I never use a lens cap with my DSLR. The reason? They are a nuisance. No matter how much in habit you are, there will be a time you will miss a good shot because the lens cap was on and it took some precious seconds to hastily remove it and stuff it in your bag. And sometime late, you will waste 15 minutes looking for where you kept it.

Also, I never use a hood. I know they reduce glare. But they are a problem themselves. They add vignetting for wide angle zooms. And, If they don’t, they don’t work at the highest zoom level! It also takes up precious space in your camera bag. Also, have you ever tried changing a filter with a hood on?

But here is a proposed design for an accessory may solve both of these issues. It’s called HoodCap and it has been designed by Rhie Hyi Joong and Lee Sang Hwa. HoodCap basically uses some magical wizardry to merge a lens hood into a lens cap. In a simple twist motion the Worm-Gear system opens the lens cap and makes it into a hood with petals, analogous to how a flower bud blooms into a flower.

Aside from the two problems mentioned above it also solves a basic problem people have with DSLR lenses. It allows you to use a lens without that unnecessary UV filter! If I had a lens cap on all the time I’d never want to put an extra layer of glass that practically does nothing to improve photos. For all I know, it might be reducing the light that goes into my expensive fast lens.

This indeed is a really smart design and if it works I wouldn’t be surprised if some major camera manufacturer integrates it into lens caps.

[via Gadget Lab]

This new camera from Lytro (a Light Field Camera) captures “all the light” on a particular shot and gives you a luxury to tweak your focus point later. If you have to do this using your regular camera, you’d need a ton of those to focus at different focus points on the scene and grab that information to be stored in multiple layers. Definitely not as easily.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7babcK2GH3I

Here’s a preview on how a picture captured using a Lytro camera looks like

There are more advantages to using a Light Field Camera, it starts off without any Shutter Lag and performs better in Low Light Areas where most cameras can only take grainy pictures (High ISO)
I so hope this camera is handy as well.

[Via ForeverGeek]

Want a 500mm mega telephoto lens without spending a bomb? Here is an option. It’s not high quality, it’s not optically stabilized but it does what it says! It maybe be a bit blurry, may have some vignetting but in the end you’re gonna upload it to Instagr.am where it’ll automagically look nice.

The kit comes with a matte black iPhone case which you can put on your iPhone. The lens can be latched onto the case and then you can use any camera app to take zoomed in pics at 500mm (35 mm equivalent). According to PhotoJojo, that’s around 8x for the iPhone’s built in camera. When you put on the lens, the camera app doesn’t auto-focus but the lens has a manual focus ring that you can use to focus and sharpen the image as a result. The kit also contains a collapsible table tripod and a cleaning cloth. The tripod lets you take steadier pictures and is light enough to carry around with the lens. You can see more pictures and samples ahead.

It’s compatible with both iPhone 4 (Verizon and AT&T both) as well as the older iPhone 3G and 3GS models. At $35, I’d recommend this to everyone as a fun accessory. Don’t expect too much of course.

[PhotoJojo via Wired]

This video beats them all. It shows a Flash Bulb firing, shot at 1052 Frames per second using a Phantom Camera. In slow motion. Wow. Just wow.

Crank up the Brightness to max.

[via CrunchGear]

Lexar has introduced 128 GB SD 133x SDXC Cards. The card is fast, fast enough for HD 1080p video. And of course, it’s stores more than hard drives in most netbooks these days. On a rough calculation you can store almost 60,000 10 Megapixel High Quality JPEG images on a card. If you only shoot still images, it’ll take a long long time before you fill up this card. It’ll set you back by $400, but that’s the price you need to pay for convenience. Official Press release ahead.

High-Capacity Lexar Professional 133x SDXC Cards Offer High-Speed Performance for Capturing, Storing, and Managing Extensive 1080p HD Video

Las Vegas, NV, January 3, 2011 – Lexar Media, a leading global provider of memory products for digital media, today announced new Lexar® Professional Secure Digital Extended Capacity (SDXC) memory cards. The new high-capacity Lexar Professional 133x SDXC cards enable the capture, storage, and transfer of extended lengths of 1080p high-definition (HD) video and continuous, rapid-fire image capture in a single, high-performance solution. The Lexar Professional 133x SDXC card is the first available in a 128GB capacity, and is also offered in a 64GB capacity. Both cards are speed rated at 133x, providing a minimum guaranteed transfer speed of 20MB per second, and feature a Class 10 speed designation. For additional information about Lexar Professional SDXC cards, visit www.lexar.com.

“The professional photography industry is at a point where digital photo- and video-capture methods are converging, meaning that professional shooters need a memory solution with the versatility and reliability to safely store both photos and videos,” said Pachi Chen-Wong, senior product marketing manager, Lexar Media. “The 64GB and 128GB Lexar Professional 133x SDXC cards combine high-speed performance with large capacities to offer solutions for professionals who shoot large volumes of high-resolution images and HD video.”

The Lexar Professional 133x SDXC memory cards are compatible with all SDXC-enabled devices. The cards include the latest version of award-winning Image Rescue software to help recover lost or deleted photo and video files. Professional photographers can now capture, store, and manage more of the photo and video content critical to their livelihoods.

Lexar Professional 133x SDXC cards provide consumers with the quality and reliability they have come to expect from Lexar Media. All Lexar product designs are tested in the Lexar Quality Labs, a group of facilities where all Lexar product designs undergo extensive testing to ensure performance, quality, compatibility, and reliability with more than 800 intended digital devices.

The Lexar Professional SDXC cards include a limited lifetime warranty and free, dedicated professional technical support. The new 64GB and 128GB Lexar Professional SDXC memory cards will be available in the first quarter of 2011 at leading retailers and on Lexar.com, with MSRPs of $399.99 and $699.99, respectively.

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About Lexar Media
Lexar Media is a leading designer, manufacturer, and marketer of NAND flash and DRAM memory products under the Lexar and Crucial® brand names. Lexar Media offers products in all major flash and DRAM memory categories, including USB flash drives, innovative backup drives, industry-leading memory cards for photography, and all popular form factors of memory cards for mobile devices. Under the Crucial brand, Lexar Media offers industry-leading solid-state drives (SSD) and more than 250,000 DRAM memory upgrades for 50,000 computer systems. For more information about Lexar brand products, visit www.lexar.com, and for Crucial brand products, visit www.crucial.com.

Lexar Media is vertically integrated with Micron Technology, one of the largest semiconductor manufacturers worldwide. Lexar Media, Inc. is a subsidiary of Micron Technology, Inc. Lexar Media is a division of Micron Europe Limited, a division of Micron Semiconductor Asia Pte. Ltd., and a division of Micron Japan, Ltd.

Lexar. When Memory Matters.™

About Micron
Micron Technology, Inc. is one of the world’s leading providers of advanced semiconductor solutions. Through its worldwide operations, Micron manufactures and markets a full range of DRAM, NAND and NOR flash memory, as well as other innovative memory technologies, packaging solutions and semiconductor systems for use in leading-edge computing, consumer, networking, embedded and mobile products. Micron’s common stock is traded on the NASDAQ under the MU symbol. To learn more about Micron Technology, Inc., visit www.micron.com.

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©2010 Lexar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. Information is subject to change without notice. Lexar, the Lexar logo, Image Rescue, and When Memory Matters are trademarks of Lexar Media, Inc. Crucial and the Crucial logo are trademarks of Micron Technology, Inc. All other brand or product names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

[via Imagine-Resource]