The McNamara Report

McNamara Report Resurrected? Perhaps.

For all of you who were once loyal readers of the McNamara Report at PopPhoto.com, and are still linked to it via RSS feed, good news! After being sent to the web abyss by our former (or shall we say, newly resigned) web editor Jay Defoore, I'm thinking of resurrecting it. Apparently, it's still live somewhere in cyberspace although not easy to find on the pop photo web site, but that should change soon. If you have an opinion either way, add it to this posting. Mike McNamara

Nikon Confusion over Dots vs. Pixels

Since the beginning of digital time, photographers—and many manufacturers–have gotten confused over the differences between dots per inch (dpi) and pixels per inch (ppi). The terms are often interchanged—but they shouldn’t be, especially when it comes to describing printer or camera resolution. Why? A printer may use 6 or more dots (from individual color cartridges) to form the image of a single full-color pixel captured by a camera or scanner. This helps to explain why a digital file with 200 ppi res can be printed at 600-5400 dpi depending on the printer and its output settings.) Now it looks like we’ll have to add the way a camera or computer LCD monitor’s resolution is described to the never-ending saga of dots vs pixels.

Canon EOS 1DS Mark III: a Medium Format Killer?

When Canon introduced the 16.7 MP EOS 1Ds Mark II several years ago it became the first digital camera to offer image quality that exceeded that of 35mm film. To be fair, Pop Photo lab and field tests showed that it captured slightly less detail and resolution than a good ISO 100 color negative or slide film, while maintaining higher color accuracy and lower noise. When enlarged, EOS 1Ds Mark II images were clearly superior in side-by-side comparisons with images made from film, primarily due to the graininess of film that obscured detail at high magnification. So now that Canon has stepped up the pixel resolution on the new EOS 1Ds Mark III to 21.1MP, will the slight advantage that film had be gone altogether?

Who won the war on paper?

I’m pretty sure that 1997 was the year that I had the opportunity to visit Greenwood, South Carolina for my first—and last—time. I’ll never forget the event that brought me there, as it was one of the proudest moments in the life of Fujifilm, USA, as it broke ground on a new state-of-the-art paper factory in this rural SC town. By then, Fujifilm had already invested over 1 billion dollars in its Greenwood factory complex, and I couldn’t understand why it chose a town in the middle of the cotton belt, more than an hour from the nearest major airport, to set up shop. Wouldn’t it have made more sense for Fujifilm to build it in near its USA headquarters in NY State? It took a speech from S.C. Governor David Beasley to clarify the choice made by Fujifilm. I can’t quote him word for word, but at some point in the speech he screamed something very much like “And if those Yankee’s up in Rochester, NY think they’re going to win this war, they've got something coming!”

Flower Power: DSLR Live View and IS get my vote!

Taking a sharp picture in low light often requires the same shooting technique that a rifle marksman uses to hit a target. Brace yourself, breath out slowly, and press the trigger (or in our case, the shutter button). This technique works with both compact cameras and DSLRs, but doesn’t help that much when shooting outdoor macro photographs of flowers (one of my favorite subjects this time of year). Why?

Coming Distractions

It's become a tradition at photo trade shows for at least one major camera company to showcase a nonfunctioning "concept" camera. But at this year's PMA show in March, Olympus, Pentax, and Sony were all in on the act -- or should I say magic show? In my experience, concept cameras rarely make it to stores with the specifications and shapes that they have in the wooden-block stages -- and sometimes they just disappear altogether.

The Report: Cleansweep

Photos scattered all over your computer? Here's help.

Do you know where to FIND every digital photo or film scan you've ever made? If so, you're either incredibly organized, in deep denial, or don't have a digital camera or scanner. For the rest of you, with too many images tossed in virtual shoeboxes (hard drives, memory cards, CDs, etc.), here's how to put them within reach.

Hell hath frozen over!

What happens when you try to load Microsoft’s Vista Ultimate OS on a new Apple laptop? And why would you try such a dangerous stunt? I wasn’t planning to do it, I swear! It’s just that a brand new Apple 17-inch MacBook Pro laptop arrived in my office on the very same afternoon as a package arrived from Microsoft containing its new Vista Ultimate operating system. I had nowhere to load the latter, given the fact that my office PC was too old (and our IS department would kill me if I touched it!) and my system at home was peaceably running Microsoft XP (and I enjoy peaceable computers at home.) Then, possibly still overdosing on chocolate Easter bunnies from the day before, a radical idea forced its way into my Mac-oriented brain and I knew exactly what I’d spend the day doing—loading Microsoft Vista on the Apple MacBook Pro!

Software versus Nightmare

Adobe’s launch of Creative Suite 3 got a lot of static from those watching, but it wasn’t Adobe’s fault.

Imagine all of the planning that Adobe must have done prior to the largest launch of new software products in its history yesterday. (You can't begin to imagine how long it took to write and debug the 80 million lines of code that Adobe claims to have written for the entire treasure trove of programs in its new Creative Suite 3 family.) Then picture the hours of rehearsal and preparation that must have occurred on site involving hundreds of employees and support staff, plus the extra networking challenges faced by hosting the entire event live on the web before thousands of Adobe fans and journalists around the world. What could go possibly go wrong?

Photo Politics as Usual

I’m sure that by now nearly everyone with an email account has received their share of junk mail and humorous chain letters. But I’m getting tired of the following letter that’s been sent to me at least a dozen times by friends, family, and acquaintances. It's a test that’s designed to make fun of a politician at the expense of photojournalists everywhere. If you receive it, feel free to send back my answer to the sender, and make sure you cc everyone so they can learn something about photography: