Digital Trends
Japan’s Konica Minolta announced today that it is exiting the camera and film businesses, putting an end to one of the world’s most-recognized names in photography. Company President Fumio Iwai also announced he would be stepping down April 1, 2006, to be replaced by Vice President Yoshikatsu Ota.
Konica Minolta had said in November 2005 that it was considering scaling back its traditional photography business, but not shutting it down entirely.
Konica Minolta today announced they were expanding their line of DiMAGE digital cameras. The newest entry is the six megapixel DiMAGE Z6.
The DiMAGE Z6, Konica Minolta said, offers up a 12x optical zoom and 2†LCD monitor on a compact and easy to hold design. Besides the 12x optical zoom, a 4x digital zoom capability gives the camera a total zoom range of 48x.
Other features on the new DiMAGE Z6 include a CCD-shift anti-shaking system featured in Konica Minolta’s high end Maxxum 7D digital SLR, a GT APO lens, Konica Minolta’s proprietary image processing technology, up to 240 shots on 4 AA batteries, rapid auto focus and a “progressive drive†mode which records images continuously at approximately 1.8 seconds regardless of image size or quality.
Quote from the review at HardwareZone:
Quote from the review at the Hardware Zone:
“The Minolta DiMAGE Xt performed fine for a 3.2Mpixel ultra-compact camera, but beware of its substandard performance in low light conditions, such as poor flash reach, pale skin tone, slow auto focus and an orange tinge in the night scene test shots. After weighing the pros and the cons, we decided that the Minolta DiMAGE Xt warrants a 3.5 out of 5 stars rating.”
Quote from the review at HardwareZoom:
“Notice that both have the same ppm speed and the same printing resolution too. The Minolta has a software rendering process that allows for 1200 and 2400dpi. However, the HP printer has a higher capacity input tray as well as a higher starting RAM. Also, the HP uses PCL6 as well as Postscript 3 emulation, but the Minolta is only a host-based printer. This turned the HP into a printer that is compatible with Mac OS but not for the Minolta.”
Building upon the success of Minolta Corporation’s highly acclaimed DiMAGE 7 series of digital cameras, Minolta introduces the new 5 megapixel SLR- type DiMAGE A1 digital camera. The DiMAGE A1 wasdesigned with today’s creative digital photographer in mind.
Featuring the world’s fastest AF speed among 5-megapixel SLR-type digital cameras*, a fast built-in f/2.8 – 3.5 7x optical zoom lens, a top shutter speed of 1/16,000 of a second, dual-focal macro system, extra-fine image-quality option, Minolta’s new CxProcess II and 3-D Predictive Focus Control, Subject Tracking AF, Anti-shake function, and compatibility with portable and studio flash systems, the Minolta DiMAGE A1 exploits the power of digital imaging by providing the tools photographers need to express their creativity and solve visual problems. In addition, Minolta has also introduced new remote imaging software for use with the DiMAGE A1, the new DiMAGE Capture software, for enhanced creative capabilities.
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