A Brave New World

Yesterday I was given an early birthday present of a Lytro light field camera. So far I have taken a couple of test images and then put the camera onto charge.

My Lytro is one of the first generation ones:

I know that they are getting on a bit now and attention is turned to the new model coming out but we were surprised to see how grubby the box was. Inside the story was little different

It's a neat little unit and feels sturdy in the hand. Manufacturing quality feels good.

The power button is on the bottom, along with the USB socket for charging the camera and transferring images. This is the 8GB model and will hold about 400 images, the 100% charge is good for all of those. So, it's convenient too. The lens cover is magnetic and not attached permanently in any way. Bound to be lost soon.

The shutter release is the dimple on the top. The ridged part is the zoom control

Controls are accessed with a swipe of the LCD screen.

I have not had time to experiment yet and have only taken basic shots. ISO is controllable across a fairly wide range. Exposure is automatic but can be set for a specific region of the image in the basic mode. In Creative mode exposure is not accessible by tapping but the focus zone can be set instead. That's the sum extent of my current knowledge.

I snapped my P510 taking the shot of the Lytro box.


and this is the "doing my head in shot" from the P510 of the LCD screen on the Lytro showing the P510 taking the shot of the Lytro box (keeping up? Good.)

Having got this far I can say with some confidence that the Lytro is not a panacea for poor photographers. It is certainly not a case of not having to worry where your focus is. In fact, I rather think that more care in composition is required rather than less. I'll come back with more comments once I am more familiar with the camera.

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