Show Notes

Greetings, you’re listening to the Liam Photography Podcast, I’m your host Liam Douglas and this is Episode 408 for Thursday June 20th, 2024.

DOJ Sues Adobe

The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a lawsuit against Adobe in the United States District Court, Northern District of California, alleging that the software company obscures fees and makes it illegally tricky for users to cancel software subscriptions.

The complete complaint, filed today, June 17, has been filed by the DOJ after notification and referral from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

“For years, Adobe has harmed consumers by enrolling them in its default, most lucrative subscription plan without clearly disclosing important plan terms,” the lawsuit alleges. “Adobe fails to adequately disclose to consumers that by signing up for the ‘Annual, Paid Monthly’ subscription plan, they are agreeing to a yearlong commitment and a hefty early termination fee that can amount to hundreds of dollars. Adobe clearly discloses the early termination fee only when subscribers attempt to cancel, turning the stealth early termination fee into a powerful retention too that [redacted] by trapping consumers in subscriptions they no longer want.”

Although entire paragraphs have been redacted from the publicly available lawsuit, what is eminently clear is that the United States aims to end Adobe’s “unlawful conduct” and seeks injunctive relief, civil penalties, monetary relief, and additional relief.

The lawsuit names the United States of America as the plaintiff, with Adobe as the primary defendant. Additional defendants include Maninder Sawhney, Adobe’s Senior Vice President of Digital Go To Mark and Sales at Adobe, and David Wadhwani, Adobe’s President of Digital Media Business. The lawsuit explains that Sawhney and Wadhwani have acted in ways relevant to the complaint, alone or in concert with others.

“The Federal Trade Commission is taking action against software maker Adobe and two of its executives, Maninder Sawhney and David Wadhwani, for deceiving consumers by hiding the early termination fee for its most popular subscription plan and making it difficult for consumers to cancel their subscriptions,” the Federal Trade Commission explains in its associated statement.

“Adobe trapped customers into year-long subscriptions through hidden early termination fees and numerous cancellation hurdles,” says Samuel Levine, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “Americans are tired of companies hiding the ball during subscription signup and then putting up roadblocks when they try to cancel. The FTC will continue working to protect Americans from these illegal business practices.”

The FTC claims that, based on complaints it has received from consumers, Adobe failed to explain its pricing model and early termination fees adequately. Further, users have taken issue with Adobe weaponizing its early termination fees to allegedly pressure customers into not canceling their subscriptions. This corresponds to multiple parts of the DOJ’s lawsuit, including that it believes Adobe makes canceling a subscription excessively difficult, to the point of violating consumer protection laws.

“When consumers reach out to Adobe’s customer service to cancel, they encounter resistance and delay from Adobe representatives. Consumers also experience other obstacles, such as dropped calls and chats, and multiple transfers. Some consumers who thought they had successfully cancelled their subscription reported that the company continued to charge them until discovering the charges on their credit card statements,” the FTC says.

The complaint specifically charges Adobe’s business practices with violating the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act (ROSCA), (https://www.ftc.gov/legal-library/browse/statutes/restore-online-shoppers-confidence-act) which includes prohibitions against unfair and deceptive online sales practices. The act, law 15 U.S.C. §§ 8401-8405, was approved by the United States Congress in December 2010, about two years before Adobe adopted its much-maligned subscription-only model. As much as users have disliked this move, it has led to Adobe achieving record revenues year after year.

The FTC opted to refer the civil penalty complaint to the DOJ by a three-to-zero vote. The United States has requested a trial by jury and demands relief in the form of conviction, monetary civil penalties, permanent injunctions to prevent further ROSCA violations, and additional relief to those affected.

Fujifilm Instax Wide 400

Fujifilm announced the Instax Wide 400, the latest in the Wide series that captures large, 3.4 x 4.25-inch instant prints.

The new instant camera is a literal handful in order to accommodate the larger instant print size and several improvements including features an updated design including a self-timer, two-range focus modes, automatic exposure, and flash control.

“When it comes to instant photography, there is a niche segment of our user base dedicated to our wide print options,” says Bing Liem, division president, Imaging Division, Fujifilm North America Corporation.

“They have been very enthusiastic, especially through social media, about the next Instax Wide product introduction. These people like to live large in all they do, so Wide 400 allows them to take photos that include more background and more room to display their creativity. With the introduction of Wide 400, we’re excited to offer an instant camera that can capture the user’s larger than life moments.”

The Instax Wide 400 features a self timer dial that gives photographers options for timing photos in two second increments up to 10 seconds. It also has an Automatic Exposure function that Fujifilm says enables better print clarity compared to the Wide 300. The camera automatically senses the level of ambient light when the shutter button is pressed and optimizes the shutter speed and flash output accordingly. Fujifilm says this will result in photos that are properly exposed regardless of interior or exterior conditions. The camera also has automatic flash control with Fujifilm says is designed to optimize image quality in bright or low light situations.

The new instant camera has two focus modes (zone focus) that can be toggled from the lens dial, which is also where the camera can be powered on and off. The camera has framing guides for both portrait and landscape orientations as well as three modes. Normal Mode is meant for general photography that takes place between three and 10 feet, Landscape Mode is for photos where subjects are 10 feet away and beyond. The third “mode” is more of a capture option which requires the use of the close-up optional lens. With it, the camera can capture close-up subjects that are as near as between 15 and 19 inches. The close-up lens also has an integrated selfie mirror.

The Fujifilm Instax Wide 400 is expected to be available in late June 2024 in a green color for $149.95.

Pentax’s 17 Film Camera

The brand-new film camera from Pentax that has been in development since 2022 is finally here. Called the Pentax 17 and teased last month, it is a half-frame, vertically oriented, fixed-lens camera that captures two 17mm x 24mm pictures within a single 35mm-format frame.

The Pentax 17 is the first brand new 35mm film camera designed by a major manufacturer in the last 19 years (excluding the re-release of the Leica M6 since it wasn’t a new design, instant film cameras, and pinhole cameras). The last major camera maker to release a new film camera was Canon with the Sure Shot 130u II in 2005, and before that, Nikon last released a film camera with the F6 back in 2004 — final production of the camera ceased in 2020. It could be argued that the Film Never Die Nana was a new design, but that was heavily based on the Contax T2, so that line is a bit murky. Multiple companies have released cheap, reusable film cameras that mimic classic disposables, too, but they all share basically the same underlying design and feature set. Whatever the case, it’s been a very long time since there has been mass production of a wholly new, manual winding, 35mm film camera like the Pentax 17.

It had been so long since anyone at Pentax had attempted to build a new film camera from scratch that the company’s engineers called back retired camera designers to consult on the design and had to spin up manufacturing for parts that have long since been out of production.

“Borne out of the Pentax Film Camera Project, a concept first announced in December of 2022, the new camera resulted from a close collaboration between Ricoh Imaging and Pentax experts and younger engineers,” Pentax says. “The experts shared their vast knowledge and decades of experience in film and imaging technology with the current team members to design a film camera that would allow photographers to express their originality and creativity by leaving some room for manual operation, rather than making it a fully automatic camera.”

Pentax saw the rising popularity of analog photography but also balanced that against the rising costs of film, which is why the company chose a half-frame design for its first new film camera. With this design, photographers can get double the photos for the price of one roll.

The Pentax 17 is heavily inspired by the company’s heritage and incorporates multiple pieces based on products from its history. The flash and shutter buttons are based on the Pentax KP, the front texture is based on the DA WR lenses, and the film advance lever is the same one used on the Auto 110. The lens design is based on the Espio Mini (a triplet lens), the film focal plane is made similarly to the K-40, and the color of the Pentax 17 body is from the LX Titan 75-year special edition. The film rewind arrows are from the Pentax Spotomatic, the film rewind assembly is new but mechanically identically to the Pentax LX, and the font for “17” is the same as the one used on the Pentax 67.

Pentax wanted to mix the desire for a film camera with one that made it easy to take photos since fully manual film cameras can be daunting for those without experience. It uses a zone-focus system divided into six focus zones that can be selected from a ring around the lens. Depending on the selected zone, the Pentax 17 can capture subjects in focus from as close as 25 centimeters in the macro zone to as far away as infinite focus. The viewfinder uses an Albada-type frame finder to make it easier to frame a scene, compose close-up images, and provides visibility to the current focus zone, so photographers don’t need to pull the camera away from their eye and look at the lens to see which zone they’re in.

Speaking of the lens, Pentax chose a newly-developed 25mm f/3.5, which is equivalent to a 37mm lens on the 35mm format (since it is a half-frame camera). As mentioned, it’s based on the one found in the Espio Mini from 1994 but was redesigned to support the half-frame format. Pentax says that it has been treated with High Definition coatings to optimize clarity and sharpness and, as a nod to the company’s history in optics, Pentax engineers based the design on the Ricoh Auto Half from 1962 (since Pentax has never before made a half-frame camera), incorporating the angle of view and focal length.

The body features a manual film winding mechanism, a manual film advance lever, and exposure compensation and ISO sensitivity adjustments, each with its own dials. Pentax also focused on providing a camera body that uses high-quality materials: the top and bottom covers are made of solid magnesium alloy. Despite this, it weighs 290 grams (10.2 ounces) without a battery or film loaded.

The 40.5mm filter mounting thread allows photographers to use a range of filters, too.

Pentax notes the camera supports a wide range of ISO film speeds (50, 100, 125, 160, 200, 400, 800, 1600, and 3200) and features a classic note holder on the back cover where the end of the film package can be inserted to remind a photographer which stock is currently in the camera. Three strap lugs allow horizontal and vertical suspension, and the Pentax 17 is also compatible with the optional CS-205 Cable Switch for use in long-exposure photography in Bulb mode.

The camera relies heavily on auto exposure settings to ensure that photos are exposed correctly. There is no fully manual mode, for example, as Pentax’s goal was to appeal to photographers who are interested in film photography but don’t want to worry about wasted rolls during what can be a steep learning curve.

“The Pentax 17 automatically adjusts exposure settings based on the lighting data collected by its metering sensor,” Pentax explains. “In addition to the Full Auto mode in which all exposure settings are selected by the camera, it provides six other shooting modes, including Slow-speed sync, which is highly useful in twilight photography; and Bulb, a slow-shutter speed mode that comes in handy for photographing nightscapes and fireworks. The Pentax 17 also features an independent exposure compensation dial, which allows the user to swiftly shift the exposure level to accommodate different types of subjects or express the user’s creative intentions.”

As a mostly automatic camera, the control that a photographer has over it is unique, especially compared to expectations set by modern digital cameras. Its aperture will adjust between f/3.5 and f/16, its minimum shutter speed is four seconds while it can fire as fast as 1/350 second. Despite having a leaf shutter, its flash sync speed is locked to 1/125. Some settings will force the camera to lock aperture at f/3.5 and bulb mode allows photographers to control the shutter speed manually (with that locked aperture), but most of the time, the camera is making decisions based on how far away a subject is and its light meter readings. The benefit here is that it is difficult to mess up an exposure, but it is simultaneously hard to give the camera specific instructions.

The Pentax 17 also has a built-in flash that can be programmed to automatically fire when needed, fire on command, or never fire, depending on a photographer’s needs. Below are a series of sample photos captured with the Pentax 17, provided courtesy of Pentax:

The Pentax 17 will be available in “late June” and will retail for $499.95.

Alice Camera Now Shipping

Photogram’s Alice Camera has been a long time coming. Unveiled in early 2021 as an AI-assisted Micro Four Thirds camera, the camera was supposed to finally release in October 2022. That target came and went, but Alice isn’t dead — it is arriving to initial pre-order customers next month.

“After three years of dedicated development, Photogram is thrilled to announce that the Alice Camera, a novel AI-powered Micro Four Thirds camera that attaches to iOS and Android smartphones, will begin shipping to pre-order customers from July 15, 2024,” Photogram explains.

The Alice Camera uses a Sony Four-Thirds CMOS image sensor, a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, and Google’s Edge TPU to handle the deep learning features. These onboard processors help Alice perform the required calculations to drive the camera’s computational photography features, including noise reduction, sharpening, and expanded dynamic range.

Many of these same features are included in smartphones to help achieve better results. However, dedicated mirrorless cameras typically eschew such niceties because they aren’t as necessary thanks to bigger sensors and lenses — image quality is naturally better. These features are also computationally intensive, and these demands only increase as the sensor gets bigger.

Alice is quite interesting in that its image sensor isn’t that small- a Micro Four Thirds sensor is still considerably bigger than an iPhone’s image sensor, for example — but it still employs computational photography features to improve image quality. As real-world samples showed in 2022, the results are pretty impressive. AI is also used for exposure, white balance, and autofocus.

The Alice Camera sports a Micro Four Thirds lens mount to go with its Sony-made Micro Four Thirds sensor. The aluminum body includes a microSD card slot, a USB-C port, and a 3.5mm mic jack. The camera has a 5,000 mAh built-in battery.

While the camera is compact and lightweight, it works alongside a separate Android or iOS smartphone. The Alice Camera relies upon a dedicated smartphone app, which includes camera control, file management, and streamlined content-sharing tools. The camera runs on a custom-built Linux-based operating system, which supports open-access development and over-the-air updates.

While Alice can be used without a smartphone, the connected device is required to use all available features, and the smartphone also acts as an electronic viewfinder.

“We’re incredibly excited to finally bring the Alice Camera to the world,” explains Vishal Kumar, CEO at Photogram.

“We set out to build the Alice Camera because we wanted to offer our customers a new type of mirrorless camera built specifically for a new era of content. We’ve developed a fundamentally new engineering paradigm for mirrorless cameras, with significantly novel implementations on hardware, software and with AI algorithms. Alice Camera represents an innovative step forward in how mirrorless cameras are designed and how our users will process, capture and share their experiences. We can’t wait to see the amazing content created with the Alice Camera.”

Why has it taken so long to get Alice into customers’ hands? Photogram blames manufacturing issues that resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We are deeply grateful for the belief and patience our community has shown throughout this journey,” adds Vishal Kumar. “As a new entrant in the camera industry, we hope to bring fresh perspectives. All the difficult development work over the last three years is now done. Now, we’re ready to deliver and start to scale manufacturing. Our journey begins from today… We’re just getting started.”

The first Alice cameras for the United Kingdom market will begin shipping on July 15. Cameras for the most of Europe, the United States, Japan, and Australia will ship on August 15. Customers in Canada, France, and the rest of the world will get their cameras starting in September. As of now, pre-orders are now on the fourth batch, which are expected to ship in September as well.

The Alice is sold body only for $845, down from the eventual retail price of $1,195.

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Also be sure to join the Liam Photography Podcast Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/liamphotographypodcast/ You can reach the show by call or text @ 470-294-8191 to leave a comment or request a topic or guest for the show. Additionally you can email the show @ liam@liamphotographypodcast.com and find the show notes at http://www.liamphotographypodcast.com.

You can find my work @ https://www.liamphotography.net and follow me on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter @liamphotoatl. If you like abandoned buildings and history, you can find my project @ http://www.forgottenpiecesofgeorgia.com. and http://www.forgottenpiecesofpennsylvania.com.

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