Adobe Workflow Workshop
Robin Preston will be holding a workshop in Stevenage on the 23rd May at The Imaging Academy. Robin is one of the top Photoshop Elements experts in Europe and will be providing instruction, help and feedback throughout the day.

The workshop runs from 10am-4pm. Price: £69 and includes a buffet lunch.

Full workshop details...

We have a new subscription offer for you! Sign up for a Digital Camera magazine subscription and you'll get 3 issues - cover price £3.99 - for only £3. That's a pound an issue! After that, it's only £12.30 by quarterly Direct Debit. Not only is this great value, but you'll also get our exclusive, cover-line free clean covers. And as a subscriber, you'll get the issue before it appears in the shops! You can take advantage of this fantastic new deal here.

In issue 72 of Digital Camera magazine, we reviewed Pentax's new K20D DSLR. Unfortunately we listed the RRP price as £999 in the mag, and while we'd be happy to pay that for such a feature-packed DSLR, we're happy to announce that the K20D retails for £899. A whole hundred pounds difference makes this impressive camera even more enticing, and a fantastic choice whether you're new to DSLR photography or looking to upgrade.

See this month's Digital Camera magazine for the full review, or take a look at our final verdict on the K20D camera page.

Ricoh has launched the G600, a go-anywhere compact that's water, shock and dust resistant. The rugged little compact will happily keep on snapping even if dropped from 1.5 meters, taken underwater or dragged through the desert. Better yet, there's a five-times optical zoom equivalent to 28-140mm, 1cm macro function and a ten megapixel sensor. We've yet to get our hands on it, but if it's anything like Ricoh's recent R8, we won't be going on holiday this summer without one!

Ask us!
Want to hone your photography skills or learn a new editing technique? Then get your shots into us at ‘Ask the Team’ for some no-nonsense advice. Email us your shots as 1.5MB JPEGs, putting ‘Ask the Team’ in the subject line.

Celebrity photographer Rankin – whose subjects have included Tony Blair, Kate Moss and Kylie Minogue – has tested the Canon EOS-1Ds Mark III in an exclusive footie shoot for Canon as part of its Euro 2008 campaign. “You can’t get a better D-SLR camera than a Canon,” Rankin commented. “What you’re hoping for with any new Canon camera is that it will be even better than the one before – and the EOS-1Ds Mark III has achieved that.” The resulting photographs, which celebrate football’s ‘tiny moments and the emotive quality of these moments’, will form part of Canon’s sponsorship and advertising campaign for Euro 2008. So while Britain won't be there, there's another reason to watch Euro 2008!

The only UK showing of photographs from the 2007 Pilsner Urquell International Photography Awards – Best of Show exhibition, will be at The Lightbox gallery and museum in Woking, Surrey, from Tuesday 22 April until Sunday 29 June. Photographers from the USA, South America, Europe, Japan, India, the Middle East and Australia are represented in the show. Their images range from evocative portraits to impressive wildlife shots, incredible landscapes, creative compositions, stark photojournalism and striking architecture. They include an image by the UK’s Charlie Crane, winner of the Deeper Perspective Photographer of the Year at the annual ‘Lucie’ Awards in New York City, USA.

Ever wondered what your photographs would look like if you were taking the same shots 100 years ago? We've come across this great site that'll convert any jpeg you upload (or point it to on the web) into an antique in seconds. It's really rather clever, doing a lot more than simply putting a warped border around it and converting it to sepia. If you don't read Japanese, don't worry - it's as simple as clicking Browse..., then hitting the blue button below once you've selected your photo. Post your results on the forum!

All you Nikon D3 owners will be happy to hear that your beloved DSLR has just got even better. Nikon has just released a firmware update, and Version 1.10 now includes a Vignette Control addition in the shooting menu, a Focus point brightness option for point illumination and a host of tweaks and improvements, ranging from ISO sensitivity changes to white balance improvements. PC users can grab the update here, while Mac users will want to go here.

Canon raises over £27,000 for British Red Cross
Red editions of products seem to be becoming synonymous with corporate charity donation. It's good to see Canon has joined the ranks with a red edition of the £99 PowerShot A460. Sold exclusively in Tesco stores, £5 from each camera has been donated to the British Red Cross, totalling twenty-seven thousand pounds. Good stuff.

Olympus E-3 receives DIWA Gold Award
The Digital Imaging Websites Association (DIWA) has bestowed a prestigious Gold Award on the Olympus E-3. The flagship of the Olympus D-SLR range was cited as a worthy winner due to its unique technological features in four key areas: speed, live view, image quality and versatility. DIWA is an association comprised of a pool of independent web-based specialist publications from across Europe.

Barnardo's celebrity photography exhibition
Barnardo's and a host of well known faces including Terry O'Neill, Laura Bailey, Bruce Oldfield, Lulu Guinness and Sean Bean, have joined forces with acclaimed photographer Cambridge Jones in a bid to find permanent homes for the thousands of children awaiting adoption across the UK.

The exhibition highlights some of the children in the care system that have nowhere to call home. Celebrities became guest photographers for the day to highlight the importance of finding every child a home.

The exhibition runs from 25 April until 3 May 2008 at the Getty Images Gallery, 46 Eastcastle Street, London, W1W 8DX

Getty Images Gallery

RTPS Exhibition 9th-20th April
The Richmond & Twickenham Photographic Society are holding their annual exhibition at The Landmarks Art Centre on Ferry Road in Teddington from the 9th-20th April.

For further information call
020 8391 5855 or visit
the RTPS website.

Photoshop Express update
Our friends at MacFormat have sent us a link for the screenshot tour of Photoshop Express, so even if you're outside the US you can still take a look around and get an idea of what to expect.

Sign up for Adobe® Photoshop® Express Beta
As of today our US friends can wield the power of Photoshop online with the release of the beta version of Photoshop Express.

This web-based image editor allows you to edit your photographs non-destructively and includes tools for red-eye removal, touching up, black and white conversion as well as cropping and resizing. You also get 2GB of online storage and the new program gives you the ability to directly upload and download to a number of social networking sites.

To use Photoshop Express you'll need a web connection, Flash 9 and it works with the major internet browsers. There's no details yet on when the rest of the world gets to play but when we hear we'll let you know.

Photoshop Express beta …

50mm f/1.4 from Sigma

Every photographer should have a 50mm lens in their kit and Sigma have just told us about their new, wide-eyed baby.

The Sigma 50mm f/1.4 EX DG HSM lens features full-time manual focus, thanks to its hypersonic motor (HSM), a minimum focussing distance of 45cm and a maximum magnification of 1:7.4.

This large aperture standard lens will be available for Sigma, Canon, Nikon, Sony and Pentax fittings.

Price and availability details are to be confirmed, but we'll keep you posted.

Sigma Imaging (UK)

Canon Ixus new models
The sexy Canon Ixus range continues to thrill with three new models. The new Ixus 970 IS has a 5x optical zoom and a 10MP image sensor. The lens covers a focal range of 27-180mm in 35mmm terms, so it may disappoint some people for not having a wider starting point. The asking price is £299.

The two other Ixus models - the 85 IS and 90 IS - are essentially the same camera except for the LCD. The 85 IS has a 2.5-inch LCD but makes up for that by including an optical viewfinder. The 90 IS has a 3-inch LCD. Both cameras have 10MP image sensors, image stabilisation, face-detection technology and a DIGIC III image processor. The 85 IS costs £239 while the 90 IS retails at £259.

Canon IXUS range

Nikon expands cashback offer
It seems like a good time to buy cameras with all the cashback offers going around.

Yesterday we told you about Canon's cashback offer and today Nikon tell us that they've extended their cashback offer to include the D60 single and twin lens kits.

Kits with cashback until 30th June:

D40 single lens = £30/€40
D40 twin lens = £45/€60
D60 single lens = £40/€50
D60 twin lens = £60/€80
D80 single lens = £50/€70
D80 twin lens = £75/€100

Visit Nikon's cashback page

Canon PowerShot cashback
Canon are offering cashback on a range of PowerShot models purchased between 20th and 31st March 2008.

Models with cashback (UK):

PowerShot A560 = £20
PowerShot A580 = £30
PowerShot A590 IS = £30
PowerShot A720 IS = £30
PowerShot A650 IS = £50

Get the claim form (UK)

Models with cashback (Ireland):

PowerShot A550 = €30
PowerShot A580 = €50
PowerShot A590 IS = €50
PowerShot A720 IS = €50
PowerShot A650 IS = €70

Get the claim form (Ireland)

Canon at Calumet
In April and May Canon will be visiting Calumet stores to demonstrate the 40D, 1Ds MkIII and their PIXMA printers.

Profoto will also be demonstrating their light shaping range.

Demonstrations run from 10am-4pm at the following locations Nottingham (23rd April), Birmingham (6th May), Drummond Street, London (14th May), Liverpool (27th May) and Glasgow (29th May).

Yemeni Community Exhibition
A photography and film exhibition centred around the Yemeni community of South Shields opens on the 2nd April and runs until 5th May at BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead, England.

The Last of the Dictionary Men exhibition documents the lives and memories of seamen from Yemen that settled in South Shields over the past century.

Exhibition information…

Digital Camera Photographer of the Year 2008 launches!

Now open for entries

Photographer of the Year 2008 is now open for your submissions.

We've partnered with Jessops to bring you the biggest competition of its kind.

There's a top prize of £15,000 for the overall winner, as well as prizes for the individual category winners.

Last year we had over 81,000 entries from people all over the world. As always, we've reviewed the categories and rules including some challenging new categories.

For full entry details and to enter online go to www.poty2008.com

To talk about the competition visit our dedicated forum thread

April issue on sale now
The new issue of Digital Camera magazine is in the shops this week. Get tips on street photography and learn how to take brilliant photographs of day-to-day happenings. The Casio EX-S10 and Nikon D60 get the full review treatment. Read our guide on perfect portrait techniques. There's over an hour of video tutorials on the free CD. Also, get tips for Your Mission as host a HDR masterclass. See what else is in the new issue…

Perfect Portrait Roadshow
Learn how to take better portraits at one of the six free studio training and presentation days being held in April and May.

Calumet will be hosting the event in Liverpool (23rd April), London (28th April), Birmingham (1st May) and Manchester (12th May). Pre-register for these dates here.

1stcameras.com will be hosting at Stoke City Football ground (15th May), pre-register by calling 01782 634 580.

Digital Depot will hosting in Stevenage (22nd May), pre-register by calling 01438 353706.

Lastolite, Fujifilm and Sigma will be displaying their wares including the Lumen8 range, Fuji's S5 Pro D and Sigma's DP1 HD. There will also be a working studio set up for a 2-hour presentation with the chance for you to try out the studio for yourself.

E-System Day 22nd March
Digital Depot are holding an E-System Day next Saturday (22nd March). They'll have the new E-420 on show as well as the 25mm pancake lens and the 14-35mm lens to drool over. If you're an E-1 owner register your place and get a free Olympus E-1 grip!

Be gentle, we're new here...
Hello. I'm Anthony Grimley, recently appointed Editor for the Digital Camera online team. It's great to meet you, albeit virtually. Together with Reviews Editor, James De Vile, our mission is to help you become a better photographer, provide some expert advice on choosing equipment and to showcase the work from our talented community. And to have some fun too.

James, myself and the magazine team are currently making some behind-the-scenes improvements to the Digital Camera Photographer of the Year 2008 competition. Nothing like being thrown in at the deep end! You'll need to be a registered member of the site to enter so sign up now if you haven't already so that you can start uploading photographs as soon as we launch.

*PMA 2008 Highlights* - Sony
Sony came up trumps with two new DSLRs we weren’t expecting - the A300 and A350 DSLRs, featuring 10.2 and 14.2-megapixel sensors, respectively. The killer feature is auto focus in Live View mode, as well as in-camera optical stabilisation. There are some new lenses, too – the Carl Zeiss 24-70mm looks particularly interesting.

*PMA 2008 Highlights* - Canon
Canon introduces the 450D, now with Live View, a 12.2-megapixel sensor and an impressive 3.5 frames per second shooting speed.
On the lens front Canon introduced two new L glass lenses – the larger being an 800mm f/3.8 and costing a whopping £8,999.
Disappointingly though there wasn’t even a whisper of a 5D replacement from Canon's people.

*PMA 2008 Highlights* - Nikon
Filling the gap between the D40 and the D80 is now the D60. It's a 10 MP entry-level model with an EXPEED processor. Somewhat strangely it doesn’t have Live View so it’ll be interesting to see how it’s received by the entry-level market compared with Canon’s 450D.

*PMA 2008 Highlights* - Olympus
No new DSLR from Olympus but a flurry of digital compacts featuring face detection and 10-megapixel sensors. Our favourite? The new 1030SW - it's waterproof to ten metres and designed to take some pretty hard knocks.