Fluid Mask 3 stands on its own

Vertus, the Boston-based developer of technology designed to ease the selection of specific elements in a digital photo, has released version three of its Fluid Mask software, the first time the product has been able to run as a standalone application and not just as a Photoshop plug-in.

Fluid Mask 3, costing US$239, attempts to reproduce some of the human mind's ability to naturally distinguish an element from its background, a task that's tricky when backgrounds are complicated or the element's border isn't well defined. The common, but notorious example, is hair.

The new version includes new edge-detection technology and new modes for blending selected areas and their backgrounds. Multiprocessor support speeds tasks by about 40 percent. Users can save settings for particular images for reuse later. And users can apply changes just to particular patches instead of to the whole image.

Photoshop includes its own selection, or masking, technology, and the new CS3 version includes a significant advancement in that area. But plug-in makers try to stay a step ahead of what's generally available.

Fluid Mask 3 is available as a stand-alone product or as a plug-in to Adobe Photoshop CS2 and CS3 or Adobe Photoshop Elements. It works on Windows XP and Vista and Apple's on both Intel- and PowerPC-based Macs.

Samsung introduces a rush of 8MP cameras

Hours after it unleashed three new models on Europe, the L830, L83T and L730, Samsung has officially announced three new 8 megapixel still cameras for the US market--the L83T, L830, and the S85. All three will include Samsung's new Successive Recording mode, which lets you pause and then resume while recording video. Most still cameras only let you start and stop while recording video, so you end up with many short clips if you want to stop the action for a short period of time.

Editors' note: Samsung Asia has confirmed that all four cameras will be entering the Asia market by end August. However, stocks may vary in each country.

The ultracompact L83T sports a 3x optical, 38mm-to-114mm (equivalent) zoom lens, 2.5-inch LCD, face detection, 14 scene modes, MPEG-4 video capture at up to 800 x 592 pixel resolution. The camera boasts sensitivity up to ISO 1,600 and includes what the company calls a Wise Shot mode which captures consecutive shots, one with flash and one with Samsung's Advanced Shake Reduction system (which boosts the ISO to combat shake) and then asks the user which one to keep. It also has a macro mode that focus down to 1cm away from a subject and has a maximum shutter speed of 1/2,000sec, which can come in handy when shooting so close.

The L830 also includes a 3x optical zoom lens and 2.5-inch LCD but tops out at a shutter speed of 1/1,500sec. It has nine scene modes and can also capture MPEG-4 video at up to 800 x 592 pixels. The S85 tops out at 640 x 480 video, but pairs a 5x optical, 38mm-to-190mm (equivalent) zoom lens with its 2.5-inch LCD. It also includes the Wise Shot, 1/2,000sec shutter speed, 14 scene modes, and face detection found in the L83T.  Compare all four here

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Via CNET Crave

Casio shoots with YouTube in mind

Announced in the US only yesterday, the EX-S880 and the EX-Z77 are Casio's latest models to join the compact category of cameras and the Japanese manufacturer is trumpeting the new cameras as YouTube-ready.

Now savvy tech types would snigger if they overhear someone rushing out to buy Casio's latest simply because it can shoot YouTube-sized videos. After all, the contents on the video-sharing site is not exactly known for its sterling resolution quality.

Besides being able to shoot 640 x 480 30fps videos (not groundbreaking at all) in MPEG-4 H.264, Casio has also added a custom video uploading app specific to YouTube. However, this specificity will not please Casio users who are already using other video-sharing sites like Revver or Yahoo Video. We are guessing that the application logins direct into a user's YouTube account and offers a resume function for failed uploads. But till we receive further details from Casio, this remains to be seen.

Casio US has indicated that the YouTube Capture mode will not be limited to just the S880 and Z77 though it has not released further details on other new models that will feature this functionality.

Casio Singapore was unable to revert at press time on the local availability and pricing of these two cameras.  Compare them here

 See more of the latest cameras for this fall

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Filed under:  Digital Cameras
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