Designing for better photography

[ali_mac]

<p>I am a designer undertaking a project to create innovation in photography. To make it easier, more versatile and fun.<br>

What are your main issues with photography? What holds you back?<br>

What would you like to be able to do with your camera that you cant already?<br>

Thanks for all your help</p>

[tom_mann1]

<p>What type of designer are you? Graphic, mechanical, web, CMOS imaging chips, flower arrangements, optical, lighting, course content / curricula, computer or network design, etc.? If we know your area of competence / specialization, we will probably be better able to make suggestions that may be of interest to you. I can list numerous improvements in each of the above areas that would benefit photographers.</p>

<p>However, I must say that the general goal you stated, "create innovation", seems so broad as to almost be meaningless. All photographers already innovate daily as part of their creative life, so unless you bring considerable depth of knowledge in some specific areas to the table, it seems unlikely you will be able to do much beyond conducting a survey. By any chance, are you a student?</p>

<p>Tom M.</p>

[hal_b]

<p>Tom, I agree. This post is too vague (and fishy) as it is stated. If this thread turns into a rant about "What holds you back" in general, it will be useless for any academic discussion.</p>

<p>There are photographers who would argue that there is absolutely no limit to your imagination, and photographic improvements have all been superficial for the last 50 years. On the other side of the coin are photographers who will gladly pay up and swallow any new camera for even the slightest perceived increase in functionality due to new features and menu items, but their photography rarely improves as a result of a new camera.</p>

<p>As far as "easier, more versatile, and fun" goes, have you seen the Diana cameras? You can't get much easier, versatile, or fun than that, and they were made 50 years ago.</p>

[ali_mac]

<p>Thanks for your suggestions Tom.</p>

<p>I am a student, studying in my final year for a Product Design and Manufacture Meng degree. My core competencies are in mechanical and manufacturing engineering and ergonomics though I have a relatively good knowledge of physics and electrical systems.</p>

<p>I am at a very early stage of development so want to keep my post open to interpretation. Below is a preliminary brief I have set my self:</p>

<p><strong>To design a piece of hardware (camera or accessory) which the user can interact with in order to push the boundries of photography, exploring where and how photos can be taken and what equipment can be used to enhance a shot.</strong><br>

<strong></strong><br>

I'm looking at all areas of photography at this stage from <strong>amature through to professional</strong> as well as in different industries (Commercial, Engineering, Crime scene investigation, Sports....etc)</p>

<p>I want to make sure I am not just "Designing a box" with a load of clever electronics inside. I want to create value with physical features (e.g. the gorilla pod from joby or the "lensbaby" lenses)</p>

<p>I am looking for <strong>general issues users have with photography</strong> as well as <strong>problems in specific senarios </strong>and suggestions to <strong>what people would like to take photos of but cant</strong> using their equipment.</p>

[hal_b]

<p>It sounds like you are just trying to narrow down your focus to one particular issue at this time. Essentially this is a survey of complaints, so that you may select one on which to concentrate your efforts. This is purely for academic purposes, then?</p>

<p>There was recently a thread where we discussed <a href="../canon-eos-digital-camera-forum/00Vbwn">the merits of on-camera pop-up flash</a>, and why it not implemented on professional-level cameras. Namely, Canon's 5D lacks this flash, but they included one on the 7D and Nikon put one on the D700.</p>

<p>I think more people would be inclined to appreciate the on-camera flash if it could swivel upward and be used as a ceiling-bounce flash. It would have to be both more durable and more powerful, and also fit in a way that doesn't interfere with the optical prism or larger lenses that protrude upward towards the prism area.</p>

<p>This is just one idea, and it's one that might not be well-received by many pros, who are content to ignore the pop-up flash issue altogether and rely 100% on external flashes.</p>

[ali_mac]

<p>I'm trying to brainstorm as many different ideas as possible at the moment as I dont want to write of any areas completely at this point. But yes, i'm trying to find 3 or 4 specific areas in which to develop. At the moment this is purely academic however I am aproaching it from a user and market based perspective and aim to come up with a comercially viable product which I could possibly start up a business with after i've finished university. (But thats a pipe dream at the moment!)<br>

Thanks for the link, its a great help as my strongest concept at the moment is based around creating different kinds of artificial light (for macro and portrait photos specifically) and whether a deadicated flash unit is required or if the pop up flash can be used.</p>

[tom_mann1]

<p>Ahh, now I understand where your are coming from. It turns out that I teach the Senior Design course in the engineering school of one of the local universities, so my students are going through exactly the same process at the moment. :-)</p>

<p>I'm going to wait a bit before I offer any suggestions. I want to see what other folks suggest.</p>

<p>All the best,</p>

<p>Tom M</p>

[kevin_delson]

<p>Concerning the camera, it's accessories etc..There is nothing that would interest me.<br>

Trying to re-invent the wheel for photography is IMO a excercise in futility.<br>

Perhaps there might be something of interest for beginners.</p>

<p>My ideas would be along the lines of software development.<br>

At the moment there are several image processors available to both amateur and pro with standardization amoung the platforms falling short.<br>

I don't feel the magic bullet will come in the way of hardware (cameras) but rather in a business & technical cooperative that is still feeling birth pangs.</p>

<p>(i.e) DNG is a attempt to offset possible future changes in image formats; yet is meeting with some resistance with acceptance of this file type being met with extreme caution.</p>

<p>It would be great if we could have a all in one image processor where there is no need to move from one program to another to finish a job.</p>

[maury_cohen]

<p>Lately I've been challenged to photograph sports; indoor soccer specifically. It would be wonderful to have a camera capable of high-resolution, at high ISO similar to current high-end D-SLR's but without the bulk. So the dream here is for a camera with dimesnions similar to current 4/3 designs but with imaging capability at the high end. Same with lenses and also high-speed shooting capability (4-8 fps). A single lens capable of 10-24x magnification; say something equivalent to 35mm 20-480mm f/2 with image stabilization. So in essense something like the current crop of UZ (Ultrazoom) cameras, but with a better quality output.<br>

I also think al memory cards should have capability like the Sandisk SD with built-in USB capability. Or a removable memory/USB module as part of the camera itself. </p>

[CoryAmmerman]

<p>An idea I that I had the other night was that someone should come up with a way to wirelessly transmit pics from the camera to an external storage device, similar to bluetooth. That would eliminate the need for SD and CF cards altogether. I haven't researched it, so someone may already be doing it. I had no intention of ever following up on that idea, so I figured I'd throw it out there incase anyone else could do something with it. </p>

[Charles_Webster]

<p>@Cory, there are several wireless solutions available for Nikon and Canon cameras, as well as some P&S cameras that use SD cards.<br>

<Chas></p>

[anthony_trudeau]

<p>Cory,<br>

You can already buy a wi-fi enabled SD card that will automatically upload pictures to your computer or to the Internet. In fact, I think there are multiple manufacturers. Here's one I got from a quick Bing search: <a href="http://www.eye.fi/">http://www.eye.fi/</a>.</p>

[CoryAmmerman]

<p>Like I said, I didn't research it. Never really thought about a wireless SD card. I didn't know they could get wireless into something that small. I was thinking more along the lines of something that transmits continuouslly to a PDA or iPhone or something (iPad maybe?) while you're in the field... a device with more memory and a bigger screen. </p>

[doug grosjean]

<p>If I were designing a digital camera, I'd go to a rectangular sensor like the old 6x6 TLR cameras, so that nobody would ever have to hold a camera in portrait mode. That would keep the flash on top of subject all the time. Photographer could crop as needed, after the fact. Or the camera could be made to crop automatically, at the touch of a button the image could be landscape mode or portrait mode.</p>

[tom_mann1]

<p>Hi Ali -</p>

<p>In the first semester of our SD (Senior Design) course, the students must come up with a design that demonstrates a level of knowledge appropriate for a senior and a design which is complete and technically sound. In other words, the device proposed should be able to be fabricated from only the design documents that were submitted by the student, and the device thus fabricated should work as intended (ie, meet the original requirements and specifications). In our next semester, the students must then fabricate a working device by following their own design document.</p>

<p>The above SD scenario immediately puts many constraints on the choice of a topic. First and foremost is the "Goldilocks criterion" - the proposed project must be not too easy nor too difficult. Other criteria include reasonable cost, possession of appropriate knowledge and skills, etc.</p>

<p>If your SD course works in the same way as ours, then unfortunately, many of the projects proposed thusfar in this thread are almost certainly inappropriate because they are vastly too difficult for almost any university senior in engineering. For example, no senior could ever be expected to design and code an image processor that essentially does "everything" -- this is a job for a large team of software developers with strong previous experience in image processing software for the pro and semi-pro photographer market. Similarly, the suggestion that your project be to reduce the bulk of current DSLRs is equally inappropriate for undergrad students. If this could have been done with the level of effort you likely have available, the large camera mfgrs would have already done so. As a final example, the suggestion to design a new camera analogous to the old 6x6 TLRs is also very likely far beyond any individual senior or small group of seniors because it involves VLSI and other microelectronics (designing the new sensor) and lots of computer engineering, not to mention optics and lots of mechanical design for the packaging.</p>

<p>Of the suggestions given thusfar, the only two which I feel have any hope of being at an appropriate level of difficulty for a reasonable number of university seniors are:</p>

<p>(1) The improved pop-up flash; and,</p>

<p>(2) The wireless / Bluetooth image transfer link.</p>

<p>The problem with the latter is that a strong undergrad program in computer engineering is essentially mandatory for such a project to stand any chance of being successful, even if your faculty mentor allows you to purchase the RF link and not design and implement this part of the system from scratch. I am quite familiar with projects based on RF links because our students regularly propose them. We accept some, but reject most based on insufficient knowledge in the area.</p>

<p>The SD course is typically the first truly open-ended engineering course for our students and almost all students, in their first few project proposals, wildly overestimate what that can actually accomplish.</p>

<p>Unless your course is run differently than ours, because of the problems mentioned above, I would strongly suggest that you look for a modest but truly feasible project. This would probably be something that involves relatively simple mechanical or electrical design, but probably not a new optical, microelectronics or computer engineering design because you don't seem to have the necessary training for the latter types of projects.</p>

<p>A few photography-related projects more in line with the capabilities of the hundreds of engineering seniors that I have directed include (a) an improved tripod head, (b) a sound actuated camera triggering system, © a strobe unit containing separate R, G and B sources that can be independently adjusted to achieve different color temperatures, etc., etc.. There are many other possibilities.</p>

<p>HTH,</p>

<p>Tom M.</p>

<p> </p>

[James G. Dainis]

Maybe you would like to re-check the feasibility of <a href="http://jdainis.com/efilm.jpg"><B><U>e-film</U></B></a>. It can be placed in any ordinary film camera instead of film to capture images digitally. The photo sensor is on the tongue and the necessary electronics are in the cylinder. A decade ago a company came up with the idea and was even said to have a working prototype (which they never demonstrated). The idea did not seem feasible back then because of the bulk of the electronics needed. With today's tiny credit card size cameras and cell phone camera electronics, perhaps it would be worth looking into again.

[ali_mac]

<p>Although I would love to develop a more compact version of the high end DSLR's it is far beyond my technical expertise and time scale for the project. Software based solutions would also require an impossibly large amount of learning away from my areas of expertise and would result in me just designing the housing for a clever bit of software which I would be unable to design myself.</p>

<p>Tom, my course sounds very similar to the one you run. I am expected to develop a product from idea conception through to a manufacturable product presented with photorealistic images, engineering drawings, techincal specifications etc...<br>

At this stage I have a few of initial ideas that I believe are worthy of development in relation to the amount of time I have (until the end of May) and that use an apropriate level of expertise developed over the time of my course.</p>

<p>I am currently looking at:<br>

- Making the pop-up flash more versatile<br>

- Possibilities for stereoscopic photography in commercial/personal applications<br>

- A wearable camera that records images<br>

- A camera for users with limited mobility<br>

- Disposable digital photography<br>

- Ways of encouraging people to print/display photos</p>

<p>Thanks for your suggestions any further issues/ideas/problems people have would be greatly appreciated, especially with specific types of photography.</p>

<p>Ali</p>

[tom_mann1]

<p>Hi Ali -</p>

<p>It sounds like you are on the right track w.r.t. project selection. Projects such as those you mentioned which can be set up to allow you to integrate several reasonably high level subsystems and which don't require you to design everything down to every last resistor and screw are often the most satisfying to the student and impressive to others. Your course may require you to have a module or two which is designed all the way up from individual components, but often this can be the packaging, interconnections, the microcontroller board which controls everything, etc.</p>

<p>Good luck, and if you have any specific questions, don't hesitate to email me through the link on my photo.net user page.</p>

<p>Sincerely,</p>

<p>Tom M.</p>

[nico_lilien]

<p>Just an idea: an 'end user conversion option' to facilitate eg. left hand use? Perhaps something like an easy to configure "set of controls"?</p>

<p>Focusing on the ergonomics is never a wrong idea.<br>

<br /> Regards, Nico</p>