ricoh

Ricoh announces Leica M mount for GXR series

Despite the news that it's acquiring Pentax, and likely specifically for its interchangeable-lens cameras (encompassing both the as-yet unshipped Q and its dSLRs), Ricoh seems to be moving on with support for its sort-of competing GXR series.

For those unfamiliar with the GXR--likely quite a few of you--it's Ricoh's twist on interchangeability; instead of swapping lenses, though, you swap modules containing both the sensor and lens. The latest announcement, for a module dubbed "A12" sort of turns the GXR back into a plain old ILC: it's composed of a 12.3-megapixel APS-C CMOS sensor … Read more

Hoya sells off Pentax digital camera business

Japanese company Hoya has agreed to sell its Pentax digital camera business to Ricoh, the companies announced today.

According to Japanese publication Nikkei Business Daily, Ricoh will pay Hoya 10 billion yen ($124 million) to acquire its Pentax operation.

Pentax is widely considered an also-ran in the digital camera business. The company's worldwide market share last year, according to IDC, stood at just 1.5 percent. For the most part, Pentax's digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) cameras lack advanced features found in the leading options from Nikon and Canon. However, Pentax cameras are typically quite affordable compared to their … Read more

Ricoh GXR Lens Mount Unit for Leica lenses

Ricoh today announced the development of the GXR Lens Mount Unit for its GXR interchangeable unit camera system. The GXR Lens Mount Unit module will accept Leica M-mount lenses, allowing access to a large selection of high-quality Leica M-mount lenses that date back to 1954, as well as third-party M-mount lenses such as those from Voightlander and Carl Zeiss. These are all manual-focus lenses.

In addition to the ability to accept Leica M-mount lenses, the GXR Lens Mount Unit will feature a 12.9MP CMOS APS-C sized sensor. There will also be a newly developed focal plane shutter.

There are … Read more

Ricoh gears up cloud storage for iPhone

Ricoh, the Japanese digital office solutions company, is announcing a new iPhone app from its Quanp subsidiary. The app provides 10GB of free cloud-based storage, the ability to share files up to 500MB, uploading and management of photos and videos taken on an iPhone, and a potentially cool local sharing function with other nearby iPhone users.

The Quanp app rose to No. 2 on the Japanese App Store in the Productivity category after its release in Japan earlier this month. It's now available in the App Store for users in the U.S.

There are a vast array of choices for cloud storage, including a number of products that address the need to manage files from a mobile device. One interesting angle of the Quanp product is a function called "Flick File," which allows you to send files back and forth via Bluetooth. It reminds me of the old days of beaming business cards to Palm devices, or more recently of the Bump social-networking application.

I've been watching Ricoh's Quanp organization work its way through the ins and outs of Silicon Valley for the past year and a half. Their online storage service--they call it "visual" online storage due to the fancy 3D interface of their PC client--has potential to help handle the deluge of data we are creating at home.

The vast majority of computer users don't have great backup habits, and with more and more people embracing mobile devices and data usage rates on smartphones skyrocketing, the lack of backups is only going to get worse. With cloud-based storage that can sync with a PC, much of the hassle is removed from the backup equation.

In Japan, mobile phones are ubiquitous: people use them to enter subways with a quick swipe, to pay for things in vending machines, and to manage paperless boarding passes in airports. Japanese conglomerate Sharp leads in cell phone market share with 26.2 percent, and Apple has the largest American corporate presence with 4.9 percent. … Read more

Ricoh expands GXR system with megazoom module

As promised when it announced the GXR system back in November 2009, Ricoh has introduced the P10 megazoom module to slide into the GXR camera back. It features a 28-300mm f3.5-5.6 lens (35mm equivalent) plus 10-megapixel backside-illuminated CMOS sensor. The result will essentially be a compact 10x zoom camera with specs similar to popular point-and-shoot models from manufacturers like Sony, Panasonic, and Canon. Unfortunately, pricing and availability are still up in the air.

To refresh your memory, the GXR system comprises a housing that includes the basic pieces of a point-and-shoot--920,000-pixel 3-inch LCD, controls, hot shoe, and flash--into which you can slide slide a series of modules incorporating various lens/sensor combinations. In theory, that lets Ricoh optimize the characteristics of the module by choosing different sensors to match the different tasks for which one would use different lenses.… Read more

Ricoh 10x compact a little different than the rest

It's been a few months since we've heard anything from Ricoh. That product, the GXR, was very original compared with what the company has announced Wednesday, the CX3. However, that's not to say it's not worth checking out.

The CX3 is a compact megazoom using a 10.7x 28-300mm-equivalent lens, a 10-megapixel backside-illuminated (BSI) CMOS sensor, 720p HD movie mode, and a 3-inch 920K-dot LCD. The camera does many of the new shooting options available thanks to the BSI CMOS sensors including high-speed burst shooting at 5fps at full resolution and improved dynamic range and low-light … Read more

Ricoh goes modular for GXR camera system

In what has to be the oddest new camera technology announcement of 2009, Ricoh unveiled its GXR system. It's not a mirrorless interchangeable lens (dare I say EVIL?) system, as was rumored around the blogosphere, but what the company catchily calls an "Interchangeable Unit Camera," where the "Unit" in question is a lens/sensor module which slides into a housing that includes the rest of a point-and-shoot's pieces--920,000-pixel 3-inch LCD, controls, hot shoe, and flash. A tiltable EVF that fits in the hot shoe will be optional.

When it ships in the beginning of December, Ricoh plans to have the body and two camera units. Also, according to the company, it promises to deliver a new camera unit every quarter, starting with a nonspecific telephoto in the second quarter of next year.

One of the initial modules consists of a 24-72mm-equivalent f2.5-4.4 lens coupled with a 10-megapixel 1/1.7-inch sensor-shift-stabilized CCD; it supports ISO sensitivities from ISO 100 to ISO 3,200, VGA movies, and a raw burst speed of 5 frames per second for an unspecified number of frames. Essentially, with this unit the camera becomes a slightly updated version of the GX100, with the better sensor from the GR Digital III and a bump up in LCD-screen size.

The second module is a 50mm-equivalent f2.5 macro lens coupled with an APS-C-size (23.6x15.7mm) 12.3-megapixel CMOS that supports 24fps 720p video. … Read more

Ricoh GRD III packs fixed 28mm F1.9 lens

The Ricoh GRD series of compact cameras have been a popular choice among photographers who want a stealthy point-and-shoot that offers manual focus and exposure control. The Japanese company has updated this line with the GRD III and its optics should appeal to enthusiasts.

The 28mm fixed lens has a maximum aperture of F1.9, and shutterbugs who snap a lot of pictures at night will find this large lens opening useful. Besides the usual JPEG image format, the 10-megapixel camera is able to take RAW pictures, and the 3-inch screen has been upgraded to a higher-resolution 920K-pixel display. Although … Read more

Ricoh jumps from copiers to the cloud

Japanese copier maker Ricoh launched "quanp," a new cloud storage service in beta a few months back and has decided to extend the beta period in the U.S. to garner more community participation and feedback.

'quanp' is short for "quantum paper" and apparently refers to Ricoh's interest in extending the reach of documents and creating interconnections between devices. The service calls itself a "new visual online storage service that intends to be the online spot for collecting and organizing all of your digital life memories."

To this end, Ricoh created a Windows … Read more