Canon U.S.A.

Let's face it: Smartphones, with their ever-improving cameras and ability to instantly share photos, are munching away at the digital camera market.

But some consumers still appreciate the features that a more powerful camera can provide, especially when it comes to shooting photos at weddings, on vacation or in situations that require a little more zoom.

That's where cameras like the Sony Cyber-shot TX66 and Canon PowerShot Elph 520 come in. This Sony costs $350, while the Canon camera costs $300, with some retailers offering it for $259.

Canon this week announced the arrival of four new LCD projector models. The line includes the LV-8227A high-contrast projector ($799) and the LV-7392A ($799), LV-7297M ($699), and LV-7292M ($599) multimedia projectors. 

Canon this week announced the arrival of four new LCD projector models. The line includes the LV-8227A high-contrast projector ($799) and the LV-7392A ($799), LV-7297M ($699), and LV-7292M ($599) multimedia projectors. 

IPG Editor Bob Neubauer will be visiting Canon facilities in Japan and China next week, joined by several industry analysts. The group will tour Canon headquarters in Tokyo and meet with Canon executives to discuss the company's product development strategies and continued integration with Océ. In China, the group will visit the Canon Suzhou factory, about 90 minutes west of Shanghai.

The exclusive release of the annual Dealerscope 40 Under 40.

When we asked this year's group of 40 Under 40 industry stars to share their take on the state of the economy, one of our favorite answers came from Micah Williams, owner of Sonus Car Audio in Clarksville, Tenn. "Our outlook is if you're going to stand behind the counter, clerk boxes and compete on price then the economy is bad," he said.

In-plant Graphics Editor Bob Neubauer visited Canon Inc.'s Tokyo headquarters facility last week and met with Canon Chairman and CEO Fujio Mitarai to learn more about Canon's strategy, before traveling to Shanghai, China, to tour a Canon manufacturing operation where imageRUNNER and imageRUNNER Advance printers are made. 

Taking place only once every four years, the drupa international printing trade fair is a huge show. By the time it wrapped up its two-week stint in Düsseldorf, Germany, last month 314,500 visitors from more than 130 countries had walked its 19 halls and visited its 1,850 exhibitors.

By consolidating four printing operations into one, Fidelity Investments’ Document Printing Services has already saved $1 million in costs. An influx of new equipment and software enhancements promises to further boost efficiency and effectiveness.

Diversification has served UniGraphic Inc. well during arguably the most difficult economic period in the printing industry since the Great Depression. It is bullish on the future of all things large following the acquisition of two big-bodied inkjet printers.

At the Xerox stand, Cirque do Soliel acrobats wowed the audience with astounding aerial moves several times a day on a raised, springboard-equipped stage. The first five minutes of Landa’s highly produced presentation on Nanography had skin-suit-clad performers doing a dance that didn’t have much to do with the topic at hand, but was still visually engaging.

Hewlett-Packard will report its quarterly earnings today after the close of regular trading in New York, and there's a lot riding on what its senior executives, especially CEO Meg Whitman, will have to say. The consensus among Wall Street analysts calls for HP to report sales of $29.92 billion and a per-share profit of 91 cents. And, for the most part, analysts are expecting HP's results to be in line with expectations, if maybe a little light on sales.

One possible curveball, however, is Europe. Given HP's exposure

Right now, Windows Phone isn't exactly known as a true shutterbug's preferred smartphone platform - that honor goes to Apple's iPhone. But what if Microsoft wanted to get serious about making Windows Phone a best of breed digital photography platform?

The Nokia Lumia 900, which went on sale last month to mostly positive reviews from the mainstream tech press, has a 8MP camera with Carl Zeiss optics. That's a good start, and puts it someplace on par with the iPhone 4S iSight camera, but I know Microsoft can do better.

UBM has formed two new divisions in the U.S.: UBM Technology and UBM Connect. The company said the reorganization is designed to take greater advantage of the potential growth in marketing services.

“In the past we've had to reorganize to manage a retreat. This is about reorganizing the business for growth, which is really important to note,” UBM CEO David Levin said in an interview with BtoB. “This is a positive development for the business. This is a growing business, a growing and profitable business.”

Electronics maker Canon will transition to the manufacturing of its digital cameras entirely by robots rather than human workers, company spokesperson Jun Misumi told SeattlePI. Such a move would reduce costs and isn't relegated to just Canon, as other Japanese companies are moving towards the same. Canon is aiming to have the process fully automated by as soon as 2015, though this is the best case scenario and no specific dates were revealed.

Despite this change, jobs won't be cut at Canon, Misumi promised. The human workers will be

Canon and Oscar-winning filmmaker Ron Howard have extended their partnership, for a second year of the "Imagination" campaign. The first year was known as "Project Imagin8ion," while the new campaign will be known as "Long Live Imagination."

After wowing those who saw its inkjet printheads in action at Graph Expo last year, Memjet is making a splash at Drupa right now. It just announced partnerships with several top print vendors, including Oce, Toshiba and Xanté.

Entry-level and high-speed additions to the Océ ColorStream 3000 inkjet press line, the newOcé ColorWave 650 Poster Printer and Velocity large-format digital printer based on Memjet technology are a just a few of the new and future technologies to be exhibited by Canon on its stand at drupa 2012.

While most attention in the gadget world is on the breakneck pace of innovation in mobile phones, tablets and computers, another device has resolutely refused to die: the camera.

Despite the onslaught of camera phones - the iPhone 4 has this year become the most popular device for posting snaps to the photo-sharing website Flickr - cameras are still being sold. Japan, the world's largest manufacturer, shipped nearly three times as many cameras in January as it did in the same month of 2003, when the camera phone was still in its infancy.

CustomRetailer provides an extensive directory of distributors serving the custom installation and consumer electronics markets.

Keynote presentations from the 2012 Publishing Business Conference & Expo are now online. Whether you caught these top-notch speakers in person at the New York Marriott Marquis last month or want to find out what you missed, these presentations are well worth a listen.