Pixer.us is a pretty cool AJAX based online image editor, perhaps you’re using a cafe computer or at a friends place or the work PC has no image editing software.

Now you can use pixer.us, an online image editing tool, it has quite a number of features.

http://pixer.us/

Need a quick fix for that photo? With pixer.us you can edit your photos online using only your browser.!

You just have to upload your photo using the “load image” form. In a few seconds, the image will be displayed on screen and you can start to play with it.

After you’re done fixing your photo click on the “Save” button to download it using your preferred file format.

All modifications are done in a non-destructive way. Your image will always keep it’s original quality!

You can resize, crop, flip, rotate and play with settings for brightness/contrast, saturation, blur/sharpness and some other special effects.

Canon has launched a new section of their site showing how the high grade lenses are manufactured in Japan (In this case it’s the EF 500mm F4L IS USM lens)

It’s a lengthy process.

You can see how the Raw materials are processed, the lenses machined and the final lens assembly process.

You can see the whole show here:

Canon Camera Museum – Virtual Lens Plant.

I was waiting for this camera for a while, could it be the ultimate super zoom with it’s incredible 18x optical zoom?

The SP-550 UZ main features:

• 18x wide optical zoom (equivalent to 28-504mm on a 35mm camera) 1:2.8-4.5
• Dual Image Stabilization
• 7.1 Megapixels
• 6.4cm/2.5″ LCD with 230,000 pixels
• High burst rate (up to 15fps*)
• Super Macro mode (from as close as 1cm)
• P/A/S/M exposure modes
• BrightCapture Technology for better low light photography – also available in movie mode
• 23 scene modes (including Portrait, Sports, Night Scene)
• 25 languages on board
• Internal memory plus xD-Picture Card slot
• Supplied with Olympus Master software and four AA batteries

I mean realistically I wasn’t expecting too much, and I am looking for a backup compact camera for the times when I don’t carry my dSLR around and also something to use for underwater shooting.

I’m glad they chose to go with the wider end at 28mm rather than the standard 35mm for those sweeping landscapes.

The camera seems to perform reasonably well.

Olympus SP-550 Ultra Zoom – Digital Camera Review

The Olympus SP-550 Ultra Zoom, with it’s impressive wide-angle 18x optical zoom lens and CCD-Shift image stabilisation, is an appealing digital camera providing a zoom range of 28mm – 504mm. It feels very comfortable in hand, and produces very good images with very pleasing colours and generally low noise. The screen and electronic viewfinder are good. The camera is easy to use, especially with the built in help and shooting guide, and camera speed is fairly good. The camera offers good battery life, with very good controls and very good build quality.

Olympus SP-550 UZ Review – Photography Blog

With an asking price of £375 in the UK, which is similar to what some retailers are now asking for body-only DSLR deals, potential purchasers of the Olympus SP-550 UZ face a hard choice – particularly those who are upgrading from a simple point-and-shoot, and don’t already have the increased flexibility of a prosumer camera. Build quality is however good given its mainly plastic frame – the camera is solidly fashioned, attractively finished, and with batteries inserted feels capable of withstanding a few knocks in the heat of the action. The necessary unfurling of that zoom lens however does slow down responsiveness.

DCRP Review: Olympus SP-550 Ultra Zoom

The Olympus SP-550 Ultra Zoom is a great example of a marketing-driven cameras. I’m just guessing here, but the marketing folks at Olympus probably got together and said “let’s make an ultra zoom camera with the biggest and baddest specs on the market”, and then the engineers had to make it work. And it works, for the most part — though plenty of compromises were made. While it’s not the best ultra zoom on the market, the SP-550 is still a very good one, and certainly worth a look.

Olympus SP-550 UZ Review – DPReview

The SP-550UZ is, then, a camera that tries a little to hard to be a true jack of all trades, and ends up being master of none; a perfect example of the whole being lesser than the sum of its parts. And yet the funny thing is, that after all that, I actually quite liked it. I guess – in a perverse way – it’s sometimes nice to use a camera that forces you out of the lazy ‘point and shoot’ mentality and reminds you that photographers, not cameras, take pictures.

All in all, it might be better to stick with the upcoming Canon Powershot S5 IS.

Some guy recently tested the current crop of SLR cameras with ‘dust removal’ systems to see how effective they actually are.

Sensor cleaning is becoming a standard feature on modern digital SLR cameras. While the manufacturers may use different techniques to get rid of the dust from the image sensor, they all promise clean, dust free images. Do they all work equally well? Can we throw our air blower away? We have tested the four different types of sensor cleaning technologies to see which one will most likely to fulfill the expectations.

I was quite surprised with the results, and how badly they all performed. It turns out they are all pretty much useless when it comes to cleaning/dust removal. Only the Olympus fared reasonably.

Here is our ranking according to effectiveness:

1. Olympus: good
2. Canon: poor (we are disappointed)
3. Pentax and Sony: useless (we are very disappointed)

If you are looking for a camera, have the dust removal as an expectation only at the end of your list. If sensor cleaning / dust removal is a must, the choices are limited to Olympus and Panasonic cameras.

Read the full test here:

Review: Dust removal systems / sensor cleaning

A bounce card causes you to face your flash unit up – pointing it to the ceiling, but you also put a little 3×5 index card behind the light to send some of the “caught” light forward. The Stofen Omnibounce, Flip-it and the Lightsphere do this same thing too each in their own way, but then so did the old bounce card.

Why doesn’t someone make something simple like a bounce card, but make it so the photographers can make it themselves and make it better than the simple old bounce card ever was?

There is something like this – it’s called “A Better Bounce Card”. And it is something every photographer can make themselves – without buying expensive devices – and make as many as they need!

Plus it’s DIRECTIONAL, Cheap, bump someone and it won’t fall off or worst yet bust off your hot shoe mount! And it’s light, actually, light as a piece of paper!!

I have had some trouble finding the foam paper, I’ve been in a lot of shops but they don’t even seem to know what I’m talking about.

I do know some people have managed to find it though, so it can’t be that hard.

If anyone knows where you can get it (preferably in PJ) it’d be appreciated.

I’ve heard someone say they got some in 1-U, but I don’t know where!

I do have a Gary Fong Lightsphere II (the clear one), but this is extremely portable and lightweight, so I’d like to keep it stuffed in my camera bag just in case.