Been offline this week? Working too hard to catch up on the latest photo gear news? Here are five key announcements you may have missed.

Photoshop Turns 30 and Celebrates with New Features

Adobe celebrated Photoshop’s 30th birthday in the most appropriate way possible: by topping it off with new features and feature enhancements (and the obligatory bug fixes). One of the features getting an overhaul is content-aware fill, which gets a new “apply” button so you make multiple selections and apply multiple fills without leaving the content-aware fill workspace. When you’re happy with your work, click “OK” to have your changes saved. The Lens Blur tool has also been improved and moved to your computer’s GPU, for improved realism. The iPad version of Photoshop has also been updated with object selection, type settings, and more.
Prices: Starting at $10/month | adobe.com

New Nikon Firmware 3.0 for Z 6 and Z 7 Mirrorless Cameras

If you own a Nikon Z 6 or Z 7, firmware version 3.0 will give both models a nice little upgrade. The firmware, which unlocks identical features in both cameras, adds support for ProGrade and Lexar CFexpress memory cards. Autofocusing has been enhanced with the addition of animal-detection AF, which enables the cameras to detect and focus on the faces and eyes of cats and dogs for those all-important pet portraits. Nikon also updated the subject-tracking performance in AF mode. You can now turn it on or off with a half-press of the shutter or by pressing the AF-ON  button on either camera.  Subject tracking can now be assigned to a camera or lens Fn button for when you’re using the electronic viewfinder.
Price: Free | nikonusa.com

Lomography Simple Use LomoChrome Metropolis

Lomography’s “Simple Use” camera isn’t quite identical to the single-use cameras of old–when you’ve shot through the preloaded film on the Simple Use, you can reload it with 35mm film of your own. This edition comes preloaded with LomoChrome Metropolis ISO 100-400 film and three flash gels so you can get creative with your color palette. It has a fixed-focus 31mm f/9 lens.
Price: $22.90  | lomography.com

Rokinon’s Cinema Lenses Get Carbon Fiber Builds

Rokinon’s newest XEEN cinema lenses—the CF 16mm T2.6 and CF 35mm T1.5–feature carbon fiber bodies (hence the “CF”) to keep their overall weight down. The new lenses will be sold in PL, Canon EF and Sony E mounts and feature luminous markings that will glow in the dark. Like other cinema lenses, they feature identical gearings for use with standard industry accessories, and a long, 200-degree focus throw.
Price: $2,500 (both models) | rokinon.com

The Micro Four Thirds Family Grows

While there are plenty of great Micro Four Thirds (MFT) products on the market today, three new companies officially joined the Micro Four Thirds Standards Group to help grow the number of products that conform to the camera mount standard. This trio of newly-minted member companies–Yongnuo, Venus Optics and MediaEdge–are already well established in the photo and imaging markets. Indeed, both Yongnuo and Venus Optics have already marketed several MFT products already, so we’re likely to see improved coordination between those companies and Olympus and Panasonic (the two stewards of the MFT standard).
four-thirds.org