Apple Updates Digital Raw Compatiblity For Mac OS X v10.6

Digital camera RAW formats retain more image information than JPEGs and can produce better results when used with imaging applications such as Aperture and iPhoto. Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard provides system-level support for digital camera RAW formats from the following cameras:

This update adds RAW image compatibility for the following cameras to Aperture 3 and iPhoto '11:

    •    Canon EOS Rebel T3 / 1100D / Kiss X50
    •    Canon EOS Rebel T3i / 600D / Kiss X5
    •    Olympus E-5
    •    Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ100
    •    Pentax K-r
    •    Pentax K-5

It also addresses processing issues for the following cameras:
    •    Nikon D7000
    •    Nikon COOLPIX P7000
    •    Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1
    •    Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH2

Vice President Of Design Leaves Apple

That's the latest news from Razorainfly, apparently, Sarah Brody, Apple’s Vice President of Design (up until this week), has reportedly left the company after being hired by online mirco-payments giant PayPal. Brody had many duties at Apple, actively working on both the iPhone, original iPod nano and even MobileMe.

Perhaps the most iconic job of them all though was that Brody was also responsible for the product packaging design of software packages such as Logic Studio, Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Server and Aperture 3.

While we highly doubt this will be the end of iconic product packaging for Apple, you do have to ask yourself why someone like Brody, who has worked on products as the iPhone and iPod, would leave to work for someone like Paypal.

That said, maybe Brody will be assigned the task of making Paypal’s homepage look half decent … and that we definitely cannot argue with.

Lo-fi Friday: Aperture 3, Olympus E-PL1

Olympus E-PL1 using Diorama Art-Filter, with cross-processing in Aperture 3

Olympus E-PL1 using Diorama (Tilt-Shift) Art-Filter, original (no additional processing)

I thought I would start a new category for the weekend, Lo-fi Friday, celebrating the ease with which digital imaging allows some interesting techniques.

The first picture (top) is an out-camera Jpeg with some cross-processing applied in Aperture 3. The second below is the original Jpeg before processing in Aperture. It was shot with the delightful mFT Olympus E-PL1 and Olympus 17mm (34mm-effective) f/2.8 pancake lens, using the camera's built-in Diorama Art-Filter.

As you can just about make out the filter applies blurring with quite a sharp cut-off (based on the AF point, as far as I can tell). Saturation is bumped up quite too, but it's all automatic. You don't have to do a thing, except compose and push the button.