Business travel is all about travel. Business trips are not always obligations that take you from meeting room to airport lounge to hotel. A 2008 Strategy One study showed that a third of Western business travellers fall into the category of 'explorers', looking for authentic contact with their destination and taking photos of it. Of the French respondents, 41% (%) thought that a camera was essential. But the inevitable dilemma remains: should you travel light or take your 'good' camera with you, i.e. a large SLR? Photography is constantly evolving under the influence of digital technology, but also of innovations that are closer to the user. The frantic race for megapixels is over, and sensor resolution has stabilised at between 10 and 15 million photosensitive sites. The challenge of quality has shifted to sub-segmentation. As a result, SLRs are becoming increasingly compact and compacts increasingly complex. Finally, and this is the small revolution underway, interchangeable lenses are moving beyond the strict confines of the SLR body.<\/p>\n
The first observation is that cameraphones have ceased to claim a place of honour in the world of photography. The debauchery of pixels and the appearance of optical zooms have not been enough to hide the reality: a camera needs fast electronics, and cannot do without quality optics. Camera phones that make do with plastic lenses and boast 5 or 6 megapixels have reached a performance ceiling that relegates them to a supporting role. Conversely, SLRs have shed their status as massive objects that are complicated and expensive to use.<\/p>\n
The movement was initiated by Canon, the world leader in photography, particularly at the top end of the market. Nikon and Pentax have followed suit, all offering more compact products with lenses in the 500-600 euro range. For cameras that would have been considered semi-professional a decade ago, this is an unhoped-for democratisation. However, these cameras retain all the advantages that still make SLRs the king of photography. The sensors are large, the pixels less dense and easier to work with. The definition of shots is improved, as is the reduction in chromatic aberration. They remain ultra-reactive thanks to the technical concept that defines them: the tilting-mirror optical sight, which produces the legendary click when triggered. You photograph what you see in the viewfinder, whether you're an amateur or a pro. There's something for everyone, right up to the highly accessorised 24MP, 2kg racing beast. The difference between the brands remains a quarrel between chapels, into which Sony has recently entered with its Alpha ranges, which are increasingly wide and packed with lenses. Even Panasonic and Samsung, emboldened by the rapid success of their compacts, are moving into the top end of the market, which gives them legitimacy.<\/p>\n
But the reflex chamber, where the mirror tilts, requires minimum volume. And miniaturisation has reached its limits. At the same time, certain functionalities have spread. Bridge formats had adopted shutter-priority and shutter-priority modes - in short, non-automatic modes. For the past two years, these have been found on advanced compact cameras. Initiated by Canon's G series and Sony's H series, they have made these small cameras bigger.<\/p>\n
Equipped with more powerful lenses and sensors, as well as more sophisticated image processing circuits (DSP), they have created a real alternative for quality enthusiasts. What's more, they can incorporate non-photographic innovations such as GPS, which allows you to sign your photos with their latitude and longitude. These new features have boosted the average value of the sector. With entry-level cameras costing less than \u20ac100, digital photography needed to be revitalised and avoid becoming a commodity. Generally speaking, the photo public is always looking for quality and innovation, and understands it, even when it is technically complex.<\/p>\n
So the latest innovation in the sector is called a compact with interchangeable lenses. The concept is simple: a small body onto which lenses of different sizes can be mounted. So they offer flexibility as well as a choice of focal lengths. But the validity of this concept goes deeper, because it involves integrating very high-quality micro 4\/3-type sensors (see box). As a result, the G ranges from Panasonic, the Pen from Olympus and the Nex from Sony have thrown a spanner in the works. Sold on the grounds of compactness and aesthetics, they have come full circle and removed from the SLR the last distinctive feature that the general public thought it had.<\/p>\n
But that doesn't mean we have to bury the SLR. In the great dance of hybridisation, it now has two new and useful functions.<\/p>\n
The first is called Live View, and allows you to aim not necessarily through the viewfinder, but by seeing what appears on the LCD screen on the back of the camera. As a bonus, this screen is increasingly large, high-resolution and sometimes touch-sensitive, like smartphones.<\/p>\n
The other new feature will make purists howl and generalists rejoice: video is coming to SLRs. With excellent optics and the widespread use of high definition, a good-sized camera becomes an excellent camcorder that doesn't say its name.<\/p>\n
But photography is still subject to one inescapable constraint. Even with all the automatic functions and settings in the world, it's still possible to miss a shot by the slightest amount. No full auto mode, no expense spared, can replace the minimum amount of technical mastery and talent needed to capture the real thing.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Business travellers take photos. Limited by time and space, they now have new ways of bringing back a few souvenirs. After all, digital technology has revolutionised image capture and is becoming increasingly hybrid.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16073,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[105],"tags":[],"type-darticle":[],"n_magazine":[],"class_list":["post-16071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technologies","vapo-free"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n