Toronto Photography Meetup Group

What: ProFusion 2012 (Vistek's Camera Show)
Where: Toronto Congress Centre - 650 Dixon Rd.Directions.
When: Tuesday June 19 or Wednesday June 20th?
Bring: Money to buy stuff if you want. Your camera stuff if you like though you're probably have to register it at the door.
Cost: Free if you Pre-register for a ticket. Do it now! They take time to process and the organizer set this event up last minute! Tickets are $10 at the door otherwise. Money to feed yourself, etc.

Additional Info: I don't really care whether I go Tuesday or Wednesday. I guess I have a slight preference for Tuesday (tomorrow). I would like to start fairly early but late enough to miss morning rush hour. Suggestions on where to meet to carpool are good. I can fit 2 passengers, 3 if two don't mind being cozy in the backseats. I wouldn't mind carpooling with someone else if they really want to drive. Parking is free apparently.

They do have seminars going for both photo & video on both days. Most cost more money and I'm not particularly interested in them but if someone wants to go to one, enjoy!

Show Website
Directions to Toronto Congress Centre
Pre-register for a ticket

I am going depending on which day I can get the car. I will confirm as soon as I know which day I can have my dad's car.

I completely forgot the June Social is on Wednesday so tomorrow has become my much preferred day.

I have a ticket... but not so sure I am going to make it to the profusion show.

Don't know which day I'm going, or if I'm going at all (no Olympus at this show)...depends how I feel in the morning. May just goof off downtown and say I went (to my boss).

I will be there Wed. Taking 2 seminars....Alex Buono's keynote presentation in the morning. And Cherie Steinberg's presentation in the afternoon.

I'm most likely heading there tomorrow morning, something came up for today and I couldn't go.

what is this show? like can you try all their cameras there??

I wonder why Vistek keep doing this Profusion in the middle of the week instead of the weekend like Henrys' does.

Very simple answer, got this reply from the cashier yesterday at the show. "We focused on customers who are in the video and photo industry. We close at 5pm, therefore not really for the families or entry level users to come after work!"

Things I found at this show that different from OTHERS!

Not that many visitors. Won't step over someone.
Most seminars are not free. Really, one maybe able to claim that as company expenses!
Nothing cheap on sale, as no discount/ outlet section.
No kids around, maybe their parents kept them in school!!!
The gear are not considered as toys for big boys. A video crane started at 5 grand.

Meh. Certainly no deals to be had. Vistek's ridiculous prices knocked down to standard. It was nice to look at some cool toys though. Some good toys were absent though too, where was Hasselblad?

Had a chance to speak directly to reps from:

- Colorbyte: tested and explored their new Imageprint 9
- Datacolour: addressing the issues with spyder 3&4 on Dell Ultrasharp Monitors - got an answer, will share as soon as I get the details for troubleshooting
- Epson: 9880 vs 9900 worth to upgrade? apparently not
- SanDisk: their 2nd generation extreme cards and 95 mb/s write-up capabilities
- Nikon: grabbed a couple of RAW images testing the D800 and the new 24mm f/1.4
- GoPro: discussed how Hero HD 2 has such a great image quality vs Hero HD ( My GoPro HD v1 is for sale!!)
- Stick & Stretch canvas wraps are available now in bars of 60" !!
- Wacom: their new 24" Cintiq 24HD has only 92% of Adobe RGB ... bad for a +$2000 toy

I was happy there were no kids
I was happy there was parking
I was happy it wasn't packed
I was sad there were no awesome sales
I was sad there were no medium format resp, only Phase One (Leaf, Mamiya, Hassy, Sinar ???)

Before leaving I met Greg Gorman, we chatted about my natal city, how his work inspired me, his workshops and grabbed an autographed photo (epson's promo stuff)

Not bad of an afternoon and a free ticket.

I talked to a few reps as well. I guess because I was interested in prices that's what we talked about. Those that didn't dodge the issue had some eye rolls for the prices of the benevolent hosts. Others were pushy and doing the hard sell. The Fuji rep was convinced I was walking out of there with an X1. Not for $1600 bub. For half that I'd consider it, maybe. Not a useful tool for me. I also spoke with several vendors about B&H pricing. Most conceded that it was problematic and made no excuses for the price disparities between the US and Canada - which is the correct response. I had two separate reps tell me that manufacturers they represent are looking to start enforcing minimum retail prices because of B&H's tactics.

When I was at the Nikon booth they weren't interested in taking the D800 or D4 out of the case. They did have a D300(not s!) and D7000 on display to play with though. To impress us with the D800 the Nikon rep took out a Playbook and went through a slide show of small images.... ohhhhhh how...meh. The Nikon brochures sure are pretty though.

I managed to piss the Canon guy off by mentioning the D800. He mumbled something about physics and how the sensor size is no larger so dynamic range and low light wouldn't be any good. He didn't like that I pointed out that the test results aren't showing that and the real world results are quite strong as well. He was then further miffed when I pointed out that the lack of IS on the 24-70 was "dropping the ball" citing examples of panning while shooting sports and the low light in churches for wedding photographers make IS an obvious feature. He disagreed saying that the range doesn't make sense. I know from experience it makes tons of sense in the situations I listed, plus the new 28mm has IS... So yeah, he didn't like me. I wasn't being a jerk about it, I swear, but I did point it out in front of a handful of people that did nod in agreement. That said, it wasn't all bad at Canon. The 1Dx frame rate is fantastic to experience, an amazing camera to hold. And the 5DMkIII is gorgeous as well. Very very comfortable camera. It's true about the 7D relationship. A very good thing. Their fancy new video stuff looks fantastic as well, it seemed to be getting a lot of attention throughout the floor. And their cameras weren't contained in a glass case.

Pop was priced according to Vistek guidelines: $2.45 a can. I know food is expensive at these things but c'mon!

oh i wish i was there so i could drive the canon guy nuts with all kinds of questions about the rebel t4i if they have another show next year, i'll love to go.

What I learned from this show is XQD is the future of CompactFlash memory cards.
&& Gary Fong Amberdome & Colored Gel Filter Set can turn a boring background into something spectacular turn washed-out sky into any color you like.