Author: Richard

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London Camera Exchange – Lincoln Photography Show

Today was the annual Lincoln Photography Show run by London Camera Exchange. The major players were all there, Nikon, Canon, Sony, Panasonic, Olympus, Fuji, as well as some of the bigger accessory companies.

Fuji had their Medium Format camera which I like, I also played with latest version of the Fuji X100, I camera I really want to like but I don’t know if its my imagination but the current version seems to have a very poor optical viewfinder and I would not pay the kind of money they are asking for it.

Sony keep charging forward, and while they have many good cameras there always seems to be either an issue or a replacement coming along.

Olympus and Panasonic both have strong lineups and Olympus have really rounded out their professional lens now.

A fun event and I enjoyed the seminars.

The most impressive camera was the new Nikon D850. My D800 is a real high end heavy hitter and when the D810 came out I could not see enough of an improvement but the D850 feels like a small Nikon D5, its a real top of the line pro model.

The price of the D850 is an issue for that kind of money its now worth considering a mirrorless system, you could get an Olympus and all the pro lens for the price of a D850 and a few pro Nikon lens.

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Leica L Mount Camera with EVF – Photographs leaked

We have the TL without a viewfinder, and I was disappointed when its replacement the TL2 also lacked a viewfinder.

The Leica Q shows what Leica can do in a small body and a L mount version of that is what people want.

Well from photographs leaked on the web this week it looks like we finally have what we want coming.

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Lightroom Classic – First edit


I have now finally take the jump and upgraded my Lightroom CC to the latest Lightroom Classic.

A quick edit using some of my existing M10 presets configured for the previous Lightroom, but a reasonable editing job if done in a couple of seconds.  Over the coming few weeks i’ll be using it continually and getting a good feel of the new version.  I might also download the new cloud based Lightroom CC to my laptop and do a little testing of it.

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Sony A7R III

The Sony A7R Mark III has finally been released.

I have tried several Sony mirrorless cameras.  Starting with the Sony NEX 7, a very good camera but one that I just could not get along with, then I tried the first A7, now this was a fantastic camera but the shutter was terrible and you could easily suffer with camera shake.  The menus were also terrible.  Sony fixed the shutter in subsequent models and also stole the menu system from the Sony SLR series so correcting that.

From the Mark II onwards the Sony has been a hard act to follow, the downside has always been the shortage of really good lens and the fact that paired with good glass, the mirrorless Sony really did not offer any advantages over other systems.  Good glass at 35mm full frame that can autofocus is never going to be small.  In that regard I feel Leica made the better decision with the mirrorless SL and making it larger.  If your after small I think its hard to fault the Olympus MicroFourThirds cameras.

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Good bye – Andromeda

Over the last few years we have had the joy of the A Girls.  Four lovely chickens that have enjoyed the company of and they have enjoyed the our garden.  A little too much enjoyment of our veg plot!

Today we had our first death, Andromeda.  All of our chickens have names beginning with A.

Fair well Andromeda and thanks for all the eggs and the company and friendship you have show.

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A Quite Day Off

After the excitement of the last few days we had yesterday off and paid a visit to the local teashop, today I had to go into the office for some meetings and to plan for a big system migration that night while Caroline worked from home.

The teashop in North Scarle is always worth a visit.  We had a hotpot and baguette while Caroline had a pot of tea and I had a hot chocolate.  We finished with cake.

This time we did not take Timmy the greyhound which disappointed the teashop owner as she always likes to see Timmy.  I am just glad that a Wednesday is not a diet day!

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iPhone X

My current phone is an iPhone X as my Personal Device and I currently have a Nokia Windows phone for work.  While I prefer iOS, I quite like the difference of the Microsoft phone system, its been a brave and different operating system for Microsoft.  While I cannot see myself leaving iOS, I can well see why companies go for the Microsoft Ecosystem.  Its such ashamed that Microsoft now seem to be ditching it.

I had the first iPhone and while it did less then my previous phone I liked the way it worked and have stayed with Apple ever since.

My current iPhone 6 is working well and I have no reason to upgrade, but having the first iPhone I devices I would also buy the iPhone X.

Its too expensive and I definitely do not need one but I placed my order last Friday for the top model, and look forward to receiving it in a couple of weeks.

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Leica News – a new camera and lens

There are still rumours flying that Leica are to release a new camera with the L mount and a new lens.

The camera is rumoured to be a DX format camera to partner the TL2, hopefully with an EVF this time, the lens a will also be a DX crop format to go with it but no news as to its focal length.

 

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Motorcycling – the joys and dangers

I enjoy motorcycling far more then driving a car.  Its not that I do not like driving cars, but truly fast and enjoyable cars cost far more then I am willing to pay.  A few thousand pounds will get a motorcycle that can out perform a car costing over a hundred thousand pounds.

Today we had a idiot car driver pull out onto a roundabout without looking, I have had to do a few emergency stops in the last couple of years here, but today as Caroline was turning right someone came straight out without looking.  Caroline managed to avoid being hit by him, but having to serve and brake out of the way dropped the Deauville.

Caroline with more a bruised pride then injured, gave me a call and I went and collected her, and I rode her bike to our local garage.  Luckily apart from a new front fairing the rest of the bike is alright.