Category: Computing

There have been a lot of rumours over the last year about a new retina MaBook Air. The rumours also indicate that it will have a 12 inch screen.

The range currently consists of an 11 model and a 13 inch model. The 11 is great for people on the go and easily fits into a small camera bag. You would not want to do too much work on the 11 inch screen and if it was your only computer a desktop monitor would be essential. The 13 inch is more practical and still fits in most camera bags. It also comes with a built in SD card reader making it even more useful.

This weeks upgrade was a minor processor upgrade plus a minor price cut, always gratefully received.

Not sure whether to grab one of these or wait a little longer to see what comes.

Leica Press Conference Times

• 3 pm Berlin time
• 2 pm London time
• 9 am New York time
• 6 am Los Angeles time (sorry for that)

This afternoon for us in the UK Leica make their press announcement and its now about definite that the announcement is going to be the new Leica T 701.

It is looking like a standard mirror less, none viewfinder compact system camera with a fancy touch screen, and with the ability to take Leica M glass as well as a new range of autofocus Leica T glass.

For most its likely to be too expensive and not offering anything that a Sony NEX or Fuji X camera cannot do better, but for those of us with Leica M glass its worth a serious consider as it will support coding on modern M glass and correct vignette and colour drift.

As I am publishing this before the announcement the above is conjecture but I believe will be accurate from the rumours so far leaked.

Its also going to integrate with the iPhone and iPad like many other recent mirror less releases and the iOS app has already been released.

According to Leica it will:

Camera live view Control capture settings Triggering the camera Start / Stop video recording View, download and share images from the camera Delete images.

 

Quite a while ago now, back in 2012 I think, Adobe announced lossy DNG.  Like many photographers I did not see the point but now that Adobe Lightroom Mobile has been released it makes more sense.

You see when you select a RAW file to sync from your desktop you don’t get the large RAW file synchronised across to your iPad, or a jpeg that with its 8 bit compression is easy to break when editing.

To quote Adobe

‘Lossy DNG allows something in-between Raw and JPEG in terms of size but retains the flexibility in terms of adjusting White Balance and preserving detail’

Its this lossy DNG file that gets transferred to your iPad and its that you are working on.  In this scenario it makes a lot of sense.

With cameras regularly producing RAW files over 16 MP now even 24 MP now common and the top end cameras at 36 MP, it would be useful if camera manufactures started to use lossy DNG.  When you want a file smaller then RAW but still with the ability to edit more flexibly then a jpg it makes sense.

I suspect some camera manufactures like Ricoh and Leica may adopt it but the Canon and Nikons of the world will either keep offering RAW/JPG or offer their own proprietary lossy  RAW format.

Lightroom V5.4 has finally made an appearance, I know Fuji users have been waiting this one and for myself I was hoping for a more stable version.  Lightroom V5 while very usable has been the least stable Lightroom of all the versions and I am hopping that V5.4 has finally gotten rid of all the bugs.

Along with Lightroom for the desktop; Lightroom Mobile for the iPad was released, a much anticipated launch.  While detailed editing in a colour unmanaged environment is not practical, being able to do a quick edit sort through a selection of images and decide on you selects on the iPad is a very useful thing.

I would have loved to see some meta data facilities and key wording but that has not made this version, until then we will still have to use applications like PhotoSmith on the iPad.

While the mobile app can edit your photographs already on your iPad it really works if your an Adobe Create Cloud subscriber.   You can simply select which collections you want to sync over and its as simple as that.

The big question for me was if it could handle Nikon RAW files or DNG files imported directly to the iPad.  Unfortunately testing with my little Nikon V1 and Leica M8 has shown that if your saving RAW/DNG only while the iPad can handle the files they cannot be brought into Lightroom Mobile, you need to convert first using either PhotoRaw or shoot jpg and RAW/DNG.

For now the source for you files has to be your computer not your iPad, not ideal if you want to work in the field and travel light and not take a laptop.  Unless Adobe add RAW support then I can see an Apple MacBook Air  arriving in my camera bag.  Still it may suite your work flow or it may not, if your an Adobe Creative Cloud subscriber then its free to try out and test.

Its certainly a very good first try.

 

Its been a busy week so far, buying paper and testing on my Epson 3880.  I have selected a set of images that are typical of the type of photography I do.  With these images I have been doing lots of printing on Tecco, Epson and Canson paper.

To get an optimum print you need a) a good icc profile which all three manufactures do have on their websites but also b) the correct printer driver settings for the paper type.

Epson is the easiest with it being an Epson printer, but its interesting to note that you cannot download just the profile, you have to download an installer that installs the icc profile and creates a folder with the documentation you need.  For some reason Epson have not signed the installer so if you are a Mac user, your Mac will refuse to install the untrusted application, its amazing that a company the size of Epson forgot to sign the installers.  They remembered to install the printer driver installer!

If you have not already you will need to pop into Security & Privacy and change your downloaded apps settings to Anywhere.  The installer will still fail if you just double click on it, you will have to command click and select open, that will then give you the option of running the installer.

All three of the paper manufactures have all the information you need to make quality prints but the information can be hidden on the website.  It was certainly easier to find on the Epson and Canson sites then on the Tecco.  Though I could not find the paper profile page on the Epson site, but my search engine did.

I am still in the early days of paper testing but already have some papers that I like.  As my local camera shop stocks Tecco Paper this has been the first paper I have tried.

So far I have tried the the following:

PUW285 Glossy Ultra White

So far I have printed some of my landscapes and some wedding portraits on this.  Its an incredibly sharp paper, the image quality is excellent, and its very bright and punchy with great DMax, with it being glossy it does suffer from reflection but its the kind of paper I feel that customers would like feeling and looking like a traditional glossy photo paper.

 

PPG250 Pearl-Gloss Super

This has been my favourite so far, its not as reflective as the glossy and makes lovely looking wedding portraits.

 

BT270 Baryt

This is a mat looking paper but uses the gloss ink for the higher DMax.  It feels heavy and has a subtle texture, it has produced some excellent black and white street shots, I also tried it with some high contrast black and white nudes and did a direct compare with the same image on the PUW285 Glossy Ultra White.  The  dynamic range of the glossy did result in better handling of the contrast of the image but the shine did not suit the surface.

 

BP210 Buttenpapier

This is a very interesting looking paper, it looks like hand made paper very much like traditional watercolour paper, I printed a black and white wedding portrait on it and it looked stunning, the feel of the paper makes the print very much an object to enjoy, not just the look but also the feel.

Its a paper to be used carefully, not all subjects suit this paper, its a genuine mat paper that needs mat black ink so the blacks can never be as intense as say the PUW285 Glossy.

I still have a few more Tecco papers to test and even if I decide other papers are better its been worthwhile to get up to speed with the finer details of fine art printing.

Now that I feel I am getting the hang of the printer, and of soft proofing the prints in Lightroom i’ll be picking up more trial packs paper and selecting nine or ten images that are representative of my style of work and seeing what paper works best.

I have so far ordered some Epson, Canson and Hahnemuhle paper.

I’ll also be picking up some Somerset at some point and possibly some Permajet.  I am not sure about Ilford as its unknown if they are going to continue to make paper.  I want to get down to two or three papers that will suit all my needs.