The new Venus Optics Laowa 25mm f/2.8 2.5-5X Ultra Macro lens for Canon EF, Nikon F, Pentax K and Sony FE mounts is now available for pre-order at the official Laowa website and at B&H (pre-orders from the website usually ship faster). The official release is expected at the end of the month.
Additional information on the Venus Optics Laowa 25mm f/2.8 2.5-5X Ultra Macro lens after the break
Fujifilm has registered a new camera with the FCC under the code name FF180002. The new model will be similar in size to the already discontinued Fuji X70:
The first pictures of the upcoming Fuji X-T100 camera leaked online. The official announcement will be on May 24th. Shipping starts June 21st. The price for the body only is rumored to be around 81,611 yen ($740). The detailed technical specifications of the Fuji X-T100 camera can be found here:
Additional Fuji X-T100 pictures:
→ Skylum announced Skylum AI Lab and joined forces with Photolemur:
“We at Skylum are excited to announce that we are forming a new research and development division of our company – Skylum AI Lab. This new division will work on artificial intelligence, machine learning, and neural networks.”
→ Read about Sony’s plans for the future at their Sony IR Day 2018.
→ Canon enters the sensor business: you can now purchase their 120MP APS-H CMOS sensor that was initially announced back in 2010 (see previous coverage here).
→ Lucid is partnering with RED to build an 8K 3D/4V camera for the Hydrogen One phone (via PetaPixel).
Sigma will officially start taking pre-orders for their new 105mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art lens on May 25th according to Nokishita. The lens is rumored to be priced under 2,000 in the U.S. since the Nikon 105mm f/1.4E ED lens is priced at $2,196.95.
Watch B&H and Adorama in the next few days for the official U.S. pricing of the lens.
The Kobra Flash Modifier project is now relaunched on Kickstarter and they have already more than doubled their pledged goal of $20,000 with 19 more days to go:
The KOBRA Flash Modifier is molded from a high-grade, flexible, light diffusing clear silicone that is not affected by high or low temperatures. This allows the KOBRA Flash Modifier to bounce back to its originally molded shape after being folded from storing in your camera bag.
The KOBRA Flash Modifier gets its backbone from the patent-pending built-in reflector. The reflector bounces the light forward through the clear silicone, acting as a second layer of diffusion, giving the photographer the ability to “paint with the light, not spray.”
Additional information:
Here are the rumored new product announcements for this week:
New Zeiss Supreme Prime line of cinema lenses rumored to be introduced next week
Pricing of the new Sigma 105mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art lens to be announced on May 25th
Fujifilm Fiscal Year 2018/3 (April 1, 2017 – March 31, 2018)
New: Fotodiox TLT ROKR tilt-shift lens adapters for Pentax 6×7 medium format lenses
List of upcoming MS Optics History Series lenses for Leica M-mount
“I photographed my first ever motorsports event on an Arca Swiss 4×5 camera” is written by Kieran Elson (website | Facebook):
I couldn’t let the opportunity to see England’s first closed rally slide by me, a huge part of my childhood was watching Colin Mcrae in his iconic Subaru Impreza. I couldn’t wait to finally see a live rally event, so how would I approach a rally in 2018?
I have never photographed motorsports before, should I bring a 200, 400, or how about a fisheye? I decided to look at photographs from modern reporters, see what kind of photographs are being made. A quick google search revealed 1000’s of pin sharp photographs of the cars either drifting or jumping, now while we all like to see gravel and water frozen in time with perfectly focused cars, I was a little disappointed to see that nothing looked any different from my 2005 WRC calendar. But this did make sense the camera format hadn’t changed after all, going digital didn’t really change the look of the images it just increased the image size.
I wanted to create something different, there would be no point in copying what has already been done a thousand times.
So what better to bring to a motorsports event than a 4×5 monorail Arca Swiss? With its 0 fps, manual focus, permanent viewfinder black out and maximum of 10 shots what could go wrong? Well plenty, the lens broke, my first batch of film failed and one of the film holders developed a new light leak.
Patrick Murphy Racey gives a great first look at the already announced but not yet released Sony FE 400mm f/2.8 GM OSS full frame mirrorless lens (expected to ship in September) in this video:
