COBA March 2004

Written: March 10, 2004
Last Updated: March 12, 2004

Canon and Olympus reps demo their latest products at the March 2004 COBA meeting.

The Orange Room at SLAC was packed this past Wednesday to hear from the Canon and Olympus reps demonstrate their latest products. Thanks go out to Jim Rose from Canon and Joe Guzman and Dave from Olympus for coming in to talk to COBA.

Jim kicked the meeting off with a condensed presentation of new new products announced at PMA last month. He showed off the PowerShot Pro1 and the PowerShot S1 IS. I'm intrigued by the S1 IS, since it's one of the first cameras from Canon that can record video at 640x480 and 30 frames per second with the length determined by the size of one's memory card. Sony cameras have had this feature for quite some time, but this seems to be a first for Canon. Another feature that makes its debut on a Canon PowerShot is the ability to zoom the lens while recording video (can you do this with other digicams?).

The PowerShot Pro1 is another entry in the 8 megapixel consumer digital camera marketplace, joining the Olympus C-8080, Sony DSC-F828, and the Nikon Coolpix 8700. You can think of the S1 as a PowerShot G8 with an L-series lens. At $999, it's the same price as the Digital Rebel (EOS 300D). I'd choose the 300D over the S1 if given the choice, but I know a lot of people who would take the S1 due to its large zoom range (28-200), small size, and convenience factor.

The highlight of Jim's presentation was the Canon EOS-1D Mark II. The question that everyone seemed to be asking was, "What's your number on the waiting list?" Canon is going to sell a boatload of these cameras! Jim also had the new 28-300 f/3.5-5.6L IS and the 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 DO IS.

Following Jim's presentation, Joe gave a great presentation on the 4/3 System and the Olympus E-1. People enjoyed seeing Joe pour water over his E-1 without any adverse effects. If I were in the market for a digital SLR, I would consider Olympus' offerings. At PMA, a number of companies joined the 4/3 System consortium, including Sigma, Fuji, Panasonic, and Sanyo. The key to success for the 4/3 System is to have a number of companies producing products for the system: lenses, camera bodies, and accessories. If they can't do that, I'm afraid that Nikon and Canon will have the market all sewed up for years to come.

After the two presentations, COBA members were able to examine and play with all of the products from Canon and Olympus. We weren't able to take and post any photos from the 1D Mark II, but we were able to inspect it very closely. As I said earlier, Canon is going to sell a lot of Mark II's!

Photos from the March 2004 COBA meeting. Be sure to check out Manuel's photos as well!

Enter The Photo Gallery

Reader Comments

nice shirt, adam! ;)

--posted by echeng @ Friday, March 12 2004, 20:01 pm EST

take it easy with that highlight and shadow filter

: )

--posted by jason @ Friday, March 12 2004, 23:04 pm EST

Sorry, Jason, but you've got it wrong. No Shadow and Highlight filter used on any of these images.

--posted by Adam @ Saturday, March 13 2004, 16:58 pm EST

Adam, Have you ever heard of Sigma 10.2MP SD-10 digital SLR? Is it any good? Any advice from you will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

--posted by Da Hamster @ Wednesday, April 7 2004, 13:38 pm EDT

Da Hamster - There\'s a review of the SD10 on http://dpreview.com

I really like the Foveon sensor. At low ISO\'s images from those cameras are really nice. We had Foveon come and talk at a COBA meeting last year. Check the archives for more details.

--posted by Adam @ Wednesday, April 7 2004, 16:47 pm EDT

Thank you so much Adam! The website is very informative. I really appreciate your help. Best Regards,

--posted by Da Hamster @ Thursday, April 8 2004, 3:20 am EDT


PowerShots	New Canon Products	Canon EOS-1D Mark II
COBA members listen to Jim	Joe Guzman	Jim and Robert
Checking out equipment	Checking out the Pro1	Jim with the Mark II
Jeff tries out the Pro1	Me with the EOS-1D Mark II