Are High End Compacts Back

Product photo of the Panasonic Lumix L10

Ricoh brought us the GR, Fuji the X100, Sony had the RX1. In fact most manufacturers have released at least one high end large censored compact.

Today Panasonic announce a MicroFourThirds sensor in a decent body paired with a quality Leica zoom lens. This has for me the all important viewfinder and looks a lot like the old classic L100.

Caernarfon Harbour in Wales, looking out to sea into the setting sun.  The island of Anglesey can be seen in the background.
Golden Light, Nikon S3 6mp compact, jpeg

I keep hearing rumours of Nikon high end compacts, there last bunch were pulled from release at the last moment, but the may be the start of something again.

Leica have proved with the Leica Q people will pay for a high end compact, and each Fuji X100 gets harder and harder to buy as they sell out despite higher and higher prices.

If you get the product right people will purchase.

Olympus OM3 Rumours

Product shot of Olympus OM3

Leica have been very successful with their black and white sensors in the Leica Q and M series cameras. Pentax have released one, and Phase have released a black and white digital back. In general if you want to try a back and white sensor camera its an expensive option.

With the recent Ricoh Gr back and white camera its now getting cheaper to get into this dedicated BW photography niche.

Now we are starting to see rumours about a possible back and white only Olympus OM3. This would be great if true. Its a risk but MicroFourThirds needs a bit of excitement introducing into the range, and maybe under the new leadership OM may take those risks.

New Nikkor telephoto zoom announcement

Product shot from Nikon of the new Nikon Nikkor Z 120-300mm f/2.8 T. VR S lens.  The picture has a title that says development.

It’s been a couple of years since we have seen any new telephotos from Nikon. Nikon has produced some stunning new lens recently and it’s going to be interesting to see what new technology is going to be included. Nice to see a built in 1.4 teleconverter as well so this is going to be an extremely useful lens for people. At f/2.8 its going to be expensive but this looks to be very sweet and capable lens.

Are vinyl records out selling other media?

Lady dressed in vintage 1940's outfit looking at a vintage store clothes rack.

Vintage is in.

And vintage music media is also very popular. You will hear that vinyl records are now outselling all other physical media. This sounds like a surprising statement and it needs looking into.

Maybe a better question is what are people listening to?

Well for most its streaming, then there’s those who buy Flac/mp3 etc files. For physical media most people are listening to CD’s so how come the headline?

Well many people are buying records to collect, people who do not even have record players. Then lets look at that original statement and what do they mean its out selling other media, well by value it is leading the charge, but with many records now costing £30 to £50 a record, while a new CD can often be picked up for £8. That’s a big difference. You need to sell three to five CD’s to equate to the value of one vinyl record.

Physical Media, owning or licensing

Picture of the famous music man of Lincoln, very friendly guy always seen with a smile on his face.

I have mentioned before that I still buy DVD’s of films and series I like, and I also still buy music on CD and vinyl.

Sales do seem to be growing and it was interesting to see more films and series being removed from Amazon that people had bought as digital streams, now their purchases are gone.

So remember unless you have the media file downloaded DRM free or the physical media you likely license the software and not own it; and it be taken away from you.

May Day

Morris Dancers leaping into the air.
Dancing in Air

Mayday, May Poles, Morris Dancers; we have a lot of history here in the UK and some of our traditions are still maintained by volunteers.

If your in the UK today, I hope you enjoyed your bank holiday and took advantage of the events in a city, town or village near you.

Coffee Shops

Tables outside a coffee shop, several of the tables of occupants drinking coffee and having a chat.

Whenever I am in a city or town, I look out for independent coffee shops. Away from the uniform chain shops that occupy the high street I find interesting record shops, coffee shops, secondhand shops and sometimes even camera shops, yes they still exist.

Often the buildings have more character and there are often photo opportunities.