Fujifilm has released minor firmware updates for seven of its Fujinon XC and XF lenses.
The company doesn’t elaborate on what exactly was fixed in each of the firmware updates other than a ‘fix of minor bugs.’ Still, for the sake of keeping up to date and preventing any of these unmentioned ‘minor bugs’ from affecting your workflow, it’s well worth it to download the update(s) and apply them to your Fujinon lenses.
Below is a list of each of the lenses and a link to their respective firmware updates:
XF 10–24mm F4 — firmware version 1.13
XC 15–45mm F3.5–5.6 — firmware version 1.03
XC 16–50mm F3.5–5.6 OIS II — firmware version 1.12
XF 18–55mm F2.8–4 — firmware version 3.23
XF 18–135mm F3.5–5.6 — firmware version 1.12
XC 50–230mm F4.5–6.7 OIS II — firmware version 1.11
XF80mm F2.8 — firmware version 1.12
Instructions on how to install the new firmware are listed on each of the download links above.
The new Panasonic S 20-60mm F3.5-5.6 is smaller and lighter than a constant aperture zoom and could be a great option for wide angle shooters using L-mount cameras. Chris and Jordan got their hands on a pre-production unit and tell us what they think.
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The post How to Catalog and Store Your Photos so You Can Find them Easier appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Bond.
Keeping track of the photos you’ve taken is a vital element of the photography workflow. In this article, you’ll learn about different ways you can catalog and store your photos. This is important because, first of all, you’ll want to be able to easily find the photos that you took several years ago. You’ll also want to review your photos periodically to see where you can improve your work. This is easier with a well-managed photo library. Let’s take a look at the options available to you then.
Keeping your photo library up to date is vital.
Will you catalog and store your photos in the cloud?
The options available to store large amounts of file data have grown in recent years. It’s a good job because the amount of memory most photographers go through has also grown. The biggest rule here is that if you only have one copy of something, you might as well have none. The day your hard drive fails means you could lose everything, so diversify and keep multiple copies. Let’s look at some of the options you could take.
Internal hard drive
The first and most convenient place to store your photos is on your computers internal hard drive. Doing this means the files are easy to reach, and you don’t need to play around with wires to plug other devices in.
The drawback here, of course, is that most internal hard drives are limited in storage capacity, even more so if you’re using a laptop. At best, keeping photos on your internal hard drive should only be for your most recent photos. Even then, you need to back them up on a separate external hard drive.
External hard drives like these are one solution.
External hard drive
The next option is to use external hard drives.
The capacity of external hard drives continues to rise, and with the introduction of solid-state hard drives, their reliability has also improved. Large external hard drives that have terabytes of storage space are the best solutions for photographers wishing to back up their work. While you can have storage from flashcards and pen drives, it’s realistically far too small to database your library.
A word of warning though, most hard drives have a shelf life. That means for each external hard drive you have, you need a separate backup external hard drive.
Cloud services
The newest version of storage is cloud storage. It’s become increasingly popular, and with good reason. Companies that provide these services need to ensure your data is protected, as a result they need to keep several copies in the event one of their storage systems goes down. Your files being kept in a remote location is also safer, especially if you use cloud storage in conjunction with an external hard drive.
Dropbox – One of the first cloud storage services, they offer a good service.
Adobe – Anyone using Adobe products can sign up and store their photos on Adobe’s servers.
iCloud – Those using apple products will be familiar with the iCloud, it works as a hub to link up all your devices.
The downside to this type of service is that there is an ongoing subscription fee if you want storage sizes capable of backing up your photography. That compares with an external hard drive that has a one time fee. You’re also reliant on a fast, reliable internet connection, something you might not find if you’re traveling somewhere that’s more remote.
Cataloging your photos by type works well, this is a cityscape.
What’s the best solution?
Burning to a DVD was once a way you’d store photo library’s, but this has now become outdated as storage size has far outstripped this method. The best solution is to diversify. Keep backup copies of your photos on separate external hard drives, and use a cloud service for that extra protection.
Which is the best software to use for your library?
Now you know what hardware you’ll use to store your photos, the next step is to decide which program you’re going to use to store them. Once again, there are several options, and here are some of them.
Catalog in folders
One option is to simply set up folders, and then subfolders on your hard drive. You can use these to store individual sets of photos. The problem is this takes a lot of work, and could quickly become disorganized if you’re not on top of it all the time.
Photos is the current storage option for apple users.
Apple Photos
Apple Photos is now the default photo storage program that comes with apple devices, be that a phone or a computer. It’s taken over from the older iPhoto, and the concept with the program is to share between devices. That means all your files will be synced to the iCloud account you have. You’ll likely need to pay the subscription fee for this functionality to be of any use.
The program comes with some basic editing functions, with the ability to catalog your photos into albums. You can further organize your work by putting these albums into folders. You can download Apple photos to use with windows as well.
Adobe Bridge and Lightroom
Adobe is the choice of many photographers, especially Adobe Lightroom.
There are actually two separate programs to create a library from. The two programs create folders on your hard drive, as opposed to Apple Photos, that has a closed-off app.
You can select the folder you’re going to use, so putting these photos on an external hard drive will work well.
Bridge and Lightroom allow you to organize your photos by folder, but you can also put them into collections. Where Lightroom differs from Bridge is that it offers an advanced photo editing suite. For many photographers, this is all they need.
As is becoming increasingly standard, there is also the option to store your photos in Adobe’s cloud service through these programs.
Adobe is the most popular service for most photographers.
Other options
There are many other options you can use to organize and store your photos. If you’re using a Mac, using Photos or Lightroom is probably the best move. If you’re using a Windows machine, Lightroom is a great option. However you could buy a different program if you wish, this article gives a list of some of the possible alternative options.
How will you subdivide your collection into folders?
The last step in organizing your photos is putting them into categories that will make them easy to find. This comes down to some basic organization. Typically, you’ll want to start with a broad way of labeling photos, and then get more specific for the subfolders you put these photos into.
The year
Every year it’s time to reset and look again at your photos. It’s also a good time to begin a new folder for that year’s photos. In doing this, you’ll prevent any folder or library from becoming too large.
A location like a national park is a good name for a folder.
The location
This is a category you can obviously narrow down further from the broad area of just the location. The following are some suggestions on how you might do just that.
Country – Every time you make a trip to a new country, this should have its own folder. In fact, you might decide to make a whole new library with the year and country as the title for this library.
City/Town/Village – The next step down from the country is the place you visit within that country. Often an urban center of some description will be the next folder you use.
National park – Visiting an area of natural beauty will be high on the landscape photographer list. These are often national parks, so this would also form a folder.
District/Market/Lake/Mountain – To further narrow down where the photo was taken, look to the district or market you visited in an urban center. Likewise, if you’re in the countryside, look for things like lakes or mountains to signify the photo’s location.
This photo could be labelled portrait, light painting, or wire wool.
The day
Now you’re getting down to the nitty gritty of how to catalog and store your photos.
How you apply this to your organizational structure will depend. If you’re visiting a country for one week you might dispense with the city or national park, and just name each day France day 1, France day 2 and so on. However, if you’re in a country for longer, you might decide to use Paris day 1, Paris day 2, Lyon day 1, and so on.
The event
Photographing at festivals and events is a great way of getting unique photos, as they’re dynamic and you’ll be constantly on the lookout for moments of capture. Events like these will typically lead you to take many photos. If the event lasts several days, you’ll likely want to catalog by day.
The photography technique
Another approach to organizing your photos is to do it by type. In this case, you might be working on a photographic project, and you’ll want to keep all the photos of a particular type together. Below are a few examples you could try.
Color – Take a series of photos that are all the same color.
Technique – Use a technique like silhouettes, light painting or Lensball photography.
Portraits – If you’re a portrait photographer, you’ll likely want to sub-genre this topic. If you’re a travel photographer, it might form its own folder.
Street – Street photography is a great topic to try out and lends well to anyone living in an urban center.
Urban – Urban photography could include things like cityscapes, architecture, or rooftop photography.
Festivals provide many photographic moments.
Favorites
Lastly, one of the best folders of photos any photographer can have is the favorites.
Each day you’ll choose your favorites from that day. However, at the end of the year or the end of a trip, it’s worth refining your selection further. To do this, go back over your favorites from each day and pick the very best images. Then use those images to create a portfolio folder for your very best work.
What’s your preferred way to catalog and store your photos?
There is a definite process you need to follow when you catalog and store your photos. This article lays out where and how to store photos so that you don’t lose control of your database of images.
There are many ways to do this, so how do you catalog and store your photos? If you use a different approach, we’d love to hear your ideas in the comments section.
Likewise, if you use any of the approaches in this article, which have you found the best? It’s always good to be organized, so organize your photos today so you can add more of them to your collection tomorrow!
The post How to Catalog and Store Your Photos so You Can Find them Easier appeared first on Digital Photography School. It was authored by Simon Bond.
A comparison between the 24mm F/2 Aporia and a standard Leica body cap.
Boutique Japanese optics manufacturer MS Optics has released its latest bespoke lens, a 24mm F2 pancake lens for Leica M-mount cameras.
The MS Optics Aporia 24mm F2 M-mount lens is a return to Miyazaki’s specialty — wide-angle pancake lenses. This Gauss lens is barely larger than a Leica M body cap, yet manages to pack inside six elements in four groups and a focusing range from .5m (1.5ft) to infinity.
We promise that’s a lens on the Zeiss Ikon.
According to MS Optics founder and lens designer, Mr. Sadayasu Miyazaki, Gauss lenses tend to struggle with ‘coma flare from mid-frame into the corners causing reduced contrast and peripheral light falloff.’ Miyazaki says it was a struggle to get around this shortcoming, he’s managed to ‘bring it to a satisfactory level of performance’ thanks to low-dispersion elements.
The lens measures just 50mm (2”) diameter, 5.8mm (.23”) thick and weighs just 45g (1.59oz) — roughly the weight of a golf ball. Below are a few sample photos, captured by Bellamy Hunt of Japan Camera Hunter (JCH):
The 24mm F2 Aporia is being stocked in very limited numbers on the JCH website in gold, black chrome and silver chrome. Right now all models are sold out, but Bellamy Hunt of JCH tells us units are currently being put through quality assurance and will go live ’in the coming weeks.’
Just a PSA – I noticed recently that my galleries werent loading properly when I viewed them… after briefly troubleshooting I discovered that a recent update to the firefox extension “AdBlock plus” was blocking them (without really giving any indication). So if you’re reading this with ABP turned on, you might want to disable it for the site… I don’t have any ads on it anyway
As anyone who’s been following this blog knows, I’ve been very excited about the whole inception of the new micro four thirds standard… I decided not to jump on the EP-1, waiting to see the developments from Panasonic etc… With the release of the GF1 and the announcement of the EP-2, I finally decided to get myself a GF1 for my birthday. Of course my B-day isn’t for another month, but given the impossibility of actually finding the stupid thing in stock, when I saw one available from amazon I jumped on it and received it last week.
Of course a week and a few shots are not nearly enough to get the real “feel” of a camera, but here are some initial thoughts:
I bought this camera as a replacement for my G9 (which I subsequently sold). my first thought was “this is just like my G9, only better”
Image quality is superb – particularly with the 20/1.7. Plenty of detail, and the raw files hold up to processing well (using LR3 beta). High ISO is perfectly adequate for me. I’d use it comfortably up to 800/1250, and 1600/2500 are definitely usable with some NR/processing. 3200 is a bit noisy, but still seems perfectly usable for smaller prints etc… with some NR.
I don’t miss an OVF at all. I don’t know why folks get hysterical about composing on a screen- to me it’s just another way of composing. SLR finder, Rangefinder, Waist-level finder, ground glass… whatever. as long as I can compose my image, it’s all good.
Much like the G9 it’s not truly “pocketable” it definitely needs a small bag or coat pocket. To me this is basically a camera for “good pictures that’s lighter/easier to carry than an SLR”
Responsiveness is excellent. Shutter lag is negligible, and focus is nice and snappy even in low light. It’s not quite as good as my D700 (!) but it’s more than adequate. I can’t see myself missing any shots due to lag (caveat: I don’t shoot kids or sports, so if you do YMMV!)
build quality is… decent… it’s not a leica, but it doesn’t feel like its going to fall apart either. Probably the cheapest-feeling part of the whole thing is the zoom action on the 14-45 kit lens, but even that isn’t terrible (hey it’s a kit lens!)
Manual focus with the m4/3 lenses is actually not bad at all. The “focus by wire” doesn’t bother me, and the focus rings (particularly on the 20/1.7) are surprisingly smooth and well damped, unlike many modern AF lenses. I’m curious to try some real MF lenses on it with an adaptor.
I’m still getting a feel for the menus/controls, but they seem perfectly adequate. I wasn’t sure about the whole “push-turn” control wheel but I actually really like it now. All the necessary info is shown on screen, and all the settings I need to use regularly are easily accessible without digging through 27 menus (<cough> canon mirror lockup<cough>
I’m curious how the lack of a mirror will affect hand-holdability. I know I can handhold a rangefinder at least a stop slower than an equivalent SLR, I wonder if the GF1 will have the same advantage…
So far the main “negative” I can find with the camera is that the grip on the front feels a little slippery (the rear has a nice rubber thumbpad, but the front “fingertip” area is too slick for me) Surprisingly this makes the grip less sure than my G9… it might be worth getting a little stick on pad for the front to alleviate this.
Overall, the “gestalt” of this camera is the same to me as the G9 – not a “pocket camera” per-se, but a “real camera” that I can carry around more easily than a full SLR. In this regard it succeeds superbly. For my purposes, the GF1 realizes the dream of “SLR image quality in a compact body” perfectly, particularly with the superb 20/1.7. I’m actually toying with using it fom a couple of “real” shoots coming up, to see if the ability to go ultralight/minimalist will give added freedom in location shooting.
We’ve updated our ‘best cameras over $ 2000’ buying guide, and the Sony a7R IV is now our favorite mirrorless camera in the $ 2000-4000 price range. It sits alongside the Nikon D850, which is our choice for those who prefer DSLRs.
We’re looking for more ways to showcase our readers’ photography and at the same time, to see how the complex technologies that power smartphone cameras behave in a wide range of situations. That’s why we’re calling on all Samsung Galaxy S20 and S20+ owners to send us your favorite images you’ve taken with either device – they may be included as part of DPR’s first-ever community-powered sample gallery. By curating a gallery of images from our readership, we get to learn more about these devices and show off the work of our talented readers. Win-win.
To participate, upload images taken with either the Galaxy S20 or Galaxy S20+ to your DPR gallery and tag them with s20-gallery. Selected images will be featured in a story on our front page and will be seen by tens-of-thousands of your fellow readers.
Upload your Samsung Galaxy S20 and S20+ images for consideration
A little fine print – images should be uploaded at full resolution with minimal (if any) processing. The standard terms and conditions of our gallery system apply:
We respect your copyright and intellectual property. By uploading your image to your gallery you agree to allow dpreview to host, link to and subsequently display the image on our website for the purpose of providing the service. Images marked as public may appear on the gallery home page and other gallery widgets from time to time. We acknowledge the copyright and ownership of the image remains yours, and you represent and warrant that you are the sole owner of all intellectual property rights in the image.
