Buried among all of the cameras announced last week was a new 24-105 F4 DG OS HSM lens from Sigma. The company has announced pricing and availability for this full-frame ‘Art lens’, which will be available for Canon, Nikon, Sigma, and Sony mounts (in that order). You’ll be able to pick one up for yourself starting next month at a retail price of $ 899.
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Ricoh has announced a ‘Limited Edition’ GR camera, which features a ‘high-end’ design plus bonus accessories. The Limited Edition GR’s magnesium-alloy body comes in a ‘metallic vintage green wave-tone finish’ and features a ‘marbleized ebony grip patterned in burl wood’. To sweeten the deal, Ricoh is including a lens hood as well as a leather case and strap, all of which complement the camera’s color scheme. Click through for a closer look.
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Forget the Zeiss Otus 55mm F1.4, Sony Alpha 7R and RX10, Nikon 58mm F1.4 or the tiny Panasonic GM1 – last week’s real news was Lomography’s introduction of an ‘Experimental Lens Kit’ for Micro Four Thirds. Comprising a 24mm F8 standard lens, a 12mm F8 wideangle and a 160° F8 fisheye, the kit costs £79 / €89. Each of the lenses even has a built-in shutter with speeds of 1/100sec and Bulb, allowing in-camera multiple exposures, plus a T mode to hold the shutter open for normal live view. In addition all three have a slot for colour gel filters. Click through for full details.
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Fujifilm has announced the X-E2 – its latest mid-range mirrorless interchangeable lens camera. The X-E2 gains many of the upgrades seen in the X100S, including on-sensor-phase-detection that underpins the company’s unique digital-split-image focus aid. Beyond this the 16MP X-Trans camera has received a series of hardware adjustments and revisions in response to feedback about the X-E1.
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Sigma has announced the 24-105mm F4 DG OS HSM – an image stabilized normal zoom for full frame DSLRs. The 24-105 becomes the latest addition to the company’s ‘Art’ series of lenses designed to offer high image quality. The lens features a 19 element/14 group design including Sigma’s FLD glass and both single- and double-sided aspherical elements which the company says will minimize aberrations. It has a minimum focusing distance of 45cm throughout its range, giving a maximum magnification of 1:4.6. Prices and availability have yet to be announced.
News: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
Sigma has announced the 24-150mm F4 DG OS HSM – an image stabilized normal zoom for full frame DSLRs. The 24-105 becomes the latest addition to the company’s ‘Art’ series of lenses designed to offer high image quality. The lens features a 19 element/14 group design including Sigma’s FLD glass and both single- and double-sided aspherical elements which the company says will minimize aberrations. It has a minimum focusing distance of 45cm throughout its range, giving a maximum magnification of 1:4.6. Prices and availability have yet to be announced.
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Samyang has announced that it will be making five full frame lenses in E mount, which will be available within 2 months. The lenses are all based on existing designs, namely the 14mm f/2.8 ED AS IF UMC, 24mm f/1.4 ED AS IF UMC, 35mm f/1.4 AS UMC, 85mm f/1.4 AS IF UMC, and the T-S 24mm f/3.5 ED AS UMC tilt-and-shift. All feature manual focus and aperture operation too. As these are essentially SLR lenses with an adapter tube permanently fitted, they won’t offer any of the size advantages achievable by ‘native’ lenses.
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Sony has announced no fewer than five ‘FE’ full frame E-mount lenses to accompany the A7 and A7R. First up is the FE 28-70mm F3.5-5.6 OSS, an image-stabilised ‘kit’ zoom for the A7. There are three premium lenses with Zeiss badges: the FE 55mm F1.8 ZA Carl Zeiss Sonnar T*, the FE 35mm F2.8 ZA Carl Zeiss Sonnar T*, and the FE 24-70mm F4 Carl Zeiss Vario Tessar T*. The fifth lens is a ‘G’ class telezoom, the FE 70-200mm F4 G OSS. Sony has also updated its Alpha-mount fast telezoom to make the 70-200mm F2.8G SSM II.
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Sony has announced the A7 and A7R – the world’s first full-frame mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras. Externally, the two bodies are nearly identical and feature a pentaprism-like EVF housing, generous handgrip and plenty of manual controls. The differences are internal – sporting a 36 megapixel sensor, the A7R has no optical low-pass filter and is limited to contrast-detect autofocus, while the less expensive A7 has a 24 megapixel sensor with a low-pass filter and on-chip phase detection. Both bodies are designed around the Sony NEX E-mount, though new ‘FE’ lenses are needed to take advantage of the larger sensor. Click through for more details.
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Canon has announced special edition versions of its PowerShot G16 and S120 digital compact cameras. The ‘premium’ versions appear to be intended for the Japanese domestic market, and will be available in different color finishes, with a custom engraving option. Color customization appears to comprise the option of red, gold, silver and black finished on select components and both cameras are supplied with unique accessories – a cowhide leather pouch for the S120 and a leather hard case for the G16. Click through for pictures.
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