Michael Woodford and Tsuyoshi Kikukawa (smiling the days before the fraud scandal)

It ended like we expected it: The three Olympus managers that were convicted in the famous Olympus accounting fraud scandal will definitely not go in jail. Engadget reports that Tsuyoshi Kikukawa received a three-year suspended sentence, in light of the fact that he didn’t make the original decision to hide the firm’s financial losses. And Masatoshi Kishimoto and Toshiro Shimoyama, have escaped all charges because, as reported by Kyodo News a couple of months ago, too much time has elapsed since the original crime.

Meantime Michael Woodford the ex-CEO that discovered the fraud wrote a book you can find at Amazon (Click here). More important The Financial Times speculates Woodford got $15.5 million from Olympus to avoid any trial.

The story is now over (from a legal point of view) and Olympus new management has to focus on strengthen the camera business. Let’s hope the soon to be announced new OMD and FT cameras will help them to achieve their goals!

Source: Bloomberg.

Broadcast Asia 2013: Blackmagic Design Pocket Cinema and 4K camera update from Dan Chung on Vimeo.

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Blackmagic manager confirmed in that video that the new Cinema Pocket Camera will ship this month (July 25 according to BHphoto). Watch out for the postman! :)

Blackmagic Pocket Cinema preorders in USA at Adorama (Click here), BHphoto (Click here) and in Germany at Technikdirekt, in France at pbs-video. In Sweden at macoteket, scandinavianphoto, protel.jetshop, webhallen.

First news: The Olympus E-P5 superkit (with lens and EVF) is in Stock via third party resellers at Amazon (Click here).

Second news: The brand new Panasonic G6 got tested at DxOmark (Click here). The camera may be new but the sensor is already well known. That’s why it earns the same score of the predecessor. We have to wait for the GX7 to see a brand new sensor in use!

As you all know phase detection focusing is one of the main area of interests that Olympus and Panasonic are focusing on. Particularly Olympus needs that to have full Four Thirds lens support on Micro Four Thirds cameras. And the next MFT cameras are “rumored” to have on sensor phase detection. We already had a couple of cameras from Sony, Canon, Nikon with such AF pixels on sensor. But there was always a trade off. You have to “give-up” some space and therefore sacrifice resolution for the dedicated AF pixels. More AF pixels you add (to increase the AF performance) more RGB pixels you loose. That was the equation until today:

Canon just announced the new 70D ($1199 DSLR). We wouldn’t care about it if there would not be a new amazing feature. The 70D features a “Dual Pixel CMOS AF” sensor. And the amazing thing is that every pixel can do both at the same time: Capture the light for the actual image, and act as phase detection agent! A detailed description can be read at Dpreview: According the Canon the EOS 70D’s Dual Pixel CMOS AF system has the following key characteristics:

• Usable phase detection AF area covers 80% of the frame horizontally and vertically
• AF works at apertures down to F11
• AF works in light levels as low as 0 EV
• Can work with face detection to keep moving subjects in focus

This sounds like a great solution! I am sure Sony sensors will have a similar solution that will be implemented by future Olympus cameras.

The video made by Samsung shows us in a funny way one of the reason why Mirrorless is having a hard time to convince people that they are as good as DSLR cameras. Chapeau Samsung for making such a video!

From my personal experience I can tell you that this is definitely true. Even more serious photographers sometimes buy tremendous stuff without really needing it. Just because they “think” it’s better.

Personal note: I shot pics of my son with the E-P1 and the [shoplink 15659]Nokton 25mm f/0.95[/shoplink]. Not because these are the best cameras and lenses on market…but because that’s all I need!

Image source Fotointern.ch.

If you have a massive amount of money to spend on a new Cine Zoom lens than you may be interested to learn that Zeiss announced the new CZ.2 28-80 T2.9. It has what ZEISS calls a “sweet spot effect” (uniformity of illumination) when used on Super 35 sensors and are “future-proofed” for next generation digital cinema cameras that may have larger sensors (Source: Fdtimes).

T front diameter is 95 mm, the focus rotation angle is almost 300 degrees, it is conform to “4K production standards” and cover a resolution of 4096 x 2160 with no distortion. The ZEISS Compact Zoom lenses weigh 2.5 to 2.8 kilograms (5.5 to 6.2 pounds).

Oh yes…the price…that’s the problem: You have to pay €14,900 or US$19,900 (excluding VAT)!

P.S.: List CP.2 for Micro Four Thirds at BHphoto (Click here).