Holga of China has expanded its line with a new 35mm camera in both manual and autofocus models. Also new are the Holga N, FN and CFN models using 120-size film. The new Holga 120 CFN is a medium-format camera with integrated color flash and a plastic lens. The rotating flash wheel can change the color of the flash to red, yellow, blue or standard white...

Travel photographer Blaine Harrington makes an enormous effort to research the many countries he visits, but what he likes best is sharing his experiences.

If you run into Blaine Harrington — maybe in an airport — do him a favor and ask him where he's been lately. He says he comes back from globetrotting photo shoots excited to share his experiences. That exuberance comes through the lens into award-winning photographs that have kept him happily in the business of travel photography for many years. It's a career that's equal parts adventure, good planning and desire to...

Konica Minolta Photo Imaging has developed a Minolta Maxxum 7D digital single-lens reflex camera with 6.1-megapixel resolution, as well as body-integral CCD-shift anti-shake technology. The new digital SLR also features a high-definition 2.5-inch color LCD monitor and is compatible with virtually any Maxxum AF lens.

Specifically designed to match the performance requirements of the camera’s 6-megapixel CCD, the Maxxum 7D’s built-in anti-shake technology allows photographers to shoot at shutter speeds up to...

Konica Minolta Photo Imaging’s new compact DiMage Z5 digital camera offers a built-in 12x optical mega zoom lens, anti-shake system, 5-megapixel CCD, rapid autofocusing and two-inch LCD screen.

The 12x optical zoom lens and 4x digital zoom combine for a total 48x zoom. Its CCD-shift anti-shake system is particularly effective at such high zoom ranges. It allows photographers to shoot with shutter speeds four to eight times longer. It also provides steady, shake-free images with...

In what owner Roy Robinson calls a refocusing of the company's business lines, ProLab is closing its consumer-oriented Retail, ProZone and Portrait divisions to focus exclusively on commercial, large-format point-of-sale graphics. The retail photo-processing industry has declined substantially because amateur photographers now print at home or get prints from Wal-Mart or Costco, noted Robinson, in explaining the decision.

The company's commercial division, ProLab West, provides image manipulation, prepress, printing, kitting and distributing of large-format digital images to clients such as Restoration Hardware, Smith & Hawken, Tommy Bahama, Costco, Hannah Andersson and Storables.

Although the commercial division will remain at ProLab's headquarters in Seattle, the ProZone, consumer retail and portrait sales counters at that location have been closed. Approximately 25 employees...

ShootSmarter University in Aurora, Ill., recently finished construction of its new facility. The 6,200-square-foot building includes six shooting bays fitted with up-to-date equipment. The facility has been designed to provide natural lighting conditions as well as artificial ones. Studios have a choice of Mac or PC rolling workstations and Monaco calibrated monitors and printers. The file processing room contains five computer stations complete with printers and a 5,000-dpi scanner.

ShootSmarter offers four-day courses that feature hands-on training. Current offerings include Image Control, Color Management, Monitor Calibration, Creativity, Business Strategy and Effective Workflow.

Zuma Press, an independent press agency and wire service, won the contract for exclusive worldwide rights to syndicate the picture content of the weekly Sporting News, with in excess of 700,000 images dating back more than 118 years. The Sporting News archive has been incorporated into Zuma's web site, zumapress.com, and made available for immediate syndication by clients around the world.

Highlights include portraits of baseball's early stars by Charles M. Conlon, plus more than 300,000 historical, black-and-white images that document baseball throughout most of the 20th century. Nearly as many images cover football, basketball and hockey.

The American Society of Media Photographers has posted a new copyright tutorial on the public area of its web site at asmp.org/copyrightt. Although modern law gives independent photographers an automatic copyright at the moment a picture is taken, certain procedures must be followed to obtain the maximum legal protection for the photographer's rights. The tutorial details those procedures, providing step-by-step instructions and annotated sample forms.

In addition, the tutorial explores several copyright-related issues of importance to photographers, such as pictures of public buildings and the distinctions that courts use in deciding whether two images are substantially similar.

Sports Illustrated has launched a new web site featuring the magazine's photography at sipictures.com. The site was designed for photo editors, art buyers and corporate clients interested in licensing the images that have been appearing in the magazine since 1954.

The inventory is drawn from Sports Illustrated's archive of more than 3 million pictures. The online gallery, which will be updated continuously, contains a broad range of sports images, from athlete portraits to behind-the-scenes coverage of major sporting events. Among the photographers represented are the magazine's 18 current staff photographers, as well as more than 100 of its contributing photographers, including Walter Iooss Jr., Neil Leifer, John Zimmerman and Hy Peskin.

The Stanford University Libraries have acquired the complete archive of photographer Douglas Menuez, which encompasses his editorial photojournalism and fine-art documentary work as well as recent advertising projects. Most significant, the library believes, is the inclusion of more than 250,000 negatives documenting the growth of Silicon Valley.

Menuez's rise to prominence began as an intern at the Washington Post, followed by assignments for national publications including Time, Newsweek and Life. Through the course of his career, his social documentary work covered the famine in Ethiopia, the destruction of the Amazon, the AIDS crisis, drug wars and several presidential campaigns. He won numerous awards...