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Venus Optics unveils Laowa 9mm F2.8 Zero-D lens for mirrorless APS-C cameras

23 Mar

Venus Optics has officially announced the Laowa 9mm F2.8 Zero-D lens: the “world’s widest F2.8 lens for APS-C mirrorless cameras.” Featuring a 113° angle of view, fast F2.8 aperture, and a Zero-D design that promises “close to zero” distortion, the 9mm (13mm equivalent) lens promises to deliver ‘extreme’ specs in a portable package that weighs just 215g.

The Laowa 9mm F2.8 Zero-D is the third lens in Laowa’s Zero-D lineup, and like the others it promises “close to zero” distortion despite its ultra-wide angle focal length. This is achieved using an optical design of 15 lens elements in 10 groups, including 2 aspherical elements and 3 extra-low dispersion elements.

From the press release:

The Laowa 9mm F2.8 Zero-D is designed for APS-C mirrorless cameras, and will ship in Fuji X, Sony E, and Canon EOS-M mounts starting in “early April,” at a suggested retail price of $ 500 USD. Scroll through the gallery below to see a few official sample photos from Venus Optics, then head over to the Venus Optics website to learn more or pre-order one for yourself.

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Press Release

Venus Optics announces the Laowa 9mm f/2.8 Zero-D, the World’s Widest f/2.8 Lens for APS-C Mirrorless Cameras

Featuring a 113° Angle of View, Ultra-fast f/2.8 aperture, close-to-zero distortion, 49mm filter thread & less than 0.5 pounds in weight, this is a perfect ultra-wide option for still & videographers.

Anhui China, Mar 21, 2018 – Venus Optics, the camera lenses manufacturer who had previously launched a number of unique Laowa camera lenses, is proud to announce the world’s widest rectilinear f/2.8 lens for mirrorless APS-C cameras, Laowa 9mm f/2.8 Zero- D.

Laowa 9mm f/2.8 Zero-D is the third member of the Laowa ‘Zero-D’ line-up and they all feature an excellent control of the optical distortion which is commonly appeared in ultra- wide angle lenses. This new lens is an ultra-wide & ultra-fast prime lens with a 35mm equivalent focal length of around 13mm. Despite the extreme specifications, Venus Optics has successfully minimized the weight of the lens to less than 0.5 pounds (215g) and 2-inch (53mm) long. This compact and light lens comprises of 15 elements in 10 groups with 2 pcs of aspherical elements and 3 pcs of Extra-low dispersion elements. This optical design successfully minimizes the distortion and chromatic aberrations to its lowest but at the same time, delivers a superb optical performance from corners to corners.

The extreme 113° angle of view and ultra-fast f/2.8 aperture allows photographers to create impressive astro-photography shots with ease. It also gives photographers a fast and wide-angle option for landscape photography and low-light shooting. For videographers, the compact size of this lens is friendly to the use of gimbals or even handheld shooting without much of shaking. The lens is designed with a 49mm filter thread which gives additional portability for screw-in filters. It comes with both Sony E, Fuji X & EOS-M mounts.

Availability

The Laowa 9mm f/2.8 Zero-D is currently available to pre-order in the official website of Venus Optics (http://www.venuslens.net/) and their authorized resellers. Recommended Retail Price in US (without tax) is USD 499/pc. Pricing may vary in different countries. The first 100 orders will get a set of Laowa 49mm filters for FREE (CPL + UV + ND1000). Shipping is expected to start from early April.

Specifications

Focal Length: 9mm

Max Aperture: F2.8

Angle of View: 113°

Format Compatibility: APS-C

Lens Structure: 15 elements in 10 groups

Aperture Blades: 7

Min. Focusing Distance: 12cm

Max Magnification: 1:7.5

Filter Thread: 49mm

Dimensions: 60 x 53mm

Weight: ~215g

Mounts: Fuij X, Sony E, Canon EF-M

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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How to Understand Your Camera’s Exposure Compensation Feature

20 Mar

In this article, learn about the Exposure Compensation feature on your camera to get the best exposures.

Whether you’re shooting sports, animals, portraits, toys, snowflakes, rocks, fish, weddings, or pretty much anything else you almost always have one goal in mind. You want your pictures to be properly exposed. Of course, you can fix an image in Photoshop if it’s too light or too dark, and shooting RAW definitely helps with that. But over the years I’ve found that the best solution is to just get your exposure right in camera.

This means finding the right combination of aperture, shutter speed, and ISO to get your image to look the way you want. But there’s another option you have at your disposal as well – your camera’s Exposure Compensation feature. Understanding what this does and how it works can help you get your pictures looking pixel-perfect in camera without having to adjust anything afterward.

How to Understand Your Camera's Exposure Compensation Feature - photo of a goose

What is Exposure Compensation?

Buried deep in the computational brain of your camera is something called a light meter whose job it is to measure the amount of light entering the lens. This lets your camera adjust some of the exposure settings automatically or gives you enough information for you to make adjustments yourself.

The problem with metering and the camera choosing the exposure

Depending on how you have your metering mode set up it might look at all the light coming in through lens, just the part in the center, or sometimes only the light where you have your focus point set.

As your camera takes measurements of the incoming light and adjusts exposure settings it tries as hard as it can to get a picture that is properly exposed. It might make the aperture larger or smaller, adjust the shutter speed, change the ISO or use a combination of all three of those techniques just to make sure the photo comes out right.

The trouble is, your camera doesn’t always have a good sense of how you want your picture to look.

How to Understand Your Camera's Exposure Compensation Feature - photo of a young man

My camera tried to make this image much darker because of all the light behind this young man, so I used exposure compensation to make the background slightly overexposed which meant my subject was properly exposed.

Enter the solution

Sometimes you might want your picture to be slightly over (lighter) or underexposed (darker), and this is where the exposure compensation feature really starts to shine. If you notice that your images aren’t coming out quite as light or as dark as you want them, you can either change the aperture, shutter, or ISO yourself.

Or just tell your camera “Hey, brighten things up a bit will you?” and with a quick twist of the Exposure Compensation dial, voilà, your problems are solved.

Most people find Exposure Compensation to be particularly useful when shooting in a semi-manual mode such as Aperture or Shutter Priority, but you can use it in other modes as well like program auto or even full manual.

In order to dispel some of the mystery surrounding the exposure compensation feature, let’s take a look at what your camera is actually doing to the settings when you use it in any of those modes.

General Notes for Using Exposure Compensation

NOTE: Please make note that when you dial in any Exposure Compensation it does not get reset to zero automatically for your next shot. You need to change it yourself manually once you’re done using it.

PROBLEM: One of the biggest problems beginners have is not realizing their Exposure Compensation is active. If you have erratic exposures, or all your images are either too dark or too light – check to see if the Exposure Compensation dial has been moved and correct it to zero if necessary.

How to Understand Your Camera's Exposure Compensation Feature

“How does exposure compensation work? Please, tell us more!”

Aperture Priority Mode

Most photographers I know shoot primarily in Aperture Priority mode because of the way aperture affects depth of field and other critical elements of the composition. I use this mode almost exclusively, usually combined with auto-ISO to make sure my shutter speed never gets too slow, and it works like a charm.

I like adjusting my aperture and letting my camera take care of everything else because nine times out of ten it’s just easier for the way I prefer to shoot. If I notice my pictures are too bright or too dark I just adjust the Exposure Compensation to take care of it.

When shooting in Aperture Priority, adjusting the Exposure Compensation doesn’t ever change your aperture–doing so would defeat the whole purpose of using this mode! Instead, it changes the shutter speed by either speeding it up or slowing it down in order to make your picture brighter or darker.

How it works

In the image below, shot in Aperture Priority, you can see that the subject is way too dark while the background is properly exposed. This is partially a result of my camera’s metering mode but also because the scene itself contains a high degree of dynamic range and is therefore tricky to get just right.

Aperture Priority, 200mm, 1/750th, f/4.0, ISO 100, no Exposure Compensation.

To fix the problem I could have changed my camera’s metering mode but instead, I chose to dial in an exposure compensation value of +2EV. The result left the background totally blown out while giving me a properly-exposed subject.

Aperture Priority, 200mm, 1/180th, f/4.0, ISO 100, +2EV Exposure Compensation.

The key takeaway is that while the focal length, aperture, and ISO values did not change the shutter speed most certainly did. My camera dropped it all the way down to 1/180 second which let in much more light and therefore resulted in a two-stop overexposure from the original.

When using exposure compensation in Aperture Priority your camera will adjust the shutter speed to be faster or slower, which can make a big difference if you are shooting a moving subject. You might want a fast shutter speed but if you’re dialing in a few stops of exposure compensation you might end up with one that is too slow to capture the image you are going for.

It’s not a problem per se, but it is something to note and it could dramatically affect your images if you aren’t aware of what is happening. If you need a faster shutter speed you can increase the ISO a bit also.

Shutter Priority

In a similar vein, using Exposure Compensation when shooting in Shutter Priority will not change your shutter speed but will instead alter the aperture in order to make your image lighter or darker.

When I shot the image below of a duck on a frozen pond I wanted a fast shutter speed in case my avian friend started moving quickly. So I used Shutter Priority with a speed of 1/250th of a second.

Shutter Priority, 200mm, 1/250th, f/8.0, ISO 100, no Exposure Compensation.

You can probably tell that something isn’t right with the photo. The duck is too dark! I had to lighten the composition quickly before it flew away, so I dialed in a value of +1.5EV on my Exposure Compensation.

Shutter Priority, 200mm, 1/250, f/4.8, ISO 100, +1.5EV Exposure Compensation.

This image is a bit different from the static wood carving in the aperture priority example because you can clearly see the effect that exposure compensation has had on the composition. My camera kept the shutter speed unchanged but used a much wider aperture which gave me an image with far less depth of field. Notice how both the foreground and the background are much blurrier – a direct result of shooting with a wider aperture.

What about ISO

You might have noticed that a third exposure parameter has thus far remained unchanged, that of the ISO. While it’s standard for most cameras to alter the aperture and shutter speed when using Exposure Compensation, ISO is usually the last parameter to get changed unless you are using Auto ISO.

In that case, your camera will most definitely change the ISO if it needs to, especially if shooting in Aperture Priority and your minimum shutter speed (as set up in your settings) has been reached.

I had to use a fast shutter speed on this image and didn’t care too much about aperture, so I shot in Shutter Priority and used Exposure Compensation to get the image to look how I wanted. I did not use Auto-ISO because I wanted a nice clean picture, so my camera adjusted only the aperture when I dialed in the Exposure Compensation.

Manual Mode

NOTE: This only applies to Nikon shooters! If you use Canon, Fuji or another brand Exposure Compensation does not have any effect in Manual Mode.

Exposure Compensation in Manual Mode works a bit differently because nothing changes at all when you dial in a value. Instead, it’s your camera’s light meter itself that changes so you can adjust the aperture, shutter, and ISO values manually in order to get your picture to look how you want.

It’s an interesting twist on things that might seem a little strange at first if you are used to having things automatically change when you adjust exposure compensation, but once you start using this method you may not ever want to go back.

It essentially gives you the best of all worlds by letting you adjust exposure settings to get the value you are looking for, you can then choose precisely the parameters you want to change.

In Manual Mode, adjusting Exposure Compensation only changes how your light meter displays exposure. Notice how the vertical line indicating the point of proper exposure has shifted to the left when dialing in an Exposure Compensation value of +2EV.

The magic of mirrorless

I know the subject of mirrorless cameras versus DSLRs can be a bit of a thorny one for some photographers, but I would be remiss if I didn’t at least mention it here in an article about exposure compensation.

While the same logic applies regarding Aperture and Shutter Priority modes, the big difference is how you can actually see your exposure settings change in real-time as you look at your camera.

This rear screen of this mirrorless Fuji X100F shows me that the photo will be properly exposed.

This is one of the main strengths of shooting mirrorless, though it should be noted that DSLRs can also this in Live View–albeit usually with some tradeoffs such as slower autofocus that usually happens when utilizing Live View.

I can see the result of a -1EV Exposure Compensation on the digital readouts (i.e. light meter, histogram, etc.) but most notably the image itself has decreased in brightness as well. This helps me get a very good idea of what effect this Exposure Compensation will have on the final image.

Conclusion

I used to be somewhat scared of using Exposure Compensation because I didn’t really understand what was happening when I changed its value. With a much better idea of what my camera is changing, and why, I am now much more comfortable using it on a daily basis to get my shots to look how I want.

In fact, I often won’t even change my metering modes anymore and instead just rely on Exposure Compensation because I know what it’s doing to my photos and I’m not scared of using it. If you have never used it much either, you might want to go ahead and give a try. You just might like it.

The post How to Understand Your Camera’s Exposure Compensation Feature by Simon Ringsmuth appeared first on Digital Photography School.

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Sony interview: ‘If cameras are going to develop, manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologies’

16 Mar

Kenji Tanaka, Senior General Manager of Sony’s Digital Imaging Business Group, pictured in Yokohama for the 2018 CP+ show.

At the recent CP+ show in Yokohama, we sat down with executives from several major camera and lens manufacturers. Among them was Kenji Tanaka, of Sony. In our interview we discussed the new a7 III, as well as Sony’s plans to attract more professional users, without ignoring entry-level and APS-C customers.

The following interview has been edited slightly for clarity and flow.

What is your target customer for the new Alpha a7 III?

We describe it as a basic model but maybe our definition is different [to other manufacturers]. What we mean is that any customer can use this model. Many professionals could use the a7 III, I think. I hope that many kinds of customer will be happy with this model, so we’re not strictly defining a target customer for the a7R III.

The new Sony Alpha a7 III is ostensibly an entry-level model in Sony’s a7-series lineup but despite its relative affordability, it’s packed with features.

Sony had a very busy year last year – what are your priorities going into 2018 and beyond?

We’re displaying the 400mm F2.8 [at CP+] – of course many articles are written about the a7 III, but as well as the camera bodies, the lenses are very important. Especially lenses like the 400mmm F2.8 – sports photographers are a new category for us.

One of the most important lenses for sports photographers is the 400mm F2.8

Last year we launched the a9 and some sports photographers are already using the a9, for example at the Olympics, but one of the most important lenses for sports photographers is the 400mm F2.8. The weight is very light. Usually sports photographers use monopods because the lenses are very heavy, but the weight of our 400mm F2.8 is very light, and you can use it handheld, which makes it easy to create different kinds of photographs. We already announced the development of this lens, and the launch is scheduled for this summer.

How important is feedback from sports photographers?

It’s very important. Not only when it comes to quality, but also durability. The winter Olympics for example, with the low temperatures, whether a product works in those tough conditions is very important. Whether or not we will launch a new product, the proof of concept is very important.

For a product aimed at a hobbyist, maybe it’s less important but for the 400mm F2.8 we’re really dedicated to create a ‘monster’ lens.

Sony was showing a prototype of its forthcoming 400mm F2.8 at CP+, which Mr. Tanaka sees as an essential weapon in Sony’s arsenal of lenses if the company is going to attract professional sports photographers to the brand.

There have been questions about the weather sealing of a7-series and a9 cameras. Is this something you want to address?

In really bad conditions, in really heavy rain, will photographers keep on taking pictures [for long periods of time?] I don’t think so. In those conditions, most photographers will use some kind of rain cover. But of course durability is very important. Photographers should be able to shoot [in poor weather]. We have an internal ‘weather test’ and for each kind of customer we will aim to produce products with adequate durability.

For a professional camera, the requirement for durability is higher

Is that something that your professional users are asking for?

Yes. But we need a balance between durability, and size and weight. For a professional camera, the requirement for durability is higher, but for hobbyist kinds of camera, the priority is smaller size and lower weight.

Tamron and Sigma are now creating lenses for Sony FE – is this a good thing for Sony?

Yes, it’s a good thing. The E-mount is an open standard – anyone can create a lens for the E-mount system. Of course there are criteria for compatibility, but because we think that the E-mount is a good technology, we think that the open format is good for the market and good for customers.

Tamron’s first lens for full-frame Sony mirrorless cameras will be the upcoming 28-75mm F2.8 zoom. Sigma is planning its own range of native E-Mount primes and zooms, too.

How long will it be before Canon and Nikon join Sony and mirrorless full-frame becomes the norm?

This is just my personal opinion, but I think that maybe by next year’s CP+ you’ll see full-frame mirrorless cameras from Canon and Nikon. I think [by then] they will be participating in this market.

If cameras are going to develop, manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologies

Just look at our technologies, like eye focus. All of those are made possible because of data from image sensors. In DSLRs, the data comes from separate sensors. The main imaging sensor is blacked out, 90% of the time by the mirror. The sensor is turned off. But the imaging sensor is very important. So if cameras are going to develop, and be able to capture the moment [more effectively], manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologies. So within one year, I think.

Do you think we’ll see mostly mirrorless cameras at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo?

Yes.

How many of those cameras do you want to be made by Sony?

Many! But the professional market is very conservative, so we’re taking it step by step. We saw some photographers using the Alpha 9 at this year’s winter Olympics but of course the majority was Canon and Nikon. But the number of Sony photographers is increasing.

The Sony Alpha a9’s innovative wide-coverage autofocus system makes it a powerful tool in the hands of an experienced sports photographer.

A lot of our readers want more Sony APS-C lenses…

We know that some people think we’ve neglected the APS-C market, but it’s just an issue of prioritization. A couple of years ago we introduced the a6500. Then the next year we introduced the a9, and the a7R III. But we think that the APS-C market, and APS-C customers are both very important, because the majority of the market is APS-C, and we’re developing many kinds of APS-C products, so please be patient – we will never ignore APS-C.

Some of your competitors keep flagship products up to date over time with firmware updates. This seems like the opposite strategy to Sony. Is this something that might change?

We’re still in the early stages of challenging the market with our products, and the new model cycle is relatively rapid, compared to our competitors. But the next step is to increase our market share. And if we want to reach new customers, we need [to make] new types of cameras.

We’re still in the early stages of challenging the market with our products, and the new model cycle is relatively rapid

Sony makes a lot of key devices, for example image sensors and processors. I’m originally an engineer. Engineers always want to provide the latest sensor, the latest processor, and so on. Maybe this is one of the reasons our product release cycle is faster than some of our competitors. [But] user-upgradable software is very important. Our new model cycle is speedy, however I think that firmware updates are something we should offer.

Editor’s note:

Our conversation with Mr. Tanaka was candid and interesting, coming in the middle of a very busy period for Sony. The company has released a lot of high-end products over the past 18 months, and shows no signs of slowing down. We don’t know how far out the new 400mm F2.8 sports lens is, but given recent sightings of at least one working prototype ‘in the wild’ at the winter Olympics, it could be pretty imminent.

Mr. Tanaka knows that Sony won’t have the full-frame mirrorless field to itself for much longer, and welcomes the competition

Mostly I came away from this interview with the strong sense that Sony isn’t planning on resting on its laurels. Mr. Tanaka knows that his company won’t have the full-frame mirrorless field to itself for much longer, and welcomes the inevitable competition from established DSLR manufacturers like Canon and Nikon, as well as third-party lens manufacturers like Sigma and Tamron. As he correctly points out, some of the most useful features to emerge in the photography market in recent years could only have been possible thanks to mirrorless technologies, and Sony deserves enormous credit for developing and perfecting many of these technologies faster than any other manufacturer.

Sony will not ignore either APS-C users, or entry-level full-frame customers

It was very reassuring to hear Mr. Tanaka stress the importance of durability, as well as technology in Sony’s high-end cameras. Concerns have been raised about the ability of some of its products to withstand use in wet conditions, but clearly this is something that the company is mindful of – especially in cameras and lenses designed for professional use.

That’s not to say that Sony is focused entirely on breaking into the professional market. Mr. Tanaka was at pains to reassure us that Sony will not ignore either APS-C users, or entry-level full-frame customers. The new a7 III is proof of the latter point – a ‘basic’ model in Sony’s terminology, but one that I suspect will satisfy the needs of many enthusiasts and even professionals.

Previous Sony interviews:

CP+ 2017 – Sony interview: ‘We need to offer new imaging experiences’

‘We want to make lenses that can be used forever’: Sony engineer discusses G Master lenses

Interview: Kimio Maki of Sony – ‘the customer’s voice is the most important data for me’

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Manager says Canon is willing to cannibalize DSLR sales with mirrorless cameras

06 Mar

Scroll through your photo news feeds this morning, and you’ll get a lot of “Canon manager confirms: Canon is shifting focus from SLRs to mirrorless” type headlines. But you may want to wait before you grab your hammer and smash that piggy bank in anticipation of new high-end mirrorless option from Canon, because the ‘manager’ in question confirmed no such thing.

The reports we’re seeing are based on a late-February report in Nikkei Asian Review titled, admittedly, “Canon shifts focus from SLR to mirrorless cameras.” The article was written the day after Canon released the M50 mirrorless camera, and in it, Nikkei quotes the president of Canon Marketing Japan, Masahiro Sakata, who identified mirrorless as a ‘growth market’ that Canon needed to invest in:

[Canon must] actively roll out products for a growth market even if there is some cannibalization.

Needless to say, this is not the same as confirming that “Canon is shifting focus from SLR to mirrorless cameras.”

The quote is still intriguing, however, especially in the light of recent shipment and sales numbers out of Japan. Quoting last year’s CIPA numbers, Nikkei points out that the Japanese market for interchangeable lens cameras dropped by 10% while mirrorless increased by just over 29%.

Over the years, the generally accepted narrative has been that Canon doesn’t want to invest in mirrorless because it will cannibalize its SLR sales. Sakata’s statement indicates that those days are over—Canon has noticed the industry trends, and is willing to “actively roll out” mirrorless cameras even if it means eating into sales of its affordable DSLRs.

Canon wants to be more active in the mirrorless space, but that doesn’t necessarily mean ‘high-end’ mirrorless like the full-frame Sony a7 III

When it comes to high-end mirrorless, however, Sakata was much more reserved. He tells Nikkei that Canon will “look at the timing and consider [releasing a high-end mirrorless cameras],” which makes it seem like Canon’s immediate mirrorless future might look more like the M50 than Sony’s a7 line.

Of course, only time will tell, and rumor sites are still speculating that Canon (and Nikon) will both debut full-frame mirrorless offerings at Photokina 2018. We just wouldn’t take these sparse quotes from Masahiro Sakata as “confirmation” that this will, in fact, happen.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Nikon releases new firmware for nine cameras, mostly AF-P lens support

04 Mar

Nine Nikon DSLR models are getting new firmware to fix a few issues users have been encountering, particularly when using AF-P lenses. Updated models include the D4, D4s, Df, D800, D800E, D810, D810A, D7100, and D7200.

?The whole lot of them received these fixes:

Added the following supports for AF-P lenses:

If the standby timer expires after focusing, the focus position will no longer change when the timer is reactivated.
When focus is adjusted by rotating the lens focus ring, the focus indicator in the viewfinder (and in live view, the focus point in the monitor) now flash to indicate when infinity or the minimum focus distance is reached.

The D4, D4s, Df, D800 and D800E received the following fixes:

Added support for AF-P DX lenses.

And the D4, Df, D800 and D800E also benefit from:

When photos were taken using Camera Control Pro 2 after Custom Setting d10 (Exposure delay mode) was enabled in the CUSTOM SETTING MENU, the software would sometimes mistakenly display a message stating that no photo could be taken.

Finally, the Nikon D810 and D810A received fixes to their microphone operation and multiple exposure modes, while the D7100 and D7200 get updates that fix an issue of incorrect exposures when E-type lenses are used in live view mode.

For more information on all of these updates, or if you want to get your Nikon DSLR up to the latest firmware version, visit the Nikon firmware download web page.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

03 Mar

CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

Nikon has a long history of making cameras for use in outer space. A small exhibition at this year’s CP+ show in Yokohama showcases some of the company’s most famous models.

First up is a Nikon Photomic FTN, adapted for use on the Apollo 15 mission to the moon. Although it looks much like a conventional FTN, this modified version features a thicker body shell, NASA-standard insulation in the battery chamber (electrical fires in space are no joke) and larger, easier to grip controls.

CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

The ‘horns’ on the lens enable the main controls to be manipulated easily when wearing thick gloves. Notice also the lack of a leatherette covering on the camera body. The modified FTN also featured internal changes to accommodate the thinner, polyester-based films used for specialist missions.

CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

This is another heavily modified F, without a viewfinder. This camera is similar to motordrive-equipped models supplied to NASA for the 1973 Skylab missions. The fatter, easier to grip controls are obvious in this view.

CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

The Nikon F was a relatively old camera by the time it was used on the Skylab missions, but NASA didn’t supply any modified F2 bodies – instead jumping straight to the F3 in the early 80s.

This is a ‘small’ F3, with a modified motordrive and high-magnification finder, supplied to astronauts on early space shuttle missions. Compared to the the earlier (and hugely costly) F/FTN conversions, the F3 cameras that Nikon supplied to NASA were much more similar to the standard models available for sale to the general public.

CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

This is the ‘big’ F3, also used on space shuttle missions in the 1980s. The bulk film magazine could hold enough film for 250 images before it needed to be reloaded. On earth, this looks like it would be one heavy camera to carry around, but of course that’s less of an issue in zero gravity.

CP+ 2018: Nikon’s space cameras

Skipping forward to (almost) the present day, this is a Nikon D4, shrouded in a special EVA cover – a thermal blanket, designed to protect the camera from the extreme temperature variations experienced during spacewalks. Made from mylar, kevlar, aluminum and no doubt plenty of other advanced materials, each EVA cover reportedly costs around $ 20,000.

To the right of the EVA cover is a D5 – the next camera destined for use in space, by astronauts on the International Space Station.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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‘Perfect’ sensors may be possible, but might not come to cameras

24 Feb

Fossum’s team has created a prototype chip with a variety of pixel designs and readout methods. This included combinations with sufficiently low read noise to allow individual photons to be counted.

The future could include sensors that perfectly describe the light in the scene, that offer new computational possibilities and give film-like latitude in the highlights. And yet we may not ever see them in cameras, says father of the CMOS sensor, Professor Eric Fossum.

We spoke to Fossum shortly after he received, alongside three other pioneers of digital photography, the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering for his work on CMOS sensors. But the topic of our conversation is the future, rather than his past achievements. He now leads a group at the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth, New Hampshire, working on what he calls Quanta Image Sensors (QIS). The team has recently published a paper announcing a breakthrough using the same fabrication process used to make CMOS image sensors.

The perfect sensor?

The principle is to use nanoscale, specialized pixels, called ‘Jots’ to capture light at the level of individual photons. They work in a binary fashion: they’ve either received a photon or they haven’t (as opposed to conventional sensors which accumulate the charge generated by lots of photons during exposure). These jots are read repeatedly to see whether another photon has arrived since they were last checked.

While Fossum is keen to stress that other teams are having some success in the same field (using a slightly different approach), his own team’s work is looking very promising. The paper in the journal Optica shows the team’s technology has been refined such that a 1MJot chip can be read 1000 times per second while still exhibiting sufficiently low read noise that it can distinguish between individual photons.

We can count every photon: you can’t do any better than that

“The Holy Grail is no read noise,” says Fossum: “so that the read signal is proportional to the signal as it arrived.” And the team’s latest paper says they’ve got very close to this, with noise levels so low that the sensor can distinguish between individual photons without getting confused by read noise. This opens up the possibility of cameras that could perfectly describe the light in the scene, even in near total darkness.

A mathematical model showing how noise levels (measured in the root mean square of the number of electrons), affect the ability to interpret small signals. The lower the read noise, the more accurately you can distinguish between individual values in the signal.
Diagram from the team’s paper in Optica

Eliminating read noise from the sensor wouldn’t mean totally noiseless photos, since the randomness of the light being captured is a key source of noise, but it’s the best any sensor can possibly achieve. “We can count every photon: you can’t do any better than that,” he says.

The paper, perhaps conservatively, says the technology could be suited to scientific, space, security and low-light imaging applications, but Fossum has clearly also been thinking about conventional photography.

A classic response

“Because it’s binary in nature, its response is comparable to old photographic film,” he says. “In film, when the silver halide was hit by a photon, it’s reduced to a silver atom that isn’t washed away [during processing]. If it’s hit by two photons, it doesn’t make any additional difference.”

This ends up meaning that in bright regions of the image there are ever fewer unexposed silver ions as the exposure goes on. This, in turn makes it less likely that the last few ions will be hit by a photon, so it becomes increasingly difficult to fully saturate the system. The same is true for the tiny, binary Jots: as more of them become saturated, it becomes increasingly difficult to saturate the last few.

“The response is linear at moderate exposure but it trails off to give significant overexposure latitude. It’s a pattern first observed by Hurter and Driffield in 1890,” says Fossum: “they showed the same curve that we measure, experimentally, in our QIS devices.”

Diagram showing the Jots’ exposure response, in comparison to mathematical models of different read noise levels. Note the roll-off at high exposures, comparable to the Hurter Driffield response curves of photographic film.
Diagram from the team’s paper in Optica

“That has obvious interest both for still photographers who’re used to shooting film and for cinematographers who’re looking for that kind of response.”

The use of such tiny pixels has other benefits, too: “Jots are below diffraction limits in size. This means the resolution of the system is always higher than the resolution of the lens, which means we never have to worry about aliasing.” While the group’s prototype sensors feature one million Jots, Fossum says their target is one billion.

Beyond conventional photography

Fossum isn’t just thinking about photographic history, though. The tiny size and the approach of repeatedly reading out the sensor challenges the existing concept of single exposures. “At the moment we make motion pictures by shooting a series of snapshots. With QIS it’s more like the reverse process,” he says: constructing still images from precisely captured movement.

Professor Fossum has already been responsible for one revolution in photography: the invention of the CMOS sensor. In December 2017 he was awarded the Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering for his work.

Essentially, taking lots of short, sub-frames during an exposure gives you an extra dimension to your images: time. “If you take a single frame, you get a bunch of ones and zeros. If you take another, you quickly build up a cube of ones and zeros,” Fossum says: “For example, if you shoot 100 frames at 1000 frames per second, you get a cube that’s x pixels wide by y pixels tall, but also 100 frames deep.”

This presents some interesting questions, he says: “What do you do with that data? How do you create an image from that very faithful map of where photons arrived?”

“You could choose a number of pixels in x and y but also in the time axis. If you wanted a very sensitive pixel in low light you could combine 10 x 10 Jots in x and y and then maybe combine the data from 100 frames: it’s essentially like increasing the grain size in a more sensitive film.”

Of course you can achieve something comparable to this in conventional digital photography by downscaling an image, but Jots allow greater flexibility, Fossum says: “your pixel size could vary between different parts of the image, so in some places you’d have bigger but more sensitive grains.”

What is the object of photography? Is it artistic or an attempt to perfectly recreate the scene as it was?

The time component also opens up additional possibilities, he says: “if an object moves during these hundred frames, instead of adding all the values from the same location, you could add them at an angle that corresponds to the movement,” so that all the pixels relating to the same object are combined. “We could take out motion blur or remove the scanning effect of a computer screen in video.”

The idea of combining multiple frames in interesting ways is, of course, already becoming a core part of mobile photography, and Fossum says finding all the things that are possible is a challenge he is leaving for others: “From my point of view, we’re building a platform for computational imaging, it’s for others to develop all the ways to use it. A camera would have to take account of the new sensor capabilities.”

But it’ll ask interesting questions, he believes: “What is the object of photography? Is it artistic or an attempt to perfectly recreate the scene as it was? Some of the things we associate with photography are artifacts of the way we capture them.”

Not the only future

With all this going for it, it might seem odd that Fossum isn’t promising to deliver a second revolution in digital imaging. But, having devoted a career to developing technologies and teaching about the challenges, he’s realistic both about the work left to do and the competition any product would face.

“What we’ve already achieved is wonderful. The next challenge is adding color [awareness], but I don’t think that’s going to be particularly problematic. Then there’s power: we’ve shown we can produce a large chip that doesn’t consume or disperse a prohibitively large amount of power. We’re currently at around 27mW but scale it up by 1000 [to get to one billion Jots] and that’s 27W, so we need to cut that by about a factor of ten.”

His concern is more about the current state of the rival technologies: “In order to bring a new technology to replace the existing one, it has to be compellingly better in a number of ways,” he says. “For a few niches, [our technology] is already compelling.” But for photography, the bar is already set very high.

I don’t want our startup to be another esoteric imaging product that fails to find a market

“CMOS technology is pretty awesome right now,” he says, before almost embarrassedly stressing that he’s not claiming the credit for this: “where it is today is the result of the input from thousands of engineers from different companies who’ve contributed towards where we are now.”

Professor Eric Fossum pictured with Dr Jiaju Ma, one of the co-authors of the Optica paper and a co-founder of the spin-off company, Gigajot Technology.

But, for all his cautious words, Fossum is convinced enough by the technology’s potential to have created a company, Gigajot Technology, with his co-researchers. “Finding a sweet spot in the market is a really important part of challenge. It comes back to the things I teach: ‘who is your customer?’ ‘what is your market?’ ‘how are we going to get there?'”

“I don’t want our startup to be another esoteric imaging product that fails to find a market,” he says.

While it’s by no means certain that QIS sensors will make their way into mainstream cameras, it already looks like the technology has tremendous potential for niches such as scientific measurement. This alone shows just how far the technology has come from Fossum’s original idea. As he readily admits: “When we first started this project I wasn’t even sure it could be made to work.”

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Panasonic GX9 added to ‘Best Cameras under $1000’ buying guide

22 Feb

We’ve added Panasonic’s newest mirrorless camera – the midrange DC-GX9 – to our ‘Best Cameras under $ 1000’ buying guide.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Tamron is working on a 28-75mm F2.8 lens for full-frame Sony mirrorless cameras

22 Feb

Tamron is working on a fast standard zoom lens for full-frame Sony E-mount cameras. Details are thin at this point, but the 28-75mm F2.8 Di III RXD will offer a minimum focus distance of 19cm/7.5in at wide-angle, will measure 11.7cm/4.6in long and weigh in at 19.4oz/1.2lb. Tamron claims the lens will offer excellent optical performance and high-quality bokeh. An ‘RXD’ stepping motor autofocus unit provides quiet operation for video applications, and the whole thing will be moisture-resistant.

Press Release

Tamron announces the development of a high-speed standard zoom lens for Sony full-frame mirrorless cameras

28-75mm F/2.8 Di III RXD (Model A036)

February 22, 2018, Commack, New York – Tamron announces the development of a new high-speed standard zoom lens for Sony full-frame mirrorless cameras, the 28-75mm F/2.8 Di III RXD (Model A036). This signals Tamron’s plans to further expand and improve its lens lineup for full-frame mirrorless cameras, in addition to its lenses for DSLR and other mirrorless camera formats.

Model A036 delivers superb optical performance, including both outstanding image quality and beautiful background blur effects (bokeh). Photographers may enjoy dynamic wide-angle expressions like never before thanks to a minimum object distance of 7.5 in at the wideangle zoom setting. Usefulness and versatility are enhanced by its compact size and light weight, measuring only 4.6 in and weighing 19.4 oz. Model A036 incorporates an all-new high-speed and precise AF driving system. The RXD (Rapid eXtra-silent stepping Drive) stepping motor unit operates with remarkable quietness, making it perfect for video use. The lens also features Moisture-Resistant Construction that is helpful in outdoor photography, plus hydrophobic Fluorine Coating that is highly resistant to fingerprints and debris. In addition, A036 is compatible with the “Direct Manual Focus (DMF)” system feature of Sony cameras, enabling this new zoom to take full advantage of the advanced functions that ensure comfortable user experiences.

PRODUCT HIGHLIGHTS

1. Superb optical performance, including both outstanding image quality and beautiful background blur effects (bokeh), provided by fast F/2.8 aperture.

2. Comfortably light weight (19.4 oz.) and compact (4.6 in).

3. Close-focusing; Minimum Object Distance: 7.5 in at wide-angle setting and 15.3 in at the telephoto position.

4. All-new “RXD” stepping motor AF unit is extremely quiet and therefore perfect for video capture.

5. Exciting next-generation design keeping the brand consistency that is ergonomically superb.

6. Moisture-Resistant Construction and Fluorine Coating for weather protection.

7. Compatible with the “Direct Manual Focus (DMF)” feature that enables Sony cameras to instantly switch between autofocus and manual focus.

* Specifications, appearance, functionality, etc. are subject to change without prior notice.

Tamron 28-75mm F2.8 Di III RXD specifications

Principal specifications
Lens type	Zoom lens
Max Format size	35mm FF
Focal length	28–75 mm
Image stabilization	No
Lens mount	Sony FE
Aperture
Maximum aperture	F2.8
Aperture ring	No
Optics
Special elements / coatings	Fluorine coating
Focus
Minimum focus	0.19 m (7.48″)
Autofocus	Yes
Motor type	Stepper motor
Full time manual	Yes
Focus method	Internal
Distance scale	No
DoF scale	No
Physical
Weight	550 g (1.21 lb)
Length	117 mm (4.61″)
Sealing	Yes
Colour	Black
Zoom method	Rotary (extending)
Power zoom	No
Zoom lock	No

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Ricoh will let Pentax K-1 owners update their cameras to a Mark II for $550

22 Feb

For a limited time this summer, current Pentax K-1 owners will be able to send their cameras in for service, essentially upgrading them to a Mark II. The service will include a main circuit board swap, and the ‘SR’ logo on the front of the camera will be replaced with a Mark II logo. The upgraded circuit board will add all of the features introduced in the Mark II, such as shooting at up to ISO 819,200 and an updated Pixel Shift mode.

The K-1 upgrade service will cost $ 550 US / $ 690 CAD and will be offered from May 21, 2018 to September 30, 2018.

We do not yet have details of the price or timeframe for upgrading in other regions but we’re told it should be available and we’ll post detailed when we have them.

Ricoh announces an upgrade service for current PENTAX K-1 camera owners

WEST CALDWELL, NJ, February 21, 2018?In conjunction with the announcement of the new PENTAX K-1 Mark II 35mm full-frame digital SLR (DSLR) camera, Ricoh Imaging Americas Corporation today announced an upgrade service for current PENTAX K-1 owners.

The program allows current PENTAX K-1 owners to upgrade their current camera to receive the advanced functions of the new PENTAX K-1 Mark II.

Here is an overview of the upgrade service:

– The upgrade service will be available for a limited time, from May 21, 2018 – September 30, 2018- Upgrade cost: $ 550USD / $ 690 CAD- Cameras will need to be shipped to Precision Camera (US) and Sun Camera (Canada)

The upgrade entails replacing the PENTAX K-1’s main circuit board to add new functions featured in the new PENTAX K-1 Mark II camera. Additionally, the current “SR” logo on the PENTAX K-1 will be replaced with the new PENTAX K-1 Mark II logo.

More details on the program will be released in the upcoming weeks. Please go to www.us.ricoh-imaging.com or email us at conact@us.ricoh-imaging.com for more information.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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