Leica launched its latest digital rangefinder in Berlin today with a special “monochrome” CCD sensor designed to shoot images in black and white. Called the Leica M Monochrome, the newly developed black-and-white-specific CCD has a native resolution of 18 million pixels.

“It has a sensor designed exclusively for black and white photography. It has no color filter,” said Dr. Andreas Kauffman, Leica’s Chairman at a special product unveiling event in Berlin today.

“This allows twice the amount of light to reach the sensor. So we combined this special sensor with our rangefinder system and we present you the M Monochrome with the maximized image quality available with Leica lenses.”

Kauffman later added that the new Leica M Monochrome “doesn’t mean the death of black-and-white film.”

Read more and see exclusive photos of the Leica M Monochrome digital rangefinder here.

PDN is currently in Berlin covering the launch and we’ll have more on Leica’s other announcements soon.

A fix for the exposure metering issue in the Canon 5D Mark III — which some have dubbed a “light leak” — appears to be in. And it seems as simple as Canon adding what looks like black electrical tape to the interior of the camera to prevent excessive light from the top LCD screen from throwing off metering.

Roger Cicala of Lens Rentals took apart a “new” 5D Mark III that arrived recently and noticed Canon appears to have added “very cool black tape they used to cover circuit boards” under the top LCD.

He knows the tape is a new addition because he took apart one of the early Canon 5D Mark IIIs a few weeks ago and there was no tape.

Below is a teardown of the original 5D Mark III without the tape and then the new camera with the tape. (Click to enlarge the photos.)

A simple fix but it seems effective.

Has this ever happened to you? We hope not.

Nikon announced a brand new entry-level digital SLR this morning and it comes in eye-catching candy apple red. The Nikon D3200, which will replace the D3100, has a whopping 24.2-megapixel APS-C size (DX-format) CMOS sensor and can shoot full 1080p HD video in 24p or 30p with full-time autofocus.

The small and lightweight Nikon D3200 can also shoot a snappy four frames per second in “high-speed” continuous mode. It’s also available in black and will go on sale in late April for $699.95 with a AF-S DX NIKKOR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR image stabilization kit lens.

To read the full story on the Nikon D3200 and the new Nikon accessories, click here.

Canon’s 22.3MP EOS 5D Mark III full-frame digital SLR has received a lot of early reviews but this can’t be the type of buzz the company hoped for.

Today, Canon released the following advisory for the 5D Mark III, noting that in extremely dark conditions, the LCD panel can cause what appears to be a metering issue that can affect the displayed exposure value. The exposure fluctuation may occur “as a result of the AE sensor’s detection of light from the LCD panel,” according to Canon.

Read the full advisory below or here on the Canon website.

To Users of the Canon EOS 5D Mark III Digital SLR Camera

Thank you for using Canon products.

The phenomenon described below has been confirmed when using the Canon EOS 5D Mark III Digital SLR Camera.
Canon is now examining the countermeasures and once the countermeasures are decided, we will post the information on our Web site.

Phenomenon
In extremely dark environments, if the LCD panel illuminates, the displayed exposure value may change as a result of the AE sensor’s detection of light from the LCD panel.

Affected Product
Canon EOS 5D Mark III Digital SLR Camera

Support
Once the preparations are complete, we will be making an announcement on our Web site.

This information is for residents of the United States and Puerto Rico only. If you do not reside in the USA or Puerto Rico, please contact the Canon Customer Support Center in your region.

Please register the EOS 5D Mark III. By registering, we will be able to notify you via email when service updates are available. If you already registered, please ensure you are opted-in to receive the notification.

Thank you,
Customer Support Operations
Canon U.S.A., Inc

PRESS RELEASE

New Canon EOS 60Da DSLR Camera For Astronomy Enthusiasts Captures The True Colors Of The Cosmos

LAKE SUCCESS, N.Y., April 3, 2012 – Canon U.S.A., Inc., a leader in digital imaging solutions, today introduced the EOS 60Da Digital SLR Camera, a long-awaited successor to the EOS 20Da that is optimized for astrophotography. This DSLR caters to astronomers and hobbyists who enjoy capturing the beauty of the night sky by offering a modified infrared filter and a low-noise sensor with heightened hydrogen-alpha sensitivity. These modifications allow the camera to capture magnificent photographs of “red hydrogen emission” nebulae and other cosmic phenomena.

To read more and see another image of the new Canon EOS 60Da, click here.

By Theano Nikitas

Adobe has been teasing photographers with sneak peeks of Photoshop CS6 for the past couple of months and tonight finally unveiled the software as a free public beta that’s available now for download. You can download Photoshop CS6 as a beta by clicking here.

We got an early look at the software, under NDA, at an Adobe-sponsored workshop last month. Click here to read our first impressions of Photoshop CS6.

Once you download the free beta of Adobe Photoshop CS6, tell us what you think of the software in the comments below.

By Theano Nikitas

After almost two months in public beta, Adobe has just released the finished version of its Lightroom 4 (download it here) image editing and organizational software. (The Lightroom 4 beta software officially expires on March 31, 2012.)

New features abound in Lightroom 4 ($149 full version; $79 upgrade), including some Develop module advancements, broader video integration, geo-tagging, book layout and direct-to-Blurb publishing as well as the oft-requested soft proofing functionality.

Other improvements, like more flexible DNG support, may be considered more like tweaks than updates but, overall, the differences between LR3 and LR4 are more notable than those between LR2 and LR3.

Rather than identify each and every new feature or enhancement, we’re going to concentrate on the most notable additions in this review.

Before you get too excited about Lightroom 4, those of you with older computers and operating systems — especially Windows XP — will have to upgrade to a 64-bit system. While I’m cross-platform and am covered on the Mac side, I’m a little saddened that I won’t be able to use Lightroom 4 on any of my Windows XP desktops. But XP is a little long in the tooth and we’re seeing a gradual transition away from the older OS. It had to happen sooner or later.

Still, minimum system requirements for LR4 are fairly modest. Beyond the 64-bit system, you’ll need 2GB of RAM and 1GB of free hard drive space. I worked with the beta on a 4.5-year-old Macbook Pro with 4GB of RAM and running OS X 10.6.8 (you’ll need 10.6.8 or 10.7 for LR4) and it ran fine.

Click here to read our full review of Lightroom 4.

Hold onto your hats, folks! Canon has officially unveiled its long-awaited EOS 5D Mark III, the 22.3-megapixel, full-frame, HD-shooting successor to one of the company’s most popular pro DSLRs of all time.

We got to spend some hands-on shooting time (see further down in this story) with a prototype of the Canon 5D Mark III this week, and as successors go, this camera is fairly loaded; even if its image sensor is only a tick higher in resolution that the 21.1MP 5D Mark II from 2008. (In contrast, the Canon 5D Mark III’s direct competitor, the Nikon D800, uses a 36.3MP full-frame chip.)

But let’s get the important stuff out of the way first: the 1080p-shooting Canon 5D Mark III is slated to go on sale at the end of March for $3,499 (body only) and as a kit with the 24-105mm f/4 L IS lens for $4,299.

While that’s nearly $1,000 more than the 5D Mark II initially sold for, Canon argues that the amount of new tech in the 5D Mark III justifies the bump up in price.

“The feature set on this thing is so far superior to the 5D Mark II, it’s worth it,” Chuck Westfall, Canon USA’s Technical Advisor in the Professional Engineering & Solutions Division told us during a hands-on preview with the new camera on Monday.

Meanwhile, the Canon 5D Mark II will remain in the line and its price will drop next week. Westfall wouldn’t say how much the price will be lowered on the 5D II but at least one site predicts it will go down by $300, starting this Sunday.

“The 5D Mark II will remain in the line for at least the next six months. It might go longer than that but it depends,” Westfall said. “There are people who will say I can get by with less so the 5D Mark II is there for them.”

Read more of this story and see additional photos by clicking here.