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The Kandao QooCam EGO is the best hope so far for mass adoption of compact 3D cameras

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3D cameras have fascinated me for years. When I was a kid, my parents had one of those View-Masters. Actually, they had hundreds of them (they owned a bunch of toy shops) but they gave one to me and I’d sit and stare through its binocular viewfinder for hours looking at all the different reels.

3D viewing technology’s come a long way since then, but the fascination never faded. I have a couple of small all-in-one 3D cameras, like the Weeview SID (review here) and Insta360 EVO. Some of you might remember the Kandao QooCam EGO 3D camera launching on Kickstarter a couple of months ago. Well, now I have one, and I’ve been putting it through its paces.

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The Xencelabs Medium Tablet with QuickKeys is actually better than a Wacom Intuos Pro and cheaper

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For quite a long time if you wanted a drawing tablet, Wacom was pretty much the only show in town. I’ve owned an Intuos Pro for several years now, and at first, I was thrilled with it. However, driver issues and constant lack of connectivity made me fall out of love very quickly.

These days there are a lot more choices of brands and types of tablets. Do you want one with a screen that you draw on directly? Do you want to use an Ipad? Or do you want something pretty simple that just does what it’s meant to do? The Xencelabs medium tablet and pen have been tipped as a direct, yet more affordable rival to the Wacom Intuos Pro. I was keen to find out if this was true, and whether it could actually be better.

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Projecting backgrounds behind your subject with the Wemax Nova 4K UST ALDP laser projector

Projectors have been a part of photography for a very long time. Originally, they were designed for boring your friends and family members with slides of your holiday snaps. Since then, though, projectors have become much more useful and now regularly play a creative or practical role in our photography and filmmaking needs.

We’ve shown how you might be able to incorporate projectors into your workflow before, using one as a full-screen preview monitor for video editing. This time, we’re going to take a look at the Wemax Nova 4K ultra-short-throw (UST) ALDP Laser projector with an Ambient Light Rejecting (ALR) screen as a sort of “virtual set” background projection system in the studio.

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The Huion Kamvas Pro 16 (2.5K) is a solid challenge to Wacom’s dominance in the graphics tablet market

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Whether we use Windows or a Mac, one thing we pretty much all agree on is that if you’re a photographer, a graphics tablet of some kind it’s basically a must-have item in our toolkit for working with our images on the PC. They’ve been a staple of the graphics and photography industry for years.

And that’s what we’re going to look at today with the new Huion Kamvas Pro 16 2.5K. This isn’t just your basic tablet, though. This has a built-in 15.8″ IPS display with a 2.5K QHD (2560 x 1440) resolution with an anti-glare surface. It’s also compatible with Windows and Mac, has some basic Linux support and apparently even works with Android devices.

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A great Speedlight, but is it worth the upgrade?

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Godox announced the updated version of their square-headed Speedlight the V860III last summer. Having an extra portable flash unit in your bag is always a good idea, particularly if you’re like me and often end up shooting on location, so I was keen to try it out. Godox boasted several new features such as a new hot shoe lock and modelling light, but is it really different enough from both the previous V860II or the round-headed V1 to warrant an upgrade? Let’s take a look!

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OWC Atlas S Pro V90 UHS-II SD cards are fast, reliable and reasonably priced

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In January, OWC announced their new Atlas S Pro V90 UHS-II SD Cards, available in 32GB, 64GB, 128GB and 256GB capacities. They’re priced very competitively, too – that is to say, they’re less expensive than many of their V90 competitors but still a little more expensive than V60 UHS-II cards.

As V90 cards, they guarantee sustained write speeds of at least 90MB/sec. According to OWC, real-world testing has provided write speeds of up to 276MB/sec and read speeds of up to 290MB/sec. Such claims are easy enough to verify – at least, one would think so – so when OWC offered to send us some to try out, we decided to put these speeds to the test ourselves.

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The Rode VideoMic GO II should be your new go-to low budget on-camera microphone

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Rode recently released their new Rode VideoMic GO II, replacing the VideoMic GO in their lineup. But this isn’t simply an update, it’s a complete overhaul, redesigned from the ground up. So, it presents a pretty major upgrade over its predecessor that inherits a number of features from its more expensive big brother the Rode VideoMic NTG, including the new holey design as well as USB connectivity.

I’ve been using one for a little while now and have done some tests and comparisons on the camera and when it’s plugged into a computer as a digital USB audio device. I’ve also done tests with and without the windshield to see how well it stands up to the breezy weather we’ve been having recently in Scotland.

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Autel Evo Nano drone – Is it really a DJI Mini 2 killer?

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This review of the Autel Evo Nano has taken a little longer than I’d anticipated to complete due to the abysmal weather we’ve been having here in this part of Scotland over the last few weeks. But I think this has turned out to be a bit of a blessing in disguise.

You see, when the Autel Evo Nano first came to me, there were quite a few features missing or not fully working. Even after its general release and people could actually buy it, it still had a few issues. But now, most of them seem to have been resolved and I’ve been able to fly it to its current full potential now that the weather has perked back up.

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The Insta360 ONE RS is a worthy successor, adds 6K video, Active HDR and native FlowState stabilisation

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Insta360 has today announced the new Insta360 ONE RS. It’s the follow-up to the company’s popular and modular Insta360 ONE R, released in 2020. It boasts some fancy new upgrades in both the core module as well as the 4K “Boost” module, but is it any good?

I’ve been playing with one for the last couple of weeks, so today we’re going to talk about some of its differences and benefits over its predecessor and take a look at some sample footage from both shot side-by-side to see how it compares. For those who just want the announcement info and the specs, you can check out the announcement article here. For the rest of you, carry on reading.

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The Haida M10 II Filter System brings some nice workflow improvements over the original M10

I’ve used a number of square filter solutions over the years and it’s rare that new holders are released, but that’s what’s happened with Haida, with the release of the Haida M10 II. It’s an update to the original Haida M10 (review here) and it’s not just a slight rework with a new name, but it actually comes with some pretty nice design changes and improvements over its predecessor.

First up, my overall thoughts about the original Haida M10, which you can read about here, have not changed. It’s still a fantastic holder and the M10 II takes nothing away from it, and on first glance, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the M10 II is pretty much the same as the M10, although the changes that have come with the new version make it even more of a pleasure to use.

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