ProfHankD

If it isn't yet, it will be -- because both companies and a growing research community are working on making it so.  ;-)  I'm best known for my work in making supercomputing cheap (I built the...

Thorium-doped lens elements (up to 25% Thorium or more) can have sufficient quantities of daughter products ("impurities") so that it isn't just the Alphas coming directly from Thorium-232 decay....

It's not a coating, but a major component of the glass itself. Also, it is worth noting that it isn't just Thorium (and its often hotter daughters) in some old military optics, but any of various...

GIMP actually is more "powerful" than Photoshop, but it is 8-bit/color channel before 3.0 and the user interfaces on some plugins feel like research prototypes (often, because they actually...

A lot of folks use 3D printing for camera parts. In fact, my MakerGear M2 is primarily for building custom camera parts, and I own & use over 100 non-native-mount lenses. I can't believe anyone...

One word: GIMP -- http://www.gimp.org/
Ok, maybe one more: CinePaint -- http://www.cinepaint.org/
Both are fully free and work very well.

A camera doesn't take better photos, you have to make them better. A NEX-6 is a great tool that can produce very high quality results, but you have to know what image you want to make and how to...

Actually, there are MANY old FF lenses that have more even IQ for modest tilt/shift than most real tilt/shift lenses. Catch is, FF on APS-C isn't enough coverage to tilt + shift. It's one or the...

Two lenses that overlap the kit zoom focal range under easy lighting conditions... yeah, stick with the kit lens for that. Yes, NEX is fine for you, but you need to develop a sense of when you want...

This has been discussed before (e.g., http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/50665710 ). I agree about a 24mm lens. I usually use an M42  Spiratone 24mm f/2.8 on my EOS-mount tilt adapter. Even wider...

The discussion here seems to have been largely features of Nikon/DSLR vs. Sony/mirrorless -- which isn't my point.

The issue is that the DPReview summary scores say NEX-7 IQ is markedly inferior...

The discussion here seems to have been largely features of Nikon/DSLR vs. Sony/mirrorless -- which isn't my point.

The issue is that the DPReview summary scores say NEX-7 IQ is markedly inferior...

Agreed. Also, camera bags tend to mumble or shout "Steal Me!" -- not a label I want. If you think about it, a lens is a lot like a can of soda. :-) I've found that a little bag of the type often...

In case you didn't know, Minolta changed their mount when they moved to autofocus. Minolta AF is what Sony acquired when they bought Minolta's camera business, and it is now called Sony A-mount....

Interesting. Go to the studio scene comparison tool. Add the NEX-7. Compare. Up to ISO 6400, the NEX-7 (out since 2011) clearly wins on both raw and JPEG. Above, the D7100 may be a bit better,...

Yeah, the Speed Booster (SB) may introduce some (usually negligible) defects, but mostly it preserves and "condenses" the resolution of the base lens. Here are a few very approximate and...

The images are pretty clean, but not very crisp even at low ISO with the lens at f/8-11. Ok, I'm spoiled by using a Sony NEX-7 for the past year, which is generally crisper per pixel than Canon's...

It's not much cheaper once you add-in the adapter, but I have both the Sigma 10-20mm and 8-16mm in A-mount and use them mostly manual focus with auto aperture coupling on the LA-EA1. Both are great...

Offensive? You've got to be kidding. It's a perfectly fine photo, but could be better. You asked for constructive critique and I am a professor. I still think the problem is that you were thinking...

Cute kid, nice colors. However, artistically, the bokeh circles and bright triangle on the wall are annoying, and the brown corners pointing at each other in the background keep drawing my eye. The...