Family, Photography and other misc news
Today Nikon announced some updates to their exotic telephoto’s. Both the 500mm f/4 and the 600mm f/4 received updates.
The main thing is updated elements containing the new fluorite lens coating which corrects chromatic aberration and allows lighter glass.
When the Leica X Vario was announced it was marketed as a Mini M. With its excelent build quality and image quality, Leica though they had a hit on their hands. Unfortunately coupled with a slow zoom lens, and the marketing hype, it just could not live up to the expectation.
Today we have a new compact announced, this time the Leica Q. Think Sony RX1 crossed with the best bits of a Leica X, add a viewfinder and you have the Leica Q.
A very simple fixed lens compact, with the excellent and innovative focusing of the Leica X (Type 113) but with a Leica full frame sensor and finally a EVF.
One could really call this a mini M. I have read a couple of reviews and finally we have a Leica where the electronics don’t get in the way or slow down the photographer.
You can check out the reviews at most popular photography sites:
http://www.stevehuffphoto.com/2015/06/10/the-leica-q-real-world-camera-review-by-steve-huff/
http://www.slack.co.uk/2015/Hemingway.html
http://blog.mingthein.com/2015/06/10/review-2015-leica-q-typ-116/#more-11294
Its Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference this week. While hardware was not featured we did see the next update to iOS and to OS X.
Nothing spectacular but the multitasking updates for iOS for the latest iPads and the graphics and windowing improvements to OS X are nice additions. If the performance updates for Adobe are real then a new Mac and the new OS may make things really fly!
If you don’t like motorcycles or motorcyclists then once again, this weekend was not the time to be in Lincoln. This weekend was the Lincoln Bike Fest, and annual event where hundreds of bikers turn up and park up on the Brayford Wharf. Its worth a visit to see the sites and there are some nice restaurants and bars also on the Wharf so plenty to do.
I am still working on my scanning technique but here is one from a test last week. 
The lovely Lincoln Cathedral, one of the oldest Gothic buildings in Europe.
Got the chance to look at the new 12 inch MacBook from Apple. Its a fantastic little laptop, not suitable for real power work, but if all you need is Office apps, email and internet its a fantastic little road warriors laptop.
For me, I have it down to either a new 15 inch MacBook Pro or the desktop MacPro if I can get one from the refurb store at a good discount.
One good thing about living near Lincoln is that there always seems to be something going. Whether the Santa Run or Lincoln Christmas Market in the winter to cycle races and Steam Punk events.
Last weekend was Lincoln’s 1940’s weekend and unfortunately I could not make it but from looking at the photographs people have been post on the Internet it looks like it was a fun filled weekend with lots of photographic opportunities.
Leica M8.2
Leica Summilux-M 50mm f/1.4 ASPH
50mm, 1/180 Sec at f/8, ISO160
Post Processed in Adobe Lightroom CC2015 V6
On a MacBook Pro, OS-X 10.10.3
There are three pieces of advice I can give you for scanning.
So what do I mean by this.
Well scanning is time consuming so do the proceedure once at the highest native resolution of your scanner.
Clean your scanner plate with a soft cleaning cloth then clean your slides/film. Once mounted in the frame clean again. Don’t be surprised that after the scan you made need to clean again and rescan.
Maximise the quality of the scan. Your not after something that looks fantastic that’s your usual editing softwares job. You are after a flat low contrast file which you can work with in a flexible way.
As you can see from the histogram this image is finishing at 232 not 255 so adjust the sliders to maximise the scan over the images histogram range. I also give the mid tones a slight boost and also turn off sharpening and noise reduction. Our third party tools offer far better quality and options then what comes with the scanner software.
I quickly flick through all my images in the slide/film holder setting the histogram appropriate for each image.
I then select batch scan; I scan to a folder which I set as a watch folder in Adobe Lightroom, once each image is scanned it gets auto imported into Lightroom with my default copyright and develop settings preset I have created for this.
Its service time for the BMW this week so I get to ride a loaner, this time a BMW F800R. It’s a fun naked sporty number that can be easily rode or you can get your head down and push on.
Being a naked bike it’s more a sunny day ride and the riding position does put a lot more weight on your arms then I am used to with the GS.
A fun bike but not one I would choose for a long term bike. I like my creature comforts as I ride every day.
Jumping back on the GS a few days later made the big GS seem absolutely huge. At 40,000 miles now the 1200cc boxer engine is nicely run in and with the major service, new tires and brake pads it certainly feels like a new bike.
I’ll be taking it easy over the next few days while I scrub in the tires, and also bed in the brakes but then, well; Summer is coming!