Nikon Blog
Cosina announces $825 Voigtlander Classic 50mm F1.5 lens, will be available in September
Cosina has revealed the release date and specifications for its new Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 lens for its VM mount. The lens’ optical design consists of six elements in three groups. Cosina says the lens, which has a single coating, has been specifically designed to showcase ‘classical reflections that are not found in modern lenses and dares to express various aberrations.’ It features an aperture range of F1.5 through F16, uses a ten-blade aperture diaphragm and has a minimum focusing distance of 50cm (20″), despite...
read moreAdobe brings Healing Brush, Magic Wand to Photoshop for iPad, updates Photoshop for Desktop
Adobe Photoshop for iPad and Desktop have received a pair of updates, bringing new and improved features to Adobe’s image editing program. Adobe Photoshop for iPad now has the Healing Brush tool. Just as you can with the desktop version, the Healing Brush tool in Photoshop for iPad will help to correct imperfections in images by intelligently sampling pixels from elsewhere in the scene. This can be done with your finger as well as with a connected Apple Pencil. Adobe has also brought its Magic Wand tool to Photoshop for iPad. Using Adobe...
read moreIn-depth tripod review: ProMediaGear Pro-Stix TR344
ProMediaGear’s TR344 ‘Pro-Stix’ tripod with their Katana Pro Gimbal supporting a full-frame camera and 500mm prime at lacrosse practice. ProMediaGear Pro-Stix TR344Promediagear.com | $1030 ProMediaGear was founded in 2009 by three brothers that combined their engineering degrees, a full-service machine shop, and a passion for photography. Initially, they developed innovative flash brackets out of personal need, producing them at their facility in suburban Chicago. Today they design and manufacture world-class gimbal heads...
read moreAndroid 12 now lets you use front-facing cameras, facial expressions to navigate your phone
Last week, Google released its fourth Android 12 beta for Pixel devices, bringing with it a new version of the Android Accessibility Suite. This updated version adds a new accessibility feature Google is calling ‘Camera Switches.’ As the feature name implies, Camera Switches is a new way to interact with an Android device using facial gestures detected with a device’s front-facing camera. As detailed by XDA Developers, the new featured is buried quite deep in the Android Accessiblity Suite app’s ‘Switch Access’ submenu. When turned on, the...
read moreAdobe MAX 2021 to take place online from October 26-28, is once again free to ‘attend’
Registration for the Adobe MAX 2021 conference has opened. As with last year, the event, scheduled to take place online from October 26–28, 2021, will be free for everyone. Adobe says ‘the world’s largest creativity conference’ will feature ‘Notable creative luminaries and celebrity speakers’ across eleven different creative fields: graphic design, illustration and digital painting, video, photography, UI/UX, 3D and AR, social media, creativity and design in business, collaboration and productivity, education and a special ‘Meet the Teams’...
read moreCanon patent application shows off unique camera design with a hole in the middle
Items 120a and 120b in the illustration are a pair of touch-sensitive strips positioned at a 45-degree angle. Click to enlarge. Canon has filed a patent application for what has to be one of the most interesting camera designs we’ve ever seen. Japanese patent application number 2020–009307 details the schematics for a camera system that has a cutout through the middle to provide better grip, particularly for when switching between horizontal and vertical shooting. Click to enlarge. According to the patent text, the purpose of this novel...
read moreTested: Sony’s trio of compact 24mm, 40mm and 50mm G prime lenses
Earlier this year Sony announced a set of three compact full-frame E-mount prime lenses: the 24mm F2.8 G, the 40mm F2.5 G, and the 50mm F2.5 G. Their small, lightweight design makes them convenient for casual and on-the-move photographers, and their nearly identical sizes and weights make them ideal for gimbal movie shooters requiring the versatility of a few different focal lengths. All three lenses weigh roughly 170g, offer 49mm filter threads and come in at an MSRP of $599 USD. We wanted to take a look at how they perform optically. But...
read moreSirui rehouses its 1.33x anamorphic lenses for cinema rigs and adds T-stops
Chinese anamorphic lens manufacturer Sirui has introduced a new set of lenses bases on its existing four models. The Sirui MARS lenses are designed to offer better handling for rigged cameras, and come with built-in mod gears for both aperture and focus rings. The apertures have also been reclassified as T-stops and the focus throw of each of the models has been significantly extended to make accurate focus adjustments easier with follow focus equipment. While the standard 1.33x anamorphic lenses from Sirui come in a range of mounts, the MARS...
read moreHead to Head: Adobe Lightroom Classic vs Capture One 21
Ever since that dark day when Adobe made the shift from the perpetual licensing model of the Creative Suite to the subscription-based Creative Cloud, many photographers have been searching for a viable alternative to Adobe Lightroom. Fortunately, there’s no shortage of contenders: from open-source alternatives like Darktable, to Mac-only options like Pixelmator, to universal options like On1 Photo RAW. But one app has emerged as the de-facto alternative that’s better, or at least more widely adopted, than the rest: Capture One...
read moreHow to Make Photos Feel More Deliberate
Most of the time, when you see a good photo, you’ll get a sense that the photographer took it deliberately. But how can you tell that? What subtle things about the photo make it appear deliberate rather than random? That’s what I’ll cover today. Table of Contents Getting the Technical Things Right The first and most obvious way to make a photo feel intentional is to get as much of the technical side of photography correct as possible. This usually means that your subject is sharp, your depth of field is acceptable, your exposure is accurate,...
read moreDPReview TV: Why lower resolution sensors are not better in low light
Published Aug 14, 2021 | dpreview staff [embedded content] A common belief in the camera world is that lower resolution cameras – and larger pixels – perform better in low light. In this video we illustrate why you should question that bit of conventional wisdom. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week. Panasonic’s Leica DG Vario-Summilux 25-50mm F1.7 ASPH is a fast zoom lens aimed at photographers and filmmakers using Micro Four Thirds camera bodies. Read our review to find out how it performs....
read moreGallery: 2021 Potato Photographer of the Year photo competition
Hold your spuds. The organizers behind the second edition of the world’s only international potato photography competition have announced the winning photograph (and runner ups) of the 2021 Potato Photographer of the Year photo competition. Inspired by Kevin Abosch’s Potato #345 (2010), an image of a potato which sold for $1M in 2016, the Potato Photographer of the Year photo competition also serves as a means to help fund The Trussell Trust, an charity that helps support a network of more than 1,200 food banks. After a successful 2020...
read moreTTArtisan releases its $215 11mm F2.8 Fisheye lens for Fujifilm GFX camera systems
TTartisan has announced its 11mm F2.8 Fisheye lens is now available for Fujifilm GFX camera systems. The lens features the same basic specifications as its full-frame counterparts, but offers a larger lens mount for Fujifilm’s medium format camera system. [embedded content] The fully-manual lens is constructed of 11 elements in seven groups and uses a seven-blade aperture diaphragm—the same setup found in the Canon RF, Leica L, Leica M, Nikon Z and Sony E mount versions. It has a minimum focusing distance of 17cm (6.7”) and has an aperture...
read moreFilm Fridays: New film alert – No Color Studio launches ISO 5 B&W film
Nothing makes us happier than hearing about a cool new analog film stock coming to market. And while No Color Studio‘s No.5 film isn’t actually new – the emulsion was produced by Kodak in the 1980s and intended for use with specialized archiving machines – it’s probably new to the average analog geek. No Color Studio is essentially breathing new life into a long-forgotten/ignored stock. As the name suggests, this is a super-slow ISO 5 film and promises to offer a punchy, high contrast B&W look, with very little visible...
read moreCiting COVID-19 Delta Variant concerns, Sony confirms it won’t be attending WPPI next week
Last week, Sony joined the list of exhibitors expected to be at the 2021 Wedding and Portrait Photographers International Trade Show (WPPI) expo, which is scheduled to take place from August 15–19 at the Mirage Hotel in Las Vegas Nevada. Now, Sony has announced it won’t be attending this year, ‘As a result of the unprecedented and unexpected circumstances,’ surrounding the rise in cases of the COVID-19 Delta Variant. PetaPixel reports Sony will be ‘withdrawing from WPPI and all tradeshows for the foreseeable future in order to protect the...
read moreTurn any room into a right-side-up camera obscura with the BonfotonUP kit
Finland-based company Bonfoton has announced the BonfotonUP kit, a product you can use to turn any room into a right-side-up camera obscura. Bonfoton originally released a camera obscura lens in 2017, although the Bonfoton Camera Obscura Room Lens projected the image upside down, like a traditional camera obscura. When that product was announced in 2017, the husband and wife team, Tommi and Annika, talked about starting Bonfoton, ‘We founded the Bonfoton store after we saw what the Camera Obscura room does to people emotionally when...
read more10 Things I’ve Learned in 10 Years as a Photographer
I just realized that I’ve been doing photography seriously for ten years (plus some change). So, I’d like to take this chance to look back and share ten of the most important things I’ve learned along the way, in chronological order. Table of Contents 2012: JPEG Has Consequences The first trip I took with a “serious” camera (the Nikon D5100) was to Oregon and the Pacific Coast in the Northwest United States. I daresay that most of my photos were awful, but I was having fun, and a couple of them didn’t turn out so bad. Unfortunately, I shot...
read moreGallery: International Garden Photographer of the Year Macro Art 15 Competition Winners
The results are in for the 15th Macro Art photo competition from the International Garden Photographer of the Year (IGPOTY). Claire Carter, England, took first prize for their delightfully airy macro image of the delicate patterns of leaves. Petar Sabol and Brian Lee rounded out second and third place for their photographs ‘Butterfly Dance’ and ‘In the Spotlight,’ respectively. For winning first place, Claire received £250 and her photograph will be displayed at IGPOTY galleries in the future. You can view all of the single entry award...
read moreVideo: Peter McKinnon goes hands-on with a pair of Canon EOS R3 cameras
[embedded content] Photographer and YouTuber Peter McKinnon was recently sent a pair of Canon EOS R3 cameras to play around with. While he hasn’t had much time yet to put it to the test, he has shared a new hands-on video wherein he shares his initial thoughts on the EOS R3 and shows off plenty of up-close shots of Canon’s forthcoming mirrorless camera. McKinnon starts off by acknowledging that at the time of filming, he had only spent an hour or so using the camera and getting familiarized with the new features. Canon isn’t allowing McKinnon...
read morePanasonic Leica 25-50mm F1.7 ASPH field review
Introduction Panasonic’s Leica DG Vario-Summilux 25-50mm F1.7 ASPH is a bright zoom lens aimed at photographers using Micro Four Thirds camera bodies. With a 35mm-equivalent focal range of 50 to 100mm, the 25-50mm F1.7 could make for an attractive – if somewhat unusual – portrait lens for still photographers. But it’s clearly been designed first and foremost for video capture, where it makes a really great companion for Panasonic’s existing 10-25mm F1.7 lens. Available from August 2021, list pricing is set at $1799.99. All...
read moreCanon RF 28-70mm F2 L sample gallery (DPReview TV)
Published Aug 12, 2021 | dpreview staff The Canon RF 28-70mm F2 L is a big brick of a lens, but that fast F2 aperture allows it to do things other standard zooms can’t. Check out this sample gallery shot by our team at DPReview TV. View the Canon RF 28-70 F2 L sample gallery from DPReview TV Gear in this story Canon launched the mirrorless full-frame RF-mount with a handful of impressive lenses including the versatile, fast 28-70mm F2 L. Though it feels a tad oversized for the EOS R, we’re impressed with the results. For the past...
read moreSamsung’s new Galaxy Flip 3, Galaxy Fold 3 promise better performance, durability and more
Samsung has announced a pair of new foldable smartphones, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 and the Galaxy Fold 3. The Flip 3 is a clamshell design, harkening back to a classic flip phone design. The Flip 3 is compact when not in use and gets taller when you flip it open. The Fold 3, on the other hand, has a more typical smartphone footprint, and then it unfolds like a book to offer a massive display. Let’s look at each of Samsung’s new folding phones in turn. Samsung Z Galaxy Flip 3 When folded, the Flip 3 is 106.7mm (4.2″)...
read moreElinchrom announces One, the company’s first wireless battery-powered monolight
Elinchrom has announced its first battery-powered monolight, the Elinchrom One. The off-camera light has long been requested by Elinchrom users and includes an integrated battery. The battery provides 725 full-power flashes per charge. In terms of flash features, the Elinchrom One is a 131 watt-second light and offers high-speed sync up to 1/7,000s in ‘Action’ mode. In normal mode, flash duration at minimum power is 1/1530s and 1/155s at maximum power. Flash modes include manual, TTL and HSS (with Transmitter Pro). The flash color...
read moreDPReview TV: Canon RF 28-70mm F2L USM review
Published Aug 11, 2021 | dpreview staff [embedded content] The Canon RF 28-70mm F2 L USM is a high-end standard zoom lens for the company’s full-frame mirrorless system. Chris and Jordan take an in-depth look at how this $3000 lens performs in the latest episode of DPReview TV. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week. Canon RF 28-70mm F2 sample images from this video Gear in this story Canon launched the mirrorless full-frame RF-mount with a handful of impressive lenses including the versatile,...
read moreXiaomi’s new Mix 4 smartphone is its first with under-display selfie camera
Xiaomi has revealed the Mix 4, the latest smartphone in its Mi Mix lineup. The Mix 4, which will be avaialble only in China for the time being, marks the first device from Xiaomi’s Mi Mix series in nearly three years and brings with it new technology, including Xiaomi’s first under-display selfie camera. Xiaomi says its Camera Under Panel (CUP) technology, which it first showed off back in 2019, is the culmination of ‘three major generations, five years, sixty patents, a $77 million investment and hundreds of engineers.’ Xiaomi claims the...
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Started out doing photography at the age of 6 using an uncle's old 1940 kodak brownie box camera. At 15 years of age, I decided to buy my very own 1975 Praktica SLR camera. I now shoot with a Nikon D850. I do unpaid TFP and commercial paid work.