The Aigo UH-P706 is a remarkable tool, a photographer’s delight! It comes with a 160Gb hard drive, supports most of the memory card formats available on the market like SD, MMC, Memory Stick and CF, etc.

It’s the perfect tool when you shoot and have to download your cards before re-using them. It’s not only a photo viewer, it’s a photo back up system too…

The Aigo UH-P706 supports most picture formats, including RAW and TIFF.

But has one down size compared to the Epson P-5000 (around $700)… it only packs a 3.6-inch screen (0.4″ shorter ;-)), but like I said, the UH-P706 has a whopping 160GB HD (starting at 40Gb).

It can also play videos (AVI, MPEG4) and has gaming capabilities.

So far only Chinese will enjoy this baby but it should land in the US and EU pretty soon I am sure. The question is, at what price?!

As many professional photographers, I am affiliated with a Copyright association to protect my art - the SOFAM.

They have decided to file a lawsuit against Google about reproducing content without permission (when doing an image search).

Search engines like Google are indexing pictures from servers all over the world and are returning the queries in a web page with the thumbnails to display the results…

Generating a thumbnail is actually considered and alteration of the protected artwork… and by generating a web page with some of my pictures on it without my consent could be a copyright infringement.

The SOFAM lawsuit is not seeking punitive damages but an agreement with Google to allow them to provide the service legally.

I know it looks like a business negotiation being done in a courtroom but it’s more than that.

Read more… »

If you are a professional photographer, transporting your gear can be a nightmare. Especially, accessing your equipment when you need it! The backpack is not the most convenient and the fanny pack, well, it’s a fanny pack…

Well, Think Tank Photo thought about it and came up with an original Rotation 360¬? backpack + fanny. All you have to do is pull and twist. Quite simple but just in case you want more info, check the official website.

Don’t mess with the Steve all’ight?! Apple had 3 websites close down because they were using the “Pod” & “iPod” in their domain name… Those words are under trademark license, and if Steve doesn’t like what you do with it, yer dead!

• iPodFrance
• iPod Zone
• Apple Zone

Got served and decided not to fight the giant from Cupertino. Some of those websites were around for 5+ years and were only promoting Apple products, helping people, making the community grow! I don’t know what they were thinking at Apple but this is quite shitty.

What the fuck is Robin Hood doing these days anyways??!!

Not cool Steve, not cool…

With the Apple Macworld Conference & Expo coming very soon, I can’t wait to see what Leopard’s Top Secret features will be unveiled… We can already find a sneak preview on the official page but Steve was pretty clear about some Top Secret features to Leopard that Apple was going to keep a little close to the vest and not going to show just yet.

The Time Machine and Spaces are the two upcoming features that I really look forward to, but then, what could be even cooler that those two??

It’s hard to guess but either they are super duper cool or they are not locked in yet! Marketing does that to you, you know… Selling more than you actually have! Would it be possible that Apple is just “bragging” during the Keynote? Or were the top secret features not yet complete or stable enough to demonstrate?

So far, 10 key features have been posted - how many more will join the final release of Leopard and more important, how many will be significant?! Because seriously, the following updates are over-due:

• Safari 3.0 to catch up with Firefox 2.0
• iChat 3.5 to keep ahead of Skype 2.5
• iCal 3.0 to finally compete with Outlook Calendar
• Dashboard
• Spotlight
• Mail 3.0

So, if so far that’s all we are allowed to see, what’s left? What are the big secrets??!!

There’s little sense in trying to guess for one feature or another with so little information without starting yet another rumor. But one thing is for sure, secrets are usually well kept at Apple…

So here are a few things I would LOVE to see in the next OS X release…

• iTv integration to kick Microsoft’s Windows Media Center
• An all-new look and feel - don’t get me wrong, I love the actual OS X GUI but an all new GUI would give Apple an ever bigger edge, especially since Vista sucks ass!!
• More “professional” tools - Mac are known for being super intuitive and beginners feel comfortable with easy to use tools, but we, the Pros, we need MORE!!!
• iPhone
• Boot Camp running Windows natively inside OS X (wet dream!!)

So, are the the top secret features bullshit or will we be on our asses in January?? Maybe even later, who knows… It’s all a big Jobs’ mystery fo’ sha!

The Gorillapod is not your usual tripod… For only $49.95 you get an all terrain tripod! This SLR model allows to attach pretty much any type of SLR even a big mo’ fo lens! It has flexible joints which makes it wrappable, but is also compact and lightweight! It’s available in three different sizes to meet your needs. Spiderman must be dead jealous right now!

Not so long ago, I was wondering who would pay close to $5,000 for a Digital Leica… Well, not only is it a f$cking expensive camera for what it actually offers, but on top of that, it’s a piece of garbage!

Leica issued a statement on some of the issues experienced by early M8 owners. Here it is…

LEICA statement:

“Dear Friends of Leica,

Customer feedback to us following the start of shipment of the LEICA M8 points to a performance under certain conditions that does not meet the expectations in the Leica brand. Our technical and engineering teams have isolated the source of these concerns and have identified definitive solutions. Over the next two weeks we will communicate a plan to further assure you of your investment in the LEICA M8.

We hope for your understanding and support. Please accept that I will not be able to answer all messages in the forum personally.

Kind regards

Leica Camera AG
Stefan Daniel

Product Management”

It seems those early (rich) adopters are experiencing IR color casts on certain fabrics and occasional banding…

[Via DPReview]