Family, Photography and other misc news
Well we are now on holiday in Wales. I have packed light, so just a Leica Rangefinder and a iPad for me. Though for a change we have not gone to Wales on the motorcycle but in the car, as we are taking #TimmyOnTour so look out for the hashtag on our twitter feed.
So that was quick, only yesterday did I mention rumoured firmware for the Q, SL and M and today Leica go and release v2.00 for the Q.
You can download it here.
The big thing for me is DNG only mode, which can help your workflow when working with mobile software like Adobe Lightroom Mobile on the iPad.
I have heard on the grape vine and on Leica Rumours website that we should see a flurry of Leica announcements this week. There are rumours of a new camera, hopefully a Leica X model or T model replacement, so far we only know its code number 8854. The more substantial rumours point to new firmware for the current Leica cameras, at least the Q, SL and M could be getting additional features and bug fixes.
Leica M4 and Kodak Tri-X
Sailors Reading room in Southwold
As I posted in January, Leica have been updating their lens. From the improved hood design to also making the lens design more digital friendly.
I have seen a few posts this last couple of weeks claiming that the new lens have more resolution and so Leica must be planning a major megapixel upgrade with the next M series camera.
While I would expect to see an increase from the current 24 MP sensor, I do not think we will see a very big jump and the lens that these are replacing are certainly no slouches on the resolution front.
The new lens are sharper in the corners but thats less the lens and more to do with the way the new lens present the light rays to the sensor. Digital sensors like the light to come perpendicular to the sensor, and traditionally M glass does not present the light in that way on the edges of the frame, thus especially on none M cameras like Sony A7’s and Leica’s own SL, you do see softer corners, while these new lens look sharper.
I remember many years ago when Leica release a new 50mm R series lens, which they made bold claims for. Basically saying it was the best 50mm lens money could buy and most people would agree that was true.
Then around the time the Leica M Type 240 was released they started to talk about a new ultimate 50mm lens for the Leica M, this was the Leica APO-Summicron-M 50mm f/2 ASPH. They also said that they would never produce it as no one would buy a lens that expensive.
Well around the time of the Monochrome release they also finally released this new 50mm, at around £5000 it was not cheap but it worked fantastically at any aperture.
Today Leica now announce a chrome version of this lens. Certainly not something I would be purchasing but a nice announcement which will bring in the money for more affordable Leica lens.
We had another update to Adobe Lightroom Mobile and this time they seem be indicating that we now have RAW support for the Mobile version.
This was a big thing for me as I have blogged about in the past. Though Lightroom Mobile already supports DNG, I do want Nikon NEF support.
So I just had to give it a go. I use Lightroom Mobile often to do a quick edit from when I am street shooting using my Leica. The edits are usually just quick adjustments and crops. This time the test was very simple I just grabbed my Nikon D800 and shot a few snaps of the dog and a few flowers in the garden.
So after a few quick snaps I grabbed my iPad 9.7 Pro and imported the RAW files. All looked good and this worked without issue. I then dived onto my Desktop computer and checked out the ‘From LR mobile’ Collection set.
There I saw my photographs arriving. The question was what format? Lightroom reported them as RAW and I also browsed to the file location in finder to confirm and there my files were. So we now have full RAW support in Lightroom Mobile, thanks Adobe.
We have some time off coming up so this past weekend we have been searching for places to stay that take dogs. The place we really wanted to go was fully booked but we still managed to find somewhere and only a £10 surcharge to cover room cleaning to take Timmy the Greyhound.
I now need to decide what camera equipment to take. Like are last trip out to Southwold, I would like to shoot some film, so its just a matter of choosing the format, small (35mm), medium or large 5 x 4 inches.
This is part of a project I am working on featuring offices and libraries. Its a little stereotyped, i.e. you put a pair of glasses on a woman to make them look intelligent but this more cheesy glamour is all about that kind of thing.
Apart from some studio project work which i’ll post a picture from tomorrow, I have been taking snapshots in and around the high street of Lincoln. None of it fine art, but street photography is something you need to practice.