Alphatracks

I’ve been looking forward to the Ken Burns World War II documentary on PBS. I first became aware of Burns’ talents after watching his Civil War masterpiece some 17 years ago. I was mesmerized by The Civil War, enchanted by the hundreds of photos of famous and not-so-famous participants of that incredible struggle.

I’m a history buff, and WWII has been a special interest of mine, so naturally I tuned in to the first two episodes of Burns’ new seven part series. Called simply The War, it focuses on several WWII veterans and tells their story both at home and in combat.

It is great stuff, but somehow, I found it didn’t measure up to The Civil War. Don’t get me wrong. Burns certainly hasn’t lost his touch — the film is first rate and the stories are incredibly poignant. Nor do I mean any disrespect to the “greatest generation” who fought so bravely for the cause of freeedom in WWII.

Somehow, however, The War didn’t seem to have the same impact of The Civil War. I couldn’t quite figure out what was missing, but after watching tonight’s installment, it hit me. The Civil War was composed entirely of still images. In contrast, The War relies mostly on motion picture film shot during the conflict.

Now, I am a child of the sixties and like everyone else my age, I have watched untold hours of movies, TV shows, documentaries and home movies. I have wrote before how my original interest in photography grew out of studying film making. So I have nothing against a good film. So why do I feel that The Civil War was so much more interesting?

For me, the still images of The Civil War were far more haunting than the “moving pictures” of The War. Obviously, there were no movie cameras around in the 1860s, so all Burns had to work with were still images originally recorded on glass plates. Burns was able to add motion to the stills by slowly panning over the images. This was so successful, that when Apple developed their iMovie application they included a special “Ken Burns Effect” menu item, designed to simplify panning across your own still images when making movies.

Yet, it wasn’t the Ken Burns panning that made The Civil War images so memorable. You have to remember that in that era photographers were probably shooting at an ISO of about 5 or less. They couldn’t snap candids at 1/500 of second, or even at 1/50 of a second. Most of the images required the subject to pose perfectly still while the photographer counted off the seconds to create a useable exposure.

Somehow those still-life poses created incredible glimpses of the men and women involved in the war between the states. Whether it was William Tecumseh Sherman, Robert E. Lee, Mary Chestnut or Eisha Rhodes, you saw things in those images. Because they weren’t moving, you had time to drink in all the atmosphere and ambiance of the images. It was like leafing through a giant picture book, allowing you time to examine each image in detail.

You could see all the trappings of mid-19th century America and often things in the background jumped out to surprise or shock the viewer. But the real impact was the faces of those people who fought each other in that terrible conflict. Because they were forced to hold still while their photo was being made, you have a chance to examine every detail of their face. The eyes are unbelievably dramatic, whether you are looking at some unknown private or at a slave on a plantation or at Abraham Lincoln.

The War has some of these moments, the stills of weary soldiers on Guadalcanal definitely were in this class. Yet most of the film is told with film, and for me the motion detracted rather than aided impact. Maybe it is all those movies I have seen, it is easy to fool yourself into believing that this is just another hollywood movie you are watching, rather than one of the most horrific conflicts in history.

When the still images appear, however, I find myself riveted to those faces, those eyes. This isn’t a fictional story — this is real. If those still images don’t send chills up your spine, then there is something wrong with you.

What does this have to do with our modern world of dSLRs and images stored on silicon chips? I think it reinforces how important still images can be. There is a place for movies, but still images will never become obsolete. Movies can reveal the what, why and how, but still images reveal the soul.

On a more practical level, I’m considering experimenting with some long exposure portraits. I want to see if I can capture some of the essence of the photos of Matthew Brady and his contemporaries. If those long-dead photographers could record unbearably dramatic images with wet-glass plates and primitive lenses, I should be able to delve into someone’s soul with a tripod-mounted dSLR and some neutral density filters.

At least I think it is worth a try…

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The Imaging-Resource website has just posted a number of A700 sample images. In addition to images shot in all manner of lighting conditions and ISO ranges, Imaging Resource offers something called the Comparometer™ a web application that allows you to compare images from any two cameras in their data base against each other.

Normally, I’m not a big fan of online image samples, because each computer monitor is different and one photographer may shoot a little differently than I would. So I prefer to make my own tests, since the information will more valid for my type of shooting and my hardware. But this is the A700 were talking about. Since I haven’t gotten my hands on the camera as yet, I plan to go through the images and glean how well Sony has done their image quality homework.

I’m sure many more sites will be offering Sony A700 evaluation images in the near future. If you’ve found some interesting demo images from the Alpha A700 SLR, be sure to drop me a line (or leave a comment.) Let’s try to assemble some good resources for evaluating A700 image quality.

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A few weeks ago, wrote about my rapidly failing film and negatives from Cord Industries. At the end of that post I alluded to the fact that neither hard drives or CD disks are considered safe bets for long term image storage.

Now ZNet blogger Robin Harris is posting about something called “silent corruption” on hard disks. If, like me, you store thousands of images on disk, it’s’s enough to keep you awake at night.

Harris links to a study by CERN, the world’s largest particle physics lab. The study suggests that data stored on hard disks isn’t as safe as we might like. While CERN is concerned with raw data, it would appear that our disk-stored photos are equally at risk.

Your backup is only as good as your storage media

The term data corruption doesn’t sound all that terrible. You might think that minor corruption would only affect a few pixels here and there. If that were the case, someone with good Photoshop skills could restore the corrupted image. Such is not the case.

A couple of years ago I had a nearly full Compact Flash card go corrupt on me. It worked fine while I was shooting, but when I inserted the CF card into my reader, I was greeted with a “Card Unreadable” error message.

Fortunately, I was able to recover most of the images using data recovery software. However, several images were truly and totally corrupt.

The recovery program was able to copy the bad images off the card. but there wasn’t much hope for the data they contained. The images were super-imposed over one another, in much the same way as if you made a double exposure on a piece of film. In addition, there were weird bands of color passing all through the corrupt images. I consider myself something of a Photoshop expert and I can tell you there was no hope of restoring those images. They were well past salvage.

Now imagine the same scenario on a huge hard drive with several terrabytes of stored images. if the drive becomes corrupt, how many images could you stand to lose? Sure you can back your images up, and you should. If both the primary and backup sources fail at the same rate, however, where does that leave you?

Recently I started a project that involved digitizing some Kodak 126 negatives from the early sixties. The negatives were over forty years old, but still perfectly useable. I have some my parents’ film negatives that are more than seven decades old. You still could get decent prints off them. Will we be able to say that about digital?

Can digital survive as long as film?

I’m not advocating a return to film and I’m not going to be Chicken Little and start waiting for the sky to fall. On the other hand, I don’t want to be complacent and sit idly by while my collection of digital originals becomes so much silicon dust. Even with a rigorous backup plan, however, there is a chance that silent corruption could trash valuable, irreplaceable images.

On the other hand, i have been involved with computers and hard drives since the early ’80s. I have only had one one hard disk fail so badly that I couldn’t recover the data off it. That drive suffered a power failure during the start up procedure, and the heads actually slammed against the platter, making 1.6GB of information unreadable. Sad, but not a disaster. What if it had been 1.6TB of information? And what if the back-up had quietly become riddled by errors while in storage?

There is a chance that I still may be around in another forty years. If I am, I beleive that most of my film negatives will still be usable. You have to wonder, however. How many of the digital images I shoot today will I be able to access in 2047?

Are you concerned about the life of your images stored on hard drives and CDs? What steps are you taking to ensure that your digital images survive? Let us know what you think.

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You can’t always get what you want…but (sometimes) you get what you need.

When Sony first announced they were entering the DSLR market, there were a lot of blowhards… ah, strongly opinionated folks, who predicted that Sony would fall flat on their face. Sony was an electronics company, they didn’t know anything about photography (despite the fact that Sony has been among the top producers of still and video digital cameras for years). Sony would, they insisted, produce a bunch of mass-market crud that might appeal to people who didn’t know any better, but would drive true photographers away screaming.

A place for everything and everything in it’s place…control layout of the Sony Alpha dSLR A700 photo courtesy of Sony

It didn’t work out that way, and if the early A700 reports are any indication, those strongly opinionated folks are set to eat a big helping of crow. That crow meat must be pretty bitter, because the “Sony won’t build a quality dSLR” crowd is scrambling to find a way to avoid a steady diet of field birds for the foreseeable future.

They have a problem. Unless the A700 has some deep, unforeseen flaw we know nothing about, Sony hasn’t left them much room for complaining. As I said before, the A700 appears as good or better than anything in it’s class.

So how does one save his or her reputation if you publicly predicted that nothing good could come out of Sony’s acquisition of Konica-Minolta’s SLR camera business? Simple. You make up non-issues. Such as the uncertainty over the A700’s lack of a second function dial.

To be honest, I was a little concerned over this myself.

Maxxum 7D set the standard

Konica-Minolta raised he bar when they introduced the Maxxum 7D. No other digital SLR, before or since, has offered photographers the wealth of manual controls available on the 7D. All cameras have flaws and limitations and the 7D had it’s share. But a lack of manual controls wasn’t one of them. The Maxxum 7D simply stood head and shoulders above any other dSLR in that category.

A number of Minolta A-mount users were eagerly awaiting a Maxxum 9D version. They were hoping for an advanced version of the 7D, while retaining all the manual control goodness of the original.

It was not to be. Minolta’s camera business expired before the fabled 9D could become a reality, and Sony’s first dSLR offering simply didn’t boast the manual controls of the 7D.

Some 18 months later, Sony has introduced their second dSLR. It looks to be a wonderful camera. But a Maxxum 9D it is not. There is only a single dial on the top of the Alpha A700 dSLR. The lack of a second dial is the ammunition the Sony bashers are attempting to use to save a little face. Problem is, those that have actually used the camera have universally praised the camera’s controls. Who are you going to believe? Those who have had a axe to grind against Sony’s SLR from day one or those journalists who have actually used the camera in the field? I’ll take the word of the latter, thank you very much.

So what’s so bad about a menu on a dSLR?

Let’s look at the problem. Camera makers prefer menus to dials, knobs and switches, because menus are far cheaper. It’s really just software and you can program a menu to do just about anything. In contrast, knobs and switches have to be designed, produced and stockpiled. Run short of a vital button or dial and you can’t produce more cameras until new parts are collected.

Photographers, on the other hand, prefer buttons and knobs because it is usually quicker to adjust a physical control then to scroll through a series of menus hoping to remember where the one you want is hidden.

The problem with menu driven controls:

• It is hard to find seldom used settings
• Requires the photographer memorize where settings are located
• Slower to scroll and engage specific menu items
• Difficult to change menus when on a tripod without moving camera
• Tough to use when wearing gloves, etc.

Of course knobs, dials and switches have their own problems:

• With a knob or switch it is easy to change settings by bumping or nudging
• To make knobs safer, camera makers often resort to a detent or lock, which in turn can make it difficult to change settings
• There is no “reset to normal” with manual controls. With a menu control system you can usually reset everything to a normal, default state. With manual controls you have to remember to reset each control manually.

We won’t know what the A700’s controls are like to use until the camera is in wide use. Still, I am excited that those who have used the pre-release camera have pronounced the controls as excellent.

Three inch LCD offers more room for menus.

First off, the large 3 inch display offers more room to offer easy-to-use, simple menus. With smaller displays, camera makers had to resort to grouping menus in numerous modes. This is one of the objection to menus, because you had to find the right mode for the menu choice you wanted. On some cameras, you have to set the knob to a particular setting before you can reach a particular mode. So not only do you have to remember which mode you need to achieve a setting, you have to remember which knob setting will allow you to select a particular mode. Madness!

A larger LCD provides more real estate, so menus can be organized more succinctly. There is less need to switch between modes and settings, allowing the user to find a particular menu setting more easily.

Rotating LCD helps menu clutter

I saw at least one forum where a guy was mouthing-off and making fun of the rotating LCD view on the A700. He implied it was some sort of fluff marketing gimmick that was not all that useful. I disagree. If you are shooting with a vertical grip, you pull the camera away from your eye and glance at the LCD. Having the information presented in the correct orientation is a great feature. Otherwise you have to turn the camera ninety degrees, cock your head sideways or attempt to interpret the screen at the wrong orientation. I think the A700’s rotating display is a great asset and should go a long way to eliminate menu confusion.

Knobs? We don’t need no stinkin’ knobs!

Let us not forget that Sony has found space for a number of buttons and switches in addition to the main knob. The A700 isn’t one of those toy SLRs that look like a 1/4 scale model of real 35mm SLR. The somewhat larger body means there is room for many switches and buttons, which can take the place of that second dial. Many of the most important settings (white balance, auto/manual focus, anti-shake, etc. ) are available with just a button click.

Interestingly enough, as I write this, I happened to notice my old Maxxum 7000 sitting on my desk. It was considered revolutionary in it’s day, not only because of it’s advanced auto focus system but because of all the electronic features Minolta stuffed into the camera body. Guess what? There isn’t a single knob or dial anywhere on the Maxxum 7000. Everything is controlled with buttons, slide switches or rocker switches.

Hmm…if the Maxxum 7000 could gain a reputation as one of the top film SLRs of all time with out any knobs, I’m guessing the A700 should do just fine. I’m willing to give the benefit of the doubt to those who have actually used the camera in preference to those who are complaining without having seen the camera, much less used it.

You know who you are. You haven’t used the A700, but you’re out in the forums complaining about the lack of that second dial. What sort of side dish do you want with your entree of raw crow?

Agree? Disagree? Let me know what you think!

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Last week, Adobe upgraded Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, bumping the latest version to 1.2.

The changes are mostly bug fixes, including:

improving import of catalogs to new catalogs, performance improvements regarding XMP metadata, fixed bugs involving Windows thumbnail display, fixed a bug involving the Macintosh web module, and a long list of other minor fixes.

The new version also includes support for several new digital cameras, including the new Alpha A700 dSLR.

The last is encouraging, as Sony and Adobe must be working closely to ensure that the A700, which hasn’t’ started shipping yet, is already supported in Lightroom.

Unlike the upgrade from Lightroom 1.0 to 1.1, I found the upgrade from 1.1 to 1.2 smooth as silk. The 40mb download took several minutes, even with a fast internet connection. Once downloaded, however, the actual upgrade was painless, taking less than a minute to upgrade the version on my G4 Powermac.

I’ve been working with the upgrade for a couple of days now, with no problems.

Presumably, Adobe Camera Raw, which is the raw processor included in Photoshop, has also been updated to support the A700.

Now if only I had an A700 to test with…

Download the Lightroom upgrade from Adobe here:

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If you haven’t seen it, you really should check out Stephen Shankland’s review of the Sony A700 over at his blog: Underexposed.com. If the Alpha A700 wasn’t already at the top of your shopping list, wait until you see the images at Underexposed.

The Alpha DSLR A700 is stripped bare so you can see all the exciting technology inside the camera. Everything is revealed: the magnesium body, sensor, Bionz processor, prism and more. This is really drool-worthy stuff – so protect your keyboard before visiting!

See the A700 at Underexposed.com

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Help discover DRO secrets

Interesting thread on the DPreview Sony SLR talk forum. Seems some of the forum members are casting around for a method to create a new software plugin that would allow users to edit DRO photographic images in Photoshop.

DRO is the Dynamic Range Optimizer used by the Sony Alpha A100 camera. We are expecting an enhanced version in the new Alpha 700 dSLR. Similar to an in-camera HDR tool, DRO attempts to allow the camera to display a much greater dynamic range. Thus in contrasty lighting conditions, your image can show more details in the shadows without blowing out the highlights.

DRO differs from HDR in that it is done in-camera, while HDR images are created in computer. With HDR you take a series of bracketed exposures then use software to combine the best exposed areas of each bracketed shot into a single image. Sometimes the images are hokey looking, but done correctly they can be stunning.

Looking for a few good Sony Alpha A100 owners

The original poster of the thread is asking for A100 owners o help him derive the algorithm used by the A100’s DRO system. Whether anything will come of this — or whether a DRO manipulation plugin is really necessary – I’m all for it.

One of the ways to determine the health of camera community is to watch for users making hacks, mods and tweaks to their photo gear. If there is a low amount of this sort of thing, the community isn’t thriving. If users are banding together to share information and help one another create modifications to their cameras and lenses, you can bet that is a growing community.

Sometimes camera makers frown at this sort of thing, but they really should appreciate how an active community can boost sales and brand awareness. Canon seems to be blessed with a number of active camera hackers, and it hasn’t seemed to hurt their bottom line. There was even a well publicized case where someone figured out how to hack the firmware on the original Digital Rebel to give it capabilities that were only available in higher priced models.

Camera hacking is healthy

That might sound like it could hurt the sales of higher priced cameras, but I expect that Canon got a tom of PR out of that exploit. At the same time, many users didn’t dare to apply the homebrew frimware hack, for fear they could end up with a unusable camera. So even people who didn’t own a digital Rebel (like me, for instance) heard about the hack, creating lots of brand awareness. But few people were willing to forgo buying the higher priced camera by taking a chance on messing up a perfectly good Rebel. It was all good for Canon.

So I welcome any homebrew experimenters willing to tinker with the Sony Alpha or Minolta Maxxum dSLRs. That’s how cameras get to be classics. The hackers start experimenting and share their findings on the web. Other users apply what they learned from the hackers and start improving their gear and their photography. Still others are intrigued and start their own experimenting and tweaking. The word gets out and it seems like everyone is modding their cameras. Or their lenses. Or their software. More equipment get sold, used gear retains value and the brand achieves cult status.

Like I said, nothing may come of this particular experiment. But it is a healthy indication. Sony would do well to encourage more of this sort of thing.

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Features on new Sony dSLR place it in the top tier

Until we can actually get our hands on the new A700, we will have to turn to those lucky dogs who had a chance to actually use a pre-production A700. One of the more interesting preproduction reviews I’ve seen is Dan Richards’ Sony A700 field test at PopPhoto.com.

It seems that Richards was very, very impressed by the A700. Does this signal a major change in the photographic press?

While the Alpha A100 was showered with accolades when it was introduced, I always felt that the photo press simply didn’t know what to think about Sony’s A100.

The media was confused by the A100

The problem was that the A100 didn’t fit nicely into the categories established by the other manufacturers. The 10mp sensor broke a lot of ground in June 2006. Up until then, a 10mp sensor indicated a high-end dSLR. But the A100 had the price and feature set of a starter SLR. So it was either a high-end introductory model or a low-end advanced model. No one seemed to know which.

So the press had no yardstick to compare it to. The problem was intensified because the A100 was Sony’s only dSLR. So when the magazines ran those (usually useless) articles on “Which SLR system is right for you”, the Sony Alpha didn’t fit in very well.

All the other manufacturers had several different cameras that the media could compare against one another in a “shoot out” format. Sony only had a single camera and a handful of lenses, making it appear to be a limited “system” at best. Of course this mind set failed to take into account the millions of Minolta A-mount lenses available in the used market. The media generally doesn’t talk about used stuff when reviewing camera systems. So the photo press tended to ignore the Alpha, since they really couldn’t figure out how to categorize it.

Sony only compounded the problem by keeping their future Alpha plans secret and only doing limited marketing for the A100. It seemed both the press and Sony were intent on ignoring the Alpha line.

Alpha A700 set to impress the media

I believe the A700 might signal the end of that way of thinking. Unlike the A100, which had one foot in the low-end starter SLR camp and the other foot in the advanced dSLR corral, the A700 appears to be a true advanced enthusiast camera.

Until now, the press has divided the SLR market into two categories. There’s the Nikon/Canon group and then there’s everyone else. The Alpha was included in the second group by default.

The first group receives the lion’s share of coverage. Of course the smaller, secondary group does receive some recognition, but it usually pales when compared with the big two.

That was then. this is now.

In one swift (OK, not so swift) move, Sony has solidly moved into the Canon/Nikon class. It might not happen overnight, but the press can’t ignore the A700, it is too good of a camera. If the announced specs and picture quality live up to the press releases, the A700 is as good or better than anything in it’s price class.

If you read Richards’ article, he has nothing bad to say about the A700. He stresses that the improved auto-focus is excellent, shown by a Sony marketing stunt involving an attacking bi-plane.

For years I covered the auto industry “long lead press previews.” The auto manufactures would gather the press to show off their latest models. They were expert at arranging tests and situations that would paint their vehicles in the best possible light. They did their very best to let the press drive new vehicles in conditions that the car or truck excelled in.

Sony struts A700 Auto Focus for media’s benefit

If Sony was so so confident in the improved AF that they hired a bi-plane to buzz the demo A700 equipped photographic press, the AF on the A700 must be very good. Otherwise Sony would have arranged some other type of demo and avoided situations involving fast action.

Richards’ also calls the A700 controls excellent. This is in contradiction to the many users who bemoan the lack of extensive switches and dials available to set-up the Alpha 700. I too, am concerned that the A700 relies too much on menus instead of dials, but I haven’t used the camera. Richards has and he labels the controls and handling as excellent.

In his review, Richards says that his sunset shots taken at ISO 2000 appeared clean and sharp, although he doesn’t say whether he inspected the images on a computer monitor, printed them out or just looked at them on the A700’s 3″ LCD. Sony apparently didn’t allow images taken with the pre-release cameras to be taken home by the media, so we will have to wait to see high ISO images from production A700 cameras. Still, all indications are that Sony has taken great pains to reduce high ISO noise in the A700.

…by photographers for photographers…

At the end of his review, Richards says “…the A700 is a camera designed by photographers for photographers…” Wow. Those are the sort of comments the press used to make about Minolta SLRs. It’s not the typical comment we heard about the A100.

If the A700 is that good, I think we may see that the Sony Alpha series will shortly join Canon and Nikon as a top tier camera in the eyes of the photo press.

And then there were three….

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Alpha A700 camera: the advanced amateur dSLR is announced

Finally! The news Alpha photographers hve been waiting for. Sony has announced their new Advanced Amateur dSLR, henceforth known as the A700, I like the name — it conjures up great Minoltas of the past, such as the X700, the Maxxum 7000 and the Maxxum 7D.

But the new model is a wide departure from those older SLR cameras. The feature set is very impressive, and if the picture quality lives up to Sony’s claims, Minolta A-mount shooters will be very happy indeed.

The A700 addresses almost all of the concerns I listed in my last post about Alpha A100 improvements. In addition to the vertical grip and PC sync we already knew was coming, the 12.2MP A700 feature set includes:

• Optical glass pentaprism with interchangeable focusing screens
• New 11 point enhanced auto focus system, claimed to be much faster than the A100.
• Individual compartments for both Compact Flash and Memory Stick memory cards
• Remote capture application offering tethered shooting via USB (yes!)
• Continuous 5 frames per second, limited only by memory card size in JEPG, a healthy 18 frames can be captured in one burst when shooting RAW.
• Sony claims the new dSLR is dust and moisture resistant. Is that the same as weather sealing?
• New Dynamic Range Optimizer (DRO) function that sounds similar to built-in HDR (High Dynamic Range).
• Ultra sharp 3″ LCD screen
• The press release stresses in great detail that the A700 has been optimized to significantly reduce noise.
• The initial Sony press release doesn’t mention ISO, but Engadget and several other sites claim the camera will offer 3200 ISO with some sort of extender mode to get the ISO to 6400

The new vertical grip will carry two InfoLithium(R) batteries and can automatically switch between cells when one battery is exhausted.

Body only price will be “about” $1,400. US. The A700K kit with a 18-70mm lens will set us back around 1,500, while the A700P kit will offer a 16-105 lens will go for $1,900. Sony is taking orders now. The body and A700k packages should be shipping in October, while the A700P will be on dealer’s shelves in November.

What’s missing? Live view. As I have said before, I’m not a fan of Live View so that isn’t a big disappointment for me.

That’s just the high-level overview. I’ll have more information and analysis after the dust clears and I can delve deeper into the A700’s features. in the meantime, A-mount shooters can take a deep breath and relax. If the press release is accurate, the A700 won’t be taking a back seat to anything else in it’s class. For the first time in a long, long while, we have a camera that boasts great features at an affordable price. Move over Nikon and Canon. There’s a new shooter in town!

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With the launch of the new Advanced Amateur model expected this week, everyone in the Minolta A-mount world is holding their breath to see what Sony will finally unleash on the dSLR world. There are all manner of rumors, some which sound plausible, others that are so far-fetched they make Roswell and the UFO “coverup” seem mainstream in comparison,

Will Advanced Amateur dSLR finally get a name?

One thing we do know, the Advanced Amateur model will finally have a name, and it will offer a number of features not available in the A100.

I really like the A100. It is a good, even excellent, dSLR for many applications. All cameras have flaws however, and the A100 suffered somewhat as Sony’s initial foray into the digital SLR market. It inherited some limitations from the Maxxum 5D, and Sony may have erred in some respects in creating their first dSLR entry. One thing is for sure, however. Sony has been paying close attention to the A100 critics. I expect the Alpha AA release — whatever it is finally called — will offer many improvements based on real or imagined problems with the A100.

Here is my guess about which flaws Sony will correct with the new AA model:

How well as Sony been listening?

1: Lack of a vertical grip
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 100%

Easily the most talked about problem with the A100, Sony has shown both future dSLRs (that we know about) with a nicely shaped vertical grip. This was a no brainer. The vast majority of A100 users want a vertical grip, and Sony stands to sell a truck load of the new grips. The new grip will not fit an A100, but Sony shows it has been listening.

2: Noise at higher ISO settings
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 90%

The only reason I gave this a 90% rating is that unlike the vertical grip, we don’t know anything about the picture quality of the new model. Still the A100 has been criticized, perhaps overly so, for producing unacceptable noise at higher ISOs. While the A100 is as good or better than any 10MP dSLR at 100-200 ISO settings, abundant noise starts to creep in at the higher settings. The A100’s upper ISO noise was criticized by many respected journalists. Sony has to have been stung by the critics, some of which may have overstated the problem. I’m guessing that Sony will have addressed the issue big-time, but we won’t know until we see high ISO images from the camera.

3: Lack of a PC Sync Terminal
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 100%

I’ve already discussed the A100’s lack of a PC sync terminal in an earlier post. If the concept mockups we’ve seen are to be believed, Sony has already addressed this issue.

4: No tethered shooting
Odds Sony will address this flaw: ?

I have seen no mention of tethered shooting in any of the rumors I have followed in the last month or so. To me this is a major failing of the A100. You have to believe that Sony will address this. After all Sony is also a computer company, producing laptops and desktops under the Vaio name. How could they fail to offer communication between the camera and the computer. Neither Canon or Nikon manufacture computers, but both offer excellent communication between their dSLRs and computers –both Windows and Macintosh flavors. Yet the Sony community hasn’t been too vocal about this flaw, so maybe Sony has placed it on the back burner. I hope not.

5: Slow flash sync
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 60%

This is another area that hasn’t received too much criticism. Still the A100’s paltry 1/160 second sync speed pales by comparison with many of the A100’s competitors. Not every shooter needs a fast flash sync , but if you shoot action, a sync speed of 1/250 – 1/500 can make a real difference. I think Sony will recognize this.

6: Limited ISO range
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 75%

You can’t look at the concept cameras and tell what the AA’s ISO range will be. I’m guessing, however, that the new camera will exceed the A100’s top ISO of 1600. In order to stand out in the crowded dSLR field, camera makers need selling points to make their models appear better than their rivals. Megapixels is one selling point. High ISO numbers can be another. Even if most users won’t use it very often, I expect Sony would like to advertise an ISO of at least 3200 on the new camera.

7: Slow film advance
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 90%

The A100 offers a continuous 3fps film advance. The new sensor is said to offer as much as 10fps, but I doubt we’ll see that. Most of the rumors are indicating 5 or 5 1/2fps. I think we’ll probably find they are on the money when Sony makes the big announcement,.

8: No Live View
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 75%

Personally, I’m not into Live View. It is nice to have when the camera is mounted on a tripod, but for most of the shooting I do I wouldn’t use Live View even if I had it. So I really don’t get Live View and if the AA SLR doesn’t offer it, I won’t be disappointed. Still, the masses seem to want Live View, especially those moving up from a Point & Shoot camera — most of which offer some sort of Live View capability. My guess is Sony will see this as a marketing opportunity and build some sort of Live View into the AA camera.

9: Lack of wether/dust seals on camera body
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 55%

I’m unsure which way Sony will go on this one. Most serious photographers realize that weather sealing is very important. It is even more of a concern with digital cameras, which are more susceptible to environmental harm then film cameras. Still, this isn’t a big selling point at the big box department stores. I would trade megapixels for better weather sealing any day, but this probably isn’t a concern for the average consumer. Hopefully Sony will learn toward the serious lensmen on this issue, but I’m not sure the demand is great enough.

10: Body feels too much like plastic
Odds Sony will address this flaw: 90%

I’m not convinced this is really a true flaw, but even though the A100 features a magnesium alloy chassis, many commentators insist the A100 has a “plasticity feel” — whatever that means. I think Sony will address the issue, simply because the Advanced Amateur model and the future flagship dSLR appear to share the same basic body. Since Sony has implied that the flagship will be aimed at the pro sector, I’m guessing the body will be professional grade. That mean the AA model will be as well.

So that’s my predictions. Anyone have any others? Comments are always open.

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