News tagged with "lenses"

Modern lenses tend to be large and expensive, with multiple glass elements combining to minimise optical aberrations. But what if we could just use a cheap single-element lens, and remove those aberrations computationally instead? This is the question scientists at the University of British Columbia are asking, and they've come up with a way of improving images from a simple single element lens that gives pretty impressive results. Click through to read more.  

Some people are happy to shoot with lenses and think only of the results, but it can also be fascinating to think about how such complex, precision pieces of engineering are made. Some insight is provided by Dave Etchells over at Imaging Resource, who has just posted a story about his visit to Sigma's factory in Aizu, Japan. However, no matter how hard you try, you can't make every lens perfect - as Lensrentals Roger Cicala explains in his recent blog post. Click through for more.

As part of its 'AW' launches, Nikon has announced the Nikkor 1 AW 10mm f/2.8 and 1 AW 11-27.5mm f/3.5-5.6 lenses. Both lenses are existing designs built into waterproof, shockproof housings and are only compatible with the Nikon 1 AW1 body. The 1 AW 10mm f/2.8 offers a 27mm equivalent field-of-view and will be sold separately for around $200/£300/€319. The Nikkor 1 AW 11-27.5mm zoom offers a rather limited 30-74mm equivalent range and will only be available as part of a kit with the camera - meaning there are no image-stabilized AW lenses yet.

Sony has announced three new E-mount lenses today for NEX system cameras: the Carl Zeiss Vario Tessar T* 16-70mm ZA F4, 18-105mm F4 G OSS power zoom, and a black version of its 50mm F1.8 OSS. All three feature Sony's Optical SteadyShot image stabilization. According to Sony, the 50mm F1.8 and 16-70mm F4 zoom will be ready to ship to consumers in September, with the 18-105mm F4 power zoom following in December. Click through for more details.

Rokinon has made available a video version of the Samyang 16mm f/2.0 prime. The 16mm T2.2 Cine lens is available for pre-order in Nikon F, Canon EF, Micro Four Thirds, Sony A, and Sony E mounts. Like other video primes, it offers focus and aperture racks for use with cinema rigs, stepless aperture control, and calibration in T-stops rather than F-stops. Rokinon's website lists compatible mounts for Pentax, Samsung NX and Fujifilm X though they aren't yet available for pre-order, and lists the lens at an MSRP of $499.

Which words spring to mind when you think about 70-200mm zoom lenses - solid and dependable or fragile and unreliable? Lensrentals' Roger Cicala has just published an analysis of the failure rates of the 12,000 lenses he rents out, and the results may surprise you. Even having taken into account popularity and accidental damage, five 70-200s turn up in his highest failure rate table - including the latest models from Canon and Nikon.

Lomography's campaign to raise funds to bring the centuries-old Petzval lens back into production via Kickstarter has now raised more than $1 million - ten times the original target. The 'New Petzval' lens looks and functions much like the originals, with a brass exterior, and the aim is to produce it in both Canon EF- and Nikon F- mounts. The lens is expected to be available next spring. 

Legendary filmmaker Stanley Kubrick pushed the boundaries of moviemaking in many ways, and was responsible for some of the most enduring visuals in cinema. When he made Barry Lyndon in 1975, Kubrick shot with two ultra-rare Carl Zeiss primes, originally created for NASA. Using the 50mm and 35mm f/0.7 lenses, Kubrick was able to film some scenes purely by candlelight. Now, Germany-based company P+S Technik has announced that they've modified a PS-Cam X35 HD camera to be able to accept Kubrick's primes, and the whole package is available to rent. Click through for more details. 

Sigma has announced a 'Mount Conversion Service' for any of its recent 'Global Vision' lenses - a paid-for service designed to reduce the uncertainty of changing camera systems. The company says it will charge between $80 and $250, plus shipping costs, depending on the specific lens. The Global Vision range currently includes seven lenses - from the huge 120-300mm F2.8 DG OS Sport for full-frame DSLRs, down to the 19mm F2.8 DN Art for Micro Four Thirds. The company has also extended the warranties on all new products to four years (USA only).

The people at Lomography have built a business around promoting and selling lo-fi cameras and accessories. What's (really) old is new again in their latest Kickstarter campaign, an effort to bring the centuries-old Petzval lens back into production. The 'New Petzval' lenses look and function much like the originals with a brass exterior, and would be produced in both Canon EF- and Nikon F- mounts. Click through and read more about the project.

Nikon has released distortion correction data v1.009, adding support for additional lenses for the D4, D90, D600, D800, D800E, D3100, D3200, D5000, D5100, D5200, D7000 and D7100. The latest update means these cameras can now correct distortion in 107 Nikkor lenses. The latest update includes recent launches such as the Nikon AF-S Nikkor 18-35mm f/3.5-4.5G ED and can be downloaded from Nikon's global website.

Now that he has his own copies of the new Zeiss Touit lenses, Roger Cicala of Lensrentals decided to crack into the Planar 32mm F1.8 lens. His mission was to see if the renowned build quality of Zeiss optics was compromised to make the lenses more affordable. His teardown detailed the Touit's polymer construction and its use of a DC motor. Click through to see what he thought.

Tokina has announced a US price of $599 for its AT-X 12-28mm F4 Pro DX lens. Soon to be available in both Canon and Nikon mounts for APS-C bodies, this lens was announced at the CP+ tradeshow back in January and will replace the company's existing 12-24mm F4 wideangle zoom for APS-C cameras. 

Roger Cicala of Lensrentals has published a blog post in which he gives his first impressions of the new Carl Zeiss 32mm F1.8 'Touit' lens, in Sony E-mount. Unlike Roger's normal approach, where he exhaustively tests multiple samples of the same lens, he was only able to look at a single example of the 32mm F1.8 on the Sony NEX-7. Click through for some details of his findings, and a link to the full article at the lensrentals blog.

Zeiss has announced more detail on two forthcoming lenses for Sony NEX and Fujifilm X-mount APS-C cameras -  the 12mm F2.8 and 32mm F1.8 lenses it unveiled at Photokina last year. The announcement came via the Zeiss blog, which went into detail on how they came to the name for the new series, 'Touit.' Pronounced like the English 'do it,' the new lenses are named after a Latin American band-tailed parrot, which Zeiss describes as 'small and agile,' much like mirrorless cameras are meant to be. Click for more on the new lenses.

DxO Labs has tested 85 lenses on the Canon EOS 5D Mark III and analysed the results, looking at its two proprietary measures: 'Perceptual Megapixels' for lens sharpness, and the overall DxOMark score. In the first section of a multi-part series, it makes comparisons against both the EOS 5D Mark II and the Nikon D800, with results that may be surprising. Click through for a link to the full article.

Canon Singapore has launched a 'Try and Buy' lens scheme allowing customers to borrow more than seventy of the company's EF and EF-S lenses at a fee for 48 hours. While a similar service is currently available globally to Canon Professional Services (CPS) members, Canon Singapore has opened this up for non-members as well. The service will start from March 28, 2013.

Tokina has announced it will be shipping the AT-X 12-28 F4 PRO DX lens from April 2013 in Nikon mount, and June 2013 for the Canon version. Announced at the CP+ tradeshow, the lens is a replacement for the company's existing 12-24mm F4 wideangle zoom for APS-C cameras. But rather than making the lens wider to match its competitors, Tokina has chosen to extend it further into the 'normal' range, to give an 18-42mm equivalent zoom. The Japanese RRP of ¥90,000 is the same as that for the existing AT-X Pro DX 12-24mm F4 II lens. (via DCWatch)

DxOMark has tested 61 lenses on the Nikon D800, and drawn some conclusions about the results. So far it has published two sections of an eventual four-part article: the first discusses how much benefit the D800's 36MP sensor really offers over the 24MP chips in cameras such as the D3X and D600, while the second looks at which lenses in the 50-100mm range come out with the best DxOMark scores. Further parts later this month will look at telephoto and wideangle lenses. Click through for the link.

Pentax US has announced mail-in rebates on its 645D medium-format DSLR and select Limited series lenses when purchased with the K-5 IIs DSLR. Buyers of the 645D body will receive a free D-FA 55mm lens and $500 rebate on the purchase of the D-FA 25mm and HD 90mm lens. Those buying the K-5IIs camera body will receive a $250 rebate on the purchase of FA 31mm, 43mm and 77mm lenses. The rebates can be claimed from March 11th through March 31st 2013 and will be paid in the form of a Visa gift card.