New digital cameras in July 2007 (26 new ones!)

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

New digital cameras in July 2007 (26 new ones!)

This is the first in a series of monthly recaps of new digital cameras announcements! The post will summarize all the new cameras that were officially announced during the month. This will be a good way for you to catch up with the all the new releases! If you have any suggestions or recommendations on this topic or format, please feel free to let me know!

Spotlight Cameras The two 18x superzooms grabbed the spotlight in July, the Panasonic FZ18 and the Fuji S8000fd, featuring a similar zoom range, with Fuji starting at 27mm and Panasonic at 28mm, and some form of image stablization (optical for FZ18, and sensor-shift for S8000fd). They joined the Olympus SP550UZ (also 18x) and the two Sonys H9 and H7 at 15x.

Curiosity killed the cat Award: Goes to the Kodak C513, because everyone is curious to see how the Kodak CMOS sensor is going to perform.

Most new cameras award: Samsung won the "most new models introduced" category with nine (9) new cameras. Some companies don't even have nine cameras in their whole line-up :)

Three new from Panasonic

More details in the official announcement post and the leak post

Panasonic FZ18 (8mp 1/2.5", 18x optical 28-504mm, f2.8-4.2 to f8, MegaOIS, RAW), $400

Panasonic FX55 (8mp 1/2.5" sensor, 28-100mm, MegaOIS, face detection debut), $350

Panasonic FX33 (Same as above, but with 2.5" LCD), $300

Seven new from Fujifilm and a UV IR DSLR!

More details in the official announcement post, and the Fuji IS Pro DSLR (UV IR version of Fuji S5)

Fuji IS Pro (DSLR, 12mp SuperCCD APS-C, Nikon mount, UVIR version of Fuji S5 Pro), starting at $2500; various kits bundled with Carl Zeiss lenses as high as $5000

Fuji F50fd (12mp 1/1.6" SuperCCD G7, sensor-shift stabilization, 34-102 (3x) lens, face detection), $300

Fuji S8000fd (8mp 1/2.35" Bayer CCD, 27-486mm 18x lens, sensor-shift stabilization, AA), $400

Fuji S5800 (8mp 1/2.5", 10x optical zoom, follow-up to S5700 (aka S700). Not coming to the US.

Fuji Z100fd (8mp 1/2.5", 5x folded optics, face detection), not in the US

Fuji Z10fd (7mp 1/2.5", 3x, follows Z5fd), $200

Fuji A920 (9mp 1/1.6" SuperCCD, 3x, AA, follows-up A900), $200

Fuji F480 (8mp 1/2.5", 4x, starts at 28mm, LiIon) $180

Nine new from Samsung

More details in the following official announcement posts NV-series and i85 and L83T, L830 and L730, and S85 and S750. I think that's nine, but a recount has been ordered :)

Samsung NV20 (12mp 1/7.2" sensor, 3x, SmartTouch) $350

Samsung NV15 (10mp 1/7.6" sensor, 3x, SmartTouch) $300

Samsung NV8 (8mp 1/7.6" sensor, 3x, SmartTouch), not in the US

Samsung i85 (8mp 1/2.5" sensor, 5x folded optics, 3" LCD, multimedia PMP) $350ish

Samsung L83T (8mp 1/2.5" sensor, 3x, LiIon), reminds of NV3 in style, $280

Samsung L830 (8mp 1/2.5" sensor, 3x, LiIon) $180

Samsung L730 (7mp 1/2.5" sensor, 3x, LiIon), $170

Samsung S85 (8mp 1/2.5" sensor, 5x, AA), $180

Samsung S750 (7mp 1/2.5" sensor, 3x, AA), not in the US

Kodak's first CMOS sensor digicam

More details in the official C513 announcement post

Kodak C513 (5mp 1/2.5" CMOS sensor, 3x optical, AA) $80 (not a typo, eighty dollars)