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› archive for December, 2011

Local Shooter Marc Lebryk Talks Dado, Arena Lighting, and Derby Mayhem

Shot by Marc Lebryk

A little while back, local shooter Marc Lebryk approached us about whether or not we’d be interested in helping light-up the local convention center for the Monumental Mayhem girls’ roller derby event. Now, astute readers might remember Marc from his review of the Radiopopper wireless trigger system, and a few of you might have met him at one of our photo walks. So, he’s a guy we know, and we worked out something with our own Nick Henry and rentals to get some gear out there for shooters, along with some of Manfrotto’s neat new DADO balls. And now, Marc has his blog post about the whole experience up. You should, of course, hop over there for the whole experience from a career-shooter’s view.



Using Adobe Lightroom To Help You Pick New Lenses

It’s a common problem: you’ve bought a new DSLR with a couple kit lenses, and you’re finding yourself out-growing them. It’s time to upgrade some glass, but, to what? The internet is full of all sorts of contradictory advice. Go with a 2.8 zoom. Fast primes are the way to go. And so on. And, past the entry level, it seems like everything is going to be a major investment, how do you know you’re not just going to waste your money?

Well, here’s a trick I used when I was switching systems from Olympus to Nikon and had to shop all new lenses that didn’t really line up nicely with what I was used to using. If you aren’t shopping for a special needs lens (all-in-one, macro, fisheye, tilt-shift), but just a regular ol’ lens, then you can use your exisiting photos to give you the best insight into what focal lengths you actually need in your bag. And, as always, I recommend the assistance of Adobe’s stellar Lightroom.

First off, fire it up and look at your library. Lovely, aren’t they? Your photos? Of course they are. Now, let’s get them to tell us some useful data. For this, we’ll use Smart Collections. Smart Collections are a way for us to use the embedded EXIF in our photos, where we store them, and what we’ve done to them and tagged them with to build collections that update as our catalog grows. Very useful things.

So, here’s what you do:

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Nikon SB-910 Speedlight Now In Stock

Well, that was fast, wasn’t it? It seems like just the other day I was announcing Nikon’s SB-900 successor, and now it’s in stock and ready to ship out to you or yours in time for the holiday, or just the holiday gigs. If you’re not already clicking the link below to grab yours, well, I don’t know what else you expect me to say.

http://robertscamera.com/sb-910-speedlight.html



Olympus Announces First Weather-Sealed M4/3 Lens, the M. ED 12-50mm f3.5-6.3 EZ

Olympus has announced a new lens for its ever-growing Micro Four-Thirds system (which shares a mount and spec with Panasonic’s own efforts), the M. ED 12-50mm f3.5-6.3 EZ. Like many new M4/3 lenses, this one is designed with video applications in mind, and to that end includes a power zoom function where you can operate the zoom with a toggle rocker, like on point and shoots, allowing for smoother, less jerky zooming while you’re filming your epic masterpiece. Since the product page and press release don’t mention it, for now we’re just going to assume that’s indicated by the new EZ designation, which probably stands for “Electronic Zoom” or something similar. For further video use, the lens uses Olympus’ newer MSC (Movie & Still Compatible) quiet autofocus motor.

And, in addition to all that, this is the first M.ZUIKO lens from Olympus to feature the build quality and weather-sealing that made their mid-range ZUIKO line-up for 4/3 so respected. I personally owned two lenses from that line-up, and got to use a third for a while, and I can attest to their quality and weather-sealing, so, if this new one lives up to that legacy, it’ll be a trooper, and lend some much anticipated “pro” quality to what for years now has focused on being a consumer system. Now, if only it were a bit faster, but, I suspect there’ll always be compromises inherent in making compact zooms.

The 12-50 EZ will begin being available sometime in January, with an MSRP of $499.99. It’s up for preorder on our site here, and you can read the press release after the jump.

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Tamron Announces 18-200 For Sony E-Mount / NEX System

And thus adoption for the second mirrorless system to market–Sony’s NEX system and it’s new E mount–has begun. Tamron has announced the upcoming availability of a new 18-200mm superzoom by them for Sony’s NEX system. The full name of the lens tells you most of the story: 18-200mm F/3.5-6.3 Di III VC. New here is the Di-III, presumably being their designation for mirrorless systems (Di stands for Digitally integrated, and means that the lens is full-frame but optimized for digital sensors. Di-II means the lens is designed for crop sensors). The VC indicates it’s got in-lens stabilization, which puts it on par with the Sony option. Also, Tamron has stepped up the appearance over their usual fare to match the metal build of the NEX system.

Pricing and availability aren’t known yet, but we’ll go ahead and get this up for preorder for all you NEX users looking for what we can only hope will be a cost-effective alternative to Sony’s own superzoom offering. Press release after the jump.

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