Fotoviva Art Prints

In a surprising move, one of the leading optical glass makers Hoya are to buy out Camera manufacturer Pentax - or at least have them under their name. The merger has been going on for some time behind the scenes with twists and turns in negotiations resulting in a feud within Pentax. The two companies had reached a basic agreement on the merger in December, but Pentax made a change of presidency and cancelled the plan to merge with Hoya citing reasons why the company could survive on its own.
Hoya then prepared a takeover bid for Pentax in an effort to bring about the merger. After much debating at Pentax they accepted the takeover bid by Hoya last week and reached a general agreement on the merger. Hoya intends to launch a friendly takeover bid for Pentax and make Pentax its subsidiary in June of this year.

What this means for the future is open for discussion, but hopefully everyone will benefit from a merger between two of the photography world’s largest manufacturers.

Thanks to developers at the South Korea Electronic Technology Institute we may soon wave goodbye to those awful bright white flashes that not only turn you into the devil with those red eyes and blast the exposure out the window, but also annoy anyone in the vicinity!

Those clever bods have just announced a handy technology breakthrough with a new type of sensor to replace the traditional CCD seen in most digital cameras of today. It reportedly can take a bright, clear picture in just one lux of light, the equivalent to the light output of one candle from one meter away! The sensor is claimed to be over 2,000 times more light sensitive than current technologies allow, negating the need for flash in most circumstances. The new sensor is currently known as the single carrier modulation photo detector (SMPD) for the techies among you! It’s not clear how soon we can hope to find it in new cameras but it will begin launch initially in CCTV cameras and mobile phones. These technologies require a significantly lower resolution, so it may take a few years before the technology evolves into the expected megapixel resolution that photographers expect.

We think it’s about time camera technology took another major leap forward and provided shots that more accurately reflect the world seen through our own eyes. The less work we have to spend post-processing the more time we can spend out in the field with our cameras!

I recently came across a website by photographer Simon Kitchin who specialises in mountain and coastline photography in the UK, and especially North Wales. Simon’s website landscapephotographyuk provides a nice set of galleries with some great landscape shots of areas such as the Isle of Anglesey coast, North Wales Coastal, and the Mountains and Lakes of the UK which include photographs of Buttermere Lake in the Lake District.

The feedback Simon receives in his guestbook just goes to show how well his photography and knowledge of the areas he walks is appreciated. With comments like “When I first clicked on I was greeted to the most awesome scene and when I delved deeper was stunned by your work……wonderful to say the least.” he must be inspired to add to his portfolio.

Being a photographer I appreciated his Locations and Articles pages where he lists websites that provide more information about the areas he has visited, along with information for the photographer in particular. This is helpful for those photo trips around the UK and can help you plan a route rather than wander around aimlessly looking for the best scenery and walks.

All in all a useful site with some great landscape photography which help to show what a beautiful island we live on! Keep up the good work Simon

Yesterday we had a useful update to the Fotoviva store which will make browsing the site a lot more user friendly whilst making the site look nicer too! We have removed the popup windows that opened when you wanted to view a larger image - it now opens in the main page itself. Have a closer look at Don Tiffney’s ‘At Anchor’ picture to see how it works.

There is also a new 3 column structure to the category pages which had to be implemented due to the increased number of images we now have. I have a backlog of pictures to upload and some new contributors coming onboard soon so this made sense. We have done away with the description and now just have a thumbnail and a title. The description and price now appears when you click into the image for more info. This allows more images on each category page so users will not have to go through several pages before finding the photo they want to purchase. See an example on the landscape art page. The only downside is that the portrait pictures throw the balance of the page off, but there isn’t a lot we can do about this. A small trade-off methinks.

I hope you like the site changes. If you have any comments or suggestions let me know.

We found a useful independent website called Photoshop Tutorials which has a range of resources available if you are looking to improve your post processing technique. They have interesting tutorials on working with Photoshop to improve your pictures and create special effects for backgrounds, as well as showing how to create those professional looking shots that the real pros seem to make.

There is also a section on Photography skills which provides handy ideas for generating great photography before you throw it into Photoshop. In fact there is a whole wealth of information for the photographer who is looking to improve their work or find new resources. Speaking of which, head on over to the Photoshop Plugin Download area which has lots of hard to find additions to integrate into Photoshop.

They also have a new forum that is growing all the time, so if you are looking for a new place to discuss everything Photoshop sign up and start learning new skills.

We would like to welcome Eyal Zarrad, our newest contributor to the Fotoviva team. He is a landscape photographer based in Israel and started shooting film many years ago but now, like many of us, shoots only digital.

Having been to the British Isles several times, he feels very fond with the views it has to offer and thus has a large collection of photos taken here.

He uses a Canon 350D camera, Canon 17-40 & 70-200 L-series lenses complemented by a set of professional Lee Filters.

Eyal’s work is displayed mainly in web galleries which receive a lot of positive feedback, and has also appeared in the ‘City Portrait’ project held by his hometown museum.

You can see examples of his excellent work in the Landscape picture section and our Fine Art section