Gear of the Year 2015

Epson SC-P800

Epson SureColor SC-P800 A2 desktop printer copy

As the successor to the Epson 3880, this 17-inch A2+ printer adopts Epson’s new Ultrachrome HD inkset that has been several years in development. While it uses nine inks with essentially the same colours, including the same light-black and light-light-black for mono prints and photo and matte for a variety of media, they’ve been re-formulated with denser pigments. This increased density results in richer blacks and an larger range of tones particularly in the shadows, as well as higher colour saturation and wider gamut. The extra range is subtle over the P3880 on the vast majority of prints, but significant where shadow separation is required. The SC-P800 has a couple of other nice new features over the older model too, including an option to switch automatically between matte and photo inks based on the media chosen, and it can connect over wifi.

www.epson.co.uk

IC12 LED Light Cube

IC12 LED Light cube copy

If you think an LED light cannot get hot, the Bowen Zkin, IC12 with its solid 10cm cube of fanless finned heatsink body and glass Fresnel front lens will set you right. The IC12 is a unique multifunction light, with a tight, circular, evenly lit field of 5000 lumens (150 watts) continuous light, controllable down to a very low minimum power. It has a 5500-5800k daylight quality, and a £750 linkable two-head kit can light video indoors or out. A mode button switches from continuous light to flash, with an optical slave cell and sync socket, between 1/8000s single flash and 60Hz bursts of up to one second. At medium power it can sync flash with 24fps video. IC12 has a quick-change, high- capacity Li-Po battery and a range of light shaping and filter accessories. It’s ideally matched to the good high-ISO performance of today’s sensors.

www.bowens.co.uk

Zkin Kraken

Kraken copy

Zkin’s range of high-quality bags is aimed squarely at the style-savvy, with leather-buckled waterproof canvas models like the Raw Hydra equipped for bike handlebar mounting and offered in versatile earth tones. There is even a low-cost (£25), simple wrap to protect cameras and lenses, the Mayura. The Kraken, however, has a classic black finish and leather upper cover, which is also stylish, but never out of place. Intelligent contemporary design makes it the ideal pairing for those mirrorless cameras that have come to the fore in 2015, taking full advantage of smaller kit sizes to at last provide something that is truly compact without any frustrating compromises. Strong catches and an overlapped cover on the zipped accessory pouch make it ideal for street photography and travelling on packed commuter trains. And the name? That leather cover can shrug off the most relentless storms.

www.z-kin.com

Sony SEL 24-240mm FE f/3.5-6.3

Sony SEL 24-240mm FE copy

DSLR makers have struggled to meet the demand for a wide-range zoom covering from 24mm to a good telephoto reach. Starting with 24-85mm, such zooms moved to 24-105mm (Canon), and finally 24-120mm (Nikon). Only Tokina has gone further, with a 24-200mm f/3.5-5.6, now discontinued. The first lens to break this barrier is the Sony 24- 240mm f/3.5-6.3 in the mirrorless FE-mount. The short-register mount allowed a new design to cover this range at a size only a little larger than Sony’s FE 24-70mm f/4. It takes 72mm filters (like its fellow 16 35mm f/4), is weather sealed, offers silent linear motor autofocus to 50-80cm, and achieves 0.27× subject scale. It costs £800 and weighs 780g, so is not ideal for travel at 118.6mm×80.5mm. It also lacks a zoom creep lock.

www.sony.co.uk

3XM Solution and One Vision

At trade shows, the 3XM Solution from Photovalue attracted attention for the stylish acrylic pyramid with black velvet and violet light, displaying jewellery-like USB storage linked to online gallery sales. Though the photographer’s customer never sees the pyramid, well-designed packaging and pouches keep the diamante-crystal silver hearts (etc) in style. This product makes ‘files only please’ wedding and portrait orders look worth the money you need to charge for them. In 2015, 3XM Solution went into partnership with One Vision Imaging, the UK pro superlab formed by the merging of Colab, Leach, Multiprint and Fosters. The USB memory and web gallery now link to a dedicated range of One Vision products, designed jointly to match the style and quality of the 3XM Solution – a step towards reversing the loss of print orders created by CD and memory-stick delivery.

www.3xmsolution.com

First published in the January 2015/December 2016 Cool and Noteworthy issue. For a limited time, you can subscribe to the British Journal of Photography for only £39 and get the best contemporary photography news, reviews and features. Offer ends 31st December 2015.

Magnum Professional Practice all workshops gif