Lightfield Camera

[Samir]

My Mona who was in Fast Five sent me this link to a new type of camera and photography:
www.lytro.com

So this camera instantly captures the entire field of light, allowing focusing to happen after the fact on any part of the photo.

So what do you think of it? Think it will catch on?

[RatTrap]

Wonder how long it will take for the price to come down
and the storage size to go up?

So have you ordered a case of them yet Samir?

For me it would have to be in the $199 range and have a
drop resistant outer case.

Sure makes interesting pictures, the no shutter delay part
sounds great to me!

[Samir]

Originally Posted by RatTrap

Wonder how long it will take for the price to come down
and the storage size to go up?

So have you ordered a case of them yet Samir?

For me it would have to be in the $199 range and have a
drop resistant outer case.

Sure makes interesting pictures, the no shutter delay part
sounds great to me!

They're interesting for sure, and the bokeh is really good. But what is missing is sharpness across the entire depth of a photo if you want that. I need that, and a lot of photography techniques are based on that, so its a compromise.

I'm also wondering what the image file format is like. You can't exactly share these images like regular ones.

[RatTrap]

I did notice a few drawbacks as well.

1. Right now it is "Mac only", no windows interface.
2. Fixed storage system, after you take 300 pictures
you have to stop and transfer them.
3. It uses a .lfp format which once again is Mac only.
4. Fixed rechargable battery, can't just swap to a fresh battery.

Maybe they will get better with the 2.0 version.

[Samir]

I forgot about the 'mac-only' drawback, but didn't know about the rest. Great research!

It really depends on if a camera like this can do more than something else for the price. I can't get bokeh like that for that price with zero shutter lag, but the inability to convert an image to a traditional jpg is a big drawback.

[Munchie]

I will stick with my D700!lol