Nikon stayed in the news this week after its surprise announcement that it will be acquiring RED, with a major firmware update for the Z9. FUJIFILM shows there are still more ways to have analog fun with instant film with the INSTAX MINI 99. And, we highlight a bunch of hands-on reviews published this week, including the Sony BURANO, Pentax’s monochrome DSLR, and more.
FUJIFILM INSTAX MINI 99 shows that instant film will always be fun
Instant film photography can’t die because it is simply too much fun. Even with the general concept being so well known, and a proliferation of instant film cameras and printers from FUJIFILM and other brands, there are still more fun things we can do with them. FUJIFILM’s INSTAX MINI 99 adds a new spin on the genre with controllable LED lights that will help add another element of creativity to your instant prints.
This stylish instant camera is going to look great slung over your shoulder for everyday carry and has plenty of additional features that won’t be found in the more basic INSTAX line. The biggest change is the addition of a Color Effect Dial to control colored LEDs inside the camera. It allows the camera to create analog color effects directly on the prints themselves. The options are Faded Green, Warm Tone, Light Blue, Soft Magenta, Sepia, and Light Leak.
The MINI 99 also features brightness control to dial-in your exposure, and there is a manual “aperture” control that will apply a vignette to your final images. With bulb mode, double exposure, and plenty of other easy-to-use features built in, this INSTAX camera is going to be a joy to use and provide plenty of creative options for even more instant film fun.
Nikon updates flagship Z9 with firmware version 5.0
Firmware version 5.0 is the latest major update for Nikon’s flagship Z9 mirrorless camera and brings with it enhancements to sports and portrait functions, as well as a slew of changes for enhanced operability.
Sports photographers will enjoy an added function to Auto Capture that lets you dial-in a shooting start date/time. This should help reduce battery consumption for any of those remote cameras you need to leave set up far in advance of the event. Auto Capture can also now use the DX crop mode and benefits from the Airplane AF subject-detection mode. Even more good news is the addition of a low-speed option in the High-Speed Frame Capture+ menu and common LED and signboard lighting frequencies have been added to the flicker-reduction settings.
Portraiture will benefit from a Rich Tone Portrait Picture Control that renders a more vivid image than standard Portrait, although it maintains details in the highlights better and maintains detail in the subject’s skin. It’s designed for users who will perform retouching later on. More support for the Profoto A10 is also added in this update.
Beyond that, there multiple smaller changes have been made to the operation of the Z9. A notable one is that menu banks can have photo and video separated instead of linked. There’s a lot to read about and you should definitely check out the notes while you download and install it on your camera.
All the reviews…
Every week, we highlight the best news of the week. However, we do spend a lot of time reviewing much of this new gear and putting together articles and videos to show off the capabilities of this tech. This week was a busy one for reviews and a light one for news, so I’m going to spend some time highlighting the reviews.
The Sony BURANO gets taken for a spin. This new cinema camera fills the gap between the flagship VENICE 2 and the more common FX series and blends features from both in a way that may make it the ideal camera for independent productions. It is also a great fit for filmmakers who want the quality of the VENICE in a more mobile package.
Want professional audio solutions for nearly any camera? TASCAM came up with a more universal solution—the shoe-mounted CA-XLR2d XLR Microphone Adapter. Read about how you can improve your on-camera audio with this tool.
Regarding our written reviews, we have an exciting one—a hands-on with the Pentax K-3 Mark III Monochrome DSLR. Monochrome digital cameras are a rare breed and any time one shows up, especially when made by legacy brands such as Pentax, they are well worth investigating.
Finally, our last review of the week is a bit different from our usual. It’s a review of the just-announced ELAC Adsum Debut ConneX powered speakers. These bring a stylish spin to what were already well-received speakers.
In other news…
-
Faster storage is always useful, especially as content creators continue to demand more and more resources to get the job done. For some of the best performance from your PC, you can consider the Crucial T705 NVMe Internal SSD, which uses PCIe 5.0 to achieve read and write speeds of 14,500 and 12,700 MB/s, respectively.
-
World Backup Day is coming up on March 31. Are you ready to take the pledge?
Thanks for stopping by! See you next week.
0 Comments