Lensbusters.com

Dealing with large digital files for events and other applications where large file size is not necessary. Ok, admit it. It’s a first world problem. Your yacht, house, digital file is too big. But if you are photographing events with say, a Sony A7rII, this really is an issue. You reasonably won’t want to shoot JPGs, which can be dumbed down in camera settings. But you should shoot raw files that can’t be reduced in camera to a reasonable pixel count, they’re always 42mp on this camera.  So here’s a strategy to consider. Use the Adobe DNG Converter app to both compress (or further compress) and at the same time reduce the pixel dimensions of your raw files.  Give this a try (see screen shots): Download Adobe DNG Converter (free) Select folder for files to convert, and destination (maybe try testing this on your memory card with your latest images first) Rename if you like In the bottom dialog box change preferences to the most recent compatibility, jpg preview to full size (speeds ed

Recently, I bought a Sony a7r IV. The main reason was for stock photography. The high resolution along with improved focusing and biggish buffer would allow me to make better people (and other) stock photos for my various stock endeavors.  The Sony system has treated me well. I own two A7r II's for stock and other work, and two a6500's for event photography. The A7r II's aren't ideal for events for a couple reasons. The focus tracking is pretty good, but maybe not enough for fast paced people on stage. Another reason is that silent shooting is only available on single shot mode. And (admittedly a first world problem,) the files are much bigger than needed. Well, the last problem, too big files isn't an issue with the A7rIV if you use it in APS-c mode. The files are effectively the same size as the a6500: 24 mp. Focus with the IV is even faster and more effective than the very capable a6500. And with those smaller files, the IV has no problem with buffer overflow. So

Fairly recently I discovered the magic of lossy DNG's. My stock photo library is ever growing. Though JPG's might really be enough for my archive, I've been keeping my raw files. RAW files take up lots of space. And RAW files can't typically keep user generated EXIF data in the file. RAW files keep their keywords and other metadata in a sidecar, that is if you regularly save the EXIF data to file. So recently I've been converting all my RAW files to lossy DNG's. After testing the highest ISO setting on the new-to-me A7R IV, I converted the files to lossy DNG's only to find a surprise. The very high ISO lossy DNG's were much larger than the original Sony RAW files! Lossy ARW vs Lossy DNG full image sample So I thought it would be a good test to shoot from the lowest to highest ISO, convert to lossy DNG and see where the file size savings invert. Here's the data as seen in the above screen shot: ISO Lossy Sony ARW Raw file size (MB) Lossy DNG file siz

  For years I used a Nikon Coolscan to scan my slides and negs. Those scanners use a less-common Firewire connection (Apple sucks!) Now at the school lab I run, we use Epson V700 scanners. The quality of scans for 35mm especially leaves a lot to be desired!  Here's what I did...... Put my Sony A7rII with a macro (a real macro that can do 1:1) on a copystand Put a flat panel LED light box on the stand Put my negative in a negative carrier (I tried a few carriers, in this case the neg carrier is for a Besler 45) Put a couple of boxes (in this case 100' rolls of Kodak Plus X from the 1980's) to space out above the light box (prevents dust showing from on the lightbox) For comparison, I also scanned a set of negatives on the Epson V700. The results showed me that I shouldn't be scanning 35's on the Epson! Epson vs Camera Scan, overview Right off the bat, some of the exposures from the Epson in default mode looked pretty crappy. But I chose this Epson scan (on the left)

  Here's an example of 45 20megapixel photos stitched together. ca: 88x40in @ 300ppi ca: 132x60 @ 200ppi ca: 260x120 @ 100ppi (~21x10 feet!) It's possible to stitch without distortion like that shown in my example. Also, FYI the camera is a tiny mirrorless camera (sony a5100) that was modified by removing the infra-red filter that covers the sensor.  It's hard to wrap your head around the process. Typically, you will be using a moderate telephoto lens for the process and can make a super-wide angle final pano. In this case, the lens was a 50mm on APS-c (75mm equivalent).

 Surprise!  Wide open the much less expensive old Minolta 50mm Macro outperforms Canon's 50mm f2.5 stopped down to f2.8  But wait, there's another twist....look at the out of focus areas in front of the focused areas. Though the Minolta was visibly much better wide open, it has some ugly rendering in this area. Stopped down there's little difference in the sharpness of both lenses. But the weird rendering of the Minolta was something of a disappointment. Though honestly if I wasn't looking at results side-by-side I don't know if I'd care.

 If you want the TL:DR version of this, the Voigtländer Color-Skopar 28mm lens is absolute crap on my Sony A7RII. Check out the samples. So I work at Mills College in Oakland California. We got an amazing donation - well actually several separate donations from someone who's mom graduated in 1939. There was a Leica M3 and a number of lenses for said Leica in the donation. The school doesn't have any mirrrorless cameras, but I do and wanted to test out some of these classic legends to see how they fair against modern lenses.  There were a few reviews online like this one I found that talked positively of this lens. Can't say I agree. I bought a Fotodiox (or as my friend refers to this company "Foto Detox") Leica M- to Sony FE adapter . It was $20 and is a simple adapter that all it does is hold the lens in place on the body. I believe they also make an adapter that will autofocus which blows my mind.  In any case, I put this lens on and walked around campus to do a

Mother's day was coming up and my daughter Ella has been working on a farm at University of California Davis. Ella has been bringing home some wonderful bouquets - and once again she brought home a gorgeous arrangement for her mom. Bouquet of flowers as seen through the cell phone camera Since getting a couple of reels from 20th Century Camera,  I've been itching to shoot more 8x10 and 5x7 film. They have a reel that fits four 8x10 films that fits in my exiting JOBO drum . Since testing on a Unidrum roller, it looks like this reel is real good (punny?!) Closeup of the 3d printed reel from 20th Century Camera My grandfather "Hal" (Milton or M Halberstadt) gave me an (even back then old) Burke & James 8x10 camera, and I broke that out along with a 12" Kodak Commercial Ektar to take one shot of the bouquet.  The camera setup for the shot in our dining room The exposure was 8 seconds wide open (f6.3) on Ilford FP4 Plus (outdated by a couple decades. The B and T

(13 September 2022 update, I think the title of this entry was misleading. The prints are from negatives developed with seasoned X-tol, the prints were developed with normal paper dev. If you read this previously, the title is updated to reflect that reality.)  Joke all you like. I'm a.... how does one politely put it.... frugal fellow. I've been looking into the least expensive means of developing film for a while. I'd been trying to use my thrifty skills on behalf of the school where I work (Mills College, which clearly didn't work out as we're working on shutting down.) For school I've had the lab setup to use HC-110 dilution E (1:47 from syrup, or 1:9 from stock.) HC-110 dilution E ended up being good solution for our school darkroom. Paterson tanks require 10oz per roll of 35mm, and 1:9 dilution makes math easy. And it costs about 25% of the developer we were using when I started. I like HC-110 ok. It works well for stand development. It's economical.

Apparently you can teach an old dog new tricks. Or at least that old dog can learn tricks on his own. I'm the dog in this metaphor, but by most people's standards the old is not metaphorical. Photography has been an important aspect of my life since I was in my mid-teens and now I'm 51. By trade both my dad and grandfather were/are professional photographers. So when it comes to film photography, I feel I know alot compared to most.   I've been playing around with X-ray film for a couple years now.  A sheet of conventional 8x10" film can cost from about $3 to $15. Some X-ray films are going for less than $0.50/sheet. But there are a lot of quirks. Most X-ray films are coated on both sides which is problematic for methods most of us use for processing. All (?) X-ray films are Orthochromatic (not sensitive to red) and as such can be processed under a safelight.  For conventional photography I found Carestream Ektascan BR/A film to be a good option even though it wa

For the college I work, I've been working on cyanotype testing. Our darkroom class like all others was forced into quarantine. And guess what, it's hard to learn how to develop film and enlarge it from your dorm or apartment. But you can learn cyanotype process and do that at home. Of course unlike me the students don't have a bunch of large format negatives to contact print. But they did find creative ways to use the process. I had relatively little knowledge of the process until now despite my 35 or so years of conventional photographic experience. So I'm taking some time to become as expert as I can to help students if we resort to cyanotyping. Actually, even if life resumed as normal, I'd still want to continue with this process. It's very inexpensive, easy and relatively safe. That despite half of the chemistry used to make the sensitizer having cyanide in the name (Potassium Fericyanide.) Below are some tests using different techniques and substrates. What