via: John Nack on Adobe

iPhone camera app, called Mattebox. The camera interface is based on the Konica Hexar

For 2012 and beyond, smartphone cameras will only improve further. Here are four key areas of development to watch.

Apple itself named Snapseed “App of the Year” for the iPad

The Lightroom team is proud to introduce the fourth major version of the product designed for and by photographers. It was 6 years ago today when we introduced the very first public beta of Lightroom at MacWorld on January 9, 2006. (Yes, it was Mac only, smaller in footprint than most raw files and didn’t have a crop tool!) Since 2006 we’ve been hard at work improving an application that’s intended to be as easy to use as it is powerful. This release builds on the fundamental performance architecture and image quality improvements in Lightroom 3 to provide a truly complete workflow solution. I kept hearing from customers that they love Lightroom but needed to leave the Lightroom to complete X, Y or Z. Lightroom 4 tackles those issues with improvements to image organization, adjustment tools and comprehensive publishing options.

This is a list of various resources dedicated to educating photographers about Lightroom 4 public beta

Gadget Lab

At first look, almost nothing has changed, but dig deeper and v4.0 might be the biggest upgrade yet.

CameraTrace is a service that will help you track down your stolen or lost camera. It does this by scanning popular photo-sharing sites like Flickr and extracting camera serial numbers from the EXIF metadata contained in the photos.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has published a new guide, “Defending Privacy at the U.S. Border: A Guide for Travelers Carrying Digital Devices,” which explains how the law, good technology choices, cryptography and backups can be combined to keep your data safe while you travel, especially when crossing into the USA, where customs officials reserve the rights to search your laptop and mobile phone without a warrant and keep whatever they find.

Photographers are increasingly experimenting with Apple’s iPad as a way to reach new audiences and gain financial independence from traditional revenue sources. But is the strategy working? Olivier Laurent speaks with Kadir van Lohuizen, who has developed the Via PanAm app.

Launching this Thursday, the company’s new Disposable Series iOS app — or D-Series, as it’s called — is a free program that hearkens back to the days of disposable cameras. It shuns the instant, real-time focus of today’s digital world, delivering your photos only when a virtual roll of film is completed.

Lightroom 3.6 and Camera Raw 6.6 are now available as final releases on Adobe.com and through the update mechanisms available in Photoshop CS5 and Lightroom 3.  These updates include bug fixes, new camera support and new lens profiles.

A little over a month ago, the revolutionary Lytro light-field camera became available for pre-order. But a few lucky pro photographers have been using the Lytro and its “living picture” technology for the last few months, and now we can see their stunning results.

Wired.com

A new photograph-analyzing tool quantifies changes made by digital airbrushers in the fashion and lifestyle industry, where image alteration has become the psychologically destructive norm.

Xerox says good skies are:

“Dramatic skies are good skies for the Xerox algorithm. Silhouette lit photos are ranked high as well as black and white clouds.”

Whereas bad skies are:

“Very overcast skies where everything looks blue is an indication of poor quality.”

DxO Labs introduced DxO Filmpack 3.1. This slightly updated version has 25 new creative looks and several UI enhancements. The new looks are under a separate tab from the color and B&W film looks and include several vintage effects and film-inspired filters that expand on FilmPack’s library of film emulations. The UI enhancements include screen views, hot key undo and redo, and variable sizing for the “film strip” of thumbnails showing the looks available.

To upgrade to Photoshop CS6 or any other Creative Suite 6 application at the upgrade price, however, you will need to own a license to the previous major release

With the Condition One app, which debuts Friday, viewers can get a 180-degree field of view by simply moving the iPad in their hands. Swipe the screen or move the tablet left or right to see a truck full of soldiers rolling beside you. Want to examine the sky?  Hold your iPad up, as if you are blocking the sun, and your field of view is filled with clouds or warplanes streaking overhead.