the 5N, including a built-in viewfinder and flash, plus has 24 megapixels and very fast speed. It also shows their future direction, to build all the bits in.

David Pogue of the New York Times gadget section loves this camera, and compares it and the 5N favorably to the latest entrant into the mirrorless camera space, Samsung. Like Sony, Samsung chose the APS-C sensor, which delivers better pictures than the 4/3 camera group and much better than the new Nikon mirrorless cameras; but Pogue thought either the 5N or the 7 were better choices. He also recommended the new Canon S100, an up-scale point & shoot rather than a smaller SLR equivalent like the 5N. Others have also raved about the 7. 

The other news is a new 24mm fast lens - a Zeiss f1.8 for NEX. Point & shoot enthusiasts seldom realize what they are missing with small lenses and high f-stops: the photo benefot of a tight depth-of-field. Using an f2 lens (like the Canon S100) or an f1.8 (like the new Zeiss) allows the photographer to focus on the subject and blur the foreground and background.  

The Zeiss suffers however from being like a conventional SLR lens - a little big. I would prefer a 30mm f2 lens that is much thinner, more like a pancake lens. Rumor has it that such a lens is coming for the NEX line. Then the NEX 5N or 7 with that lens is a great - and pocketable - walkaround camera, with the 55-210mm zoom for long shots.  

Re-re-imagining the Travel Camera

My prior post suggested using the 18-200mm zoom with the Sony NEX 5N as a great travel camera combo.  The lens is a beast, however, overwhelming the lithe camera body; although convenient when not wishing to swap lenses, is so huge it defeats the purpose of a small SLR-quality travel camera.  

Instead, consider the 55-210mm zoom, which is about the same size as the 18-55mm kit lens that comes with the 5N body.  Much easier for walkabouts.  

And for those of you who miss the viewfinder, you can buy an add-on viewfinder for the 5n, or move up to the NEX 7, which has a built-in viewfinder. (The 7 is currently unavailable due to supply problems, but production out of Thailand is ramping up again.) The 7 is much more expensive than the 5n, and reviews have been mixed for the extra cost. I prefer the 5n and the kit lens plus the 55-210 zoom.  

More lenses are coming out, including some really compact ones like a rumored 30mm f2, which would behave like a classic 50mm lens.  (The APS-C sensor of the NEX line has a 1.6 multiplier, so a 30mm lens acts like a 50mm lens on a full-frame sensor.) That would be a great walkabout lens, very fast and easy to use for most situations. 

Re-Imagining the Travel Camera

The travel camera is an essential today.  The area is robust, with superzooms getting smaller with faster sensors, like the new Canon 510HS 12x zoom in a small body.  

It is often said that the best camera is the one in your pocket, and this is fairly pocketable. But is it the right direction?  I have been carrying the delightfully small Canon 780 for several years, and while a 3x zoom, it is a marvelously small camera, easily lugged around - and yet I am drawn to the other camera essential, the smartphone.   

The iPhone has been a weapon of mass destruction.  It is rolling over wireless.  Walled Gardens have been opened, Nokia and RIM have been humbled, and markets not in the direct line of sight are stumbling – none more than digital cameras.  The vast majority of digital photos put up on the web are from the iPhone, not the little point & shoots. The iPhone 4S has raised the bar to the point it is making little sense to have a P&S around when you have the iPhone.  Maybe the photo giants like Canon, Nikon and Sony can retreat into super-zoom travel cameras and DSLRs, but they are then retreating into smaller markets. Is there an alternative?

Artefact Group has re-imagined the camera with the WVIL concept.  It has spurred a flurry of comment across the blogosphere.  This picture captures the essentials, which I can simplify into:

• an Android base with WiFi (or 3G) to open the camera to apps and connectivity
• a new lens system that uses folded lenses to extend focal length with mirrors to be much more compact
• an ecosystem that is formed around a new camera platform

Interesting is that a trend in digital cameras is approaching this idea: the mirrorless design that drops the SLR mirror and uses an electronic viewfinder, often called EVIL cameras. Mirrorless makes the lens closer to the body, making it thinner and the lens smaller.  Sony is the farthest along, and their recent NEX-5N is a huge leap, with am APS-C sensor like a DSLR, a  touchscreen body and a new line of small lenses. Rumor is they are working on even more compact lenses, perhaps using a folded mirror inside.

I took my Canon Rebel on a trip to Africa, using the light-weight 70-300MM DO lens, and got tremendously crisp pictures.  That lens is controversial but it worked supremely well.  The APS-C sensor in the Rebel extended the 300MM to an effective 480MM.

 

On a trip to Egypt I used instead the then-recent Canon 18-200MM zoom.  The lens is very convenient in range as a travel lens, and I never felt a need to go beyond the long end or less than the wide end ... but the pictures were soft.

 

Sony has a small NEX 18-200MM lens that reviews better than the Canon.  More here. The speed of the Sony approaches the great Canon 7D.  It is much lighter to use and has the same APS-C sensor. It is likely my next travel camera, with the iphone 4S as the quick P&S.  

 

In Search of the Killer Data SIM in Singapore

When the hotel wanted to charge S$26.50 ($21 US) per day for Internet, and it sucked, I knew I had to find a better solution. I had my iPad, my netbook and my smartphone to connect, and the hotel would only do one device at a time. Worse, WiFi was flaky in my room. Luckily, I had an unlocked smartphone that allowed tethering. It could turn into its own WiFi hotspot. 

Two years ago I scored a killer SIM in London. T-Mobile offered 5 days of unlimited 3G for free in a GBP10 prepaid package. When the five days ran out, a mere GBP2.50 (under $4 US) gave another five days. Now we're talking! Of course, there is a catch: about two minutes on an international call wiped out all the minutes. There are ways to make international calling free over 3G, but that is a topic for another time. 

Off I went, in search of a similar deal in Singapore. The concierge was a waste, so I headed down Orchard Street, the main tourist area, clean and well-lit at night.