[Photo] The Panasonic Lumix DMC-G3

Last week I decided I wanted a smaller camera which I could easily take with me. The problem is that my Canon D60 DSLR camera is quite bulky and that's not always very easy. So I started looking at some compact cameras, but the longer I looked at the specifications and the increasing prices it became more and more clear to me that this was not the way to go.

I then ran into the micro four-thirds cameras. This is a camera comparable to a DSLR however without the mirror system. This has a big influence on the size of the camera and since this was for me a big reason to look for another camera this was something I had to look into.

Background on the four-thirds system

The micro four-thirds system was announced in August 2008 by Olympus and Panasonic. So for me it is proven technology. The system will bring me the DSLR options and quality in a more compact camera.

Some of the pros in comparison to a compact camera:

• Changeable lenses which mostly feature a wider aperture then on compact cameras. Which allows more control over the depth-of-field and greater creative possibilities.
• A decent image sensor (Approximately 9 times the size of most compact cameras) which offers better image quality and more light sensitivity.

My requirements

Of course I had certain requirements while looking for a four-thirds camera:

• Electronic viewfinder, since there is no mirror it does not support an optical viewfinder like you find on a DSLR. However in certain conditions one can not do without.
• Swivel display, I like this on my Canon 60D and it allows me to take shots which are otherwise (almost) impossible to make.
• Built-in flash unit.
• Hot-shoe for external flash unit.
• Comparable image resolution as my current camera (16 MPixels)

The Panasonic DMC-G3

Based on my requirements I ended up with the Panasonic DMC-G3 (Here is a link to the review on the dpreview site). This is the camera I received last week and with which I am extremely happy since it matches all my requirements. I was a bit worried about the size of the camera in comparison to my hands, but this has not been a problem at all.

The weight of the camera with the 14-42mm lens attached and with a battery in the camera is 583 grams. Which is certainly not bad compared to the features on the camera, like the viewfinder and the swivel lcd.

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-G3 with 14-42mm and 45-200mm lens

To show the size of the camera I placed my Canon 60D next to it

The back of the cameras with the swivel LCDs (I forgot to clean the display on the G3 ...)

As a note for someone who is wondering if a Canon strobe (like the Canon 430EX II) can be used then the answer is yes. But TTL does not work and the weight distribution is quite off and because of this holding the camera is not very easy.

[Photo] England in December 2011

The 2nd day of Christmas we arrived in England and we stayed there for a few days with our friends. I made a lot of pictures and decided to show a small selection of them on my blog.

Southend-On-Sea, England

Southend-On-Sea, England

Southend-On-Sea, England, a look on the Southend Pier

Southend-On-Sea, England, at the end of the Southend Pier we saw multiple seals swimming

 

London, England, a look on the Big Ben

London, England, a look on the side of the Palace of Westminster

London, England, a look on Buckingham Palace



London, England, a look on Her Majesty's Theatre

London, England, Chinatown

London, England, the Tower Bridge at night

London, England, the Tower Bridge in the morning

My highlights of 2011 in pictures

We got married

Roundtrip Java, Indonesia, Ricefield

Roundtrip Java, Indonesia, Borobodur

Roundtrip Java, Indonesia, Prambanan

Bali, Indonesia, Our hotel Melia Benoa

Bali, Indonesia, Our hotel Melia Benoa



Bali, Indonesia, A big Manta Ray

 

Bali, Indonesia, A big Sunfish

 

Playa del Carmen, Mexico, Hotel Sandos Playacar

Playa del Carmen, Mexico, Hotel Sandos Playacar

Playa del Carmen, Mexico, A turtle

Playa del Carmen, Mexico, Some Lionfish

Playa del Carmen, Mexico, Diving in the Cenotes

Playa del Carmen, Mexico, Diving in the Cenotes

Mexico, The Coba temple

Mexico, The Tulum temple

Merry Christmas everyone !!!

I hereby wish each and everyone a merry christmas !

 Some history regarding christmas can be found here ... 

For some laughs I found this comic:

 And to end with a nice movie check this one out !

[Dev] Defining an event on the .Net Micro Framework

I was just defining an event while working on an application on my Netduino Plus. But the default EventHandler delegate was unknown ...

Searching the internet did not directly help me on the subject and so I decided to add a short post on my blog to help the next people running into the same problem.

The delegate is defined in the Microsoft.SPOT.TinyCore assembly, so just add that assembly and you're good to go.

UPDATE:
I just ran into a problem when deploying my solution to the Netduino Plus. The program had a total size of 66336 bytes which is too big ! After removing the reference to the TinyCore assembly and added the delegate (public delegate void EventHandler(object sender, EventArgs e)) to my program it ended up to a total of 2560 bytes. So no adding of additional assemblies !

[Tech] Netbook HP DM1-4000SD

I used  my Asus 1000HE netbook the last 2 years and I took it with me on holidays for entertainment, for mail, skype and as a glorified imagetank. I also used it to be able to do some internetting on the couch, it was small, light and had a 7+ hours battery length.

However last holidays it became to slow since I could not use my regular movies since the netbook was too slow for those. Instead I had to rely on DVDs or 480p MKVs. Since I am also filming in 1080p with my videocamera/DSLR I was not able to watch these on my netbook and so I had to look for a decent replacement.

Some requirements I had:

• Better resolution, 1024x600 was not decent enough for everything I did on the netbook.
• Max screen size of 11" since the netbook was then still easy to put into a backpack. 
• Weight is still very important since I take it with me on a holiday in my handluggage. The Asus netbook weighed 1 kg.
• Possible to handle 1080p content.
• HDMI output.
• Still a decent battery length, 5+ hours.
• A decent price which depended on the possibilities.

I looked at some of the Asus models but then I had to either reside on the Atom platform or had to accept the 12" screen. I also look at some ultrabooks but then I had to pay 800+ euros and had an even larger screen of 14".

Due to my requirement of the decent battery length the AMD Fusion chipset came along. It promised good battery length and good performance (also graphically). So based on this and my previous requirement the HP DM1-4000SD netbook came on top of my list. I read a few reviews and finally ordered it. It's a sturdy netbook with a good screen and a good keyboard. Battery length is about 4.5 hours with WIFI on while doing some internetting and installating some new software. The screen resolution of 1366x768 is quite nice and pretty workable ! The weigth was a bit more then expected, but 1.5 kgs is still doable.

The netbook is setup with Windows 7 Home Premium, the 32 bits version. Which is a bit strange to me since the AMD Fusion platform is 64 bits. I decided to reinstall the laptop with a x64 version of Home Premium while using the same installation key. This also provided me with a way to get rid of all the HP software which was installed. So in the end I was quite happy with my new netbook.

Some utilities I ran into:
BatteryBar - A tool which provides a toolbar in which either the remaining time is shown or the percentage of available battery capacity.
AMD System Monitor - A tool specific for the AMD Fusion platform which indicates processor load, graphic processor load, memory usage, etc.

Don't hesitate to contact me if you have some specific questions about this netbook !

[Photo] DIY Photo Crane

I just ran into this DIY camera crane and the result looks awesome ! I have to build one myself.

The link