Less than 24 hours left for the big Hasselblad announcement. You can follow the live videostream live tomorrow (June 22) at 14:00 Stockholm time. Why should we care about it?
It’s likely to be the world’s first digital mirrorless (system?) medium format camera.
It’s likely to feature the Sony 50MP medium format sensor.
There is chance Sony is somehow involved in this. Sony may share their tech to Hasselblad.
And…now I am dreaming…if Hasselblad is successful Sony could one day join the new system with their Sony branded cameras and lenses.
“Sony is currently prototypeing Image Sensors based on SiOnyx or better known as “black silicon”. Basically it uses a porous silicon etch on the front side to reduce reflectance. However, while this works well in reducing the visible light reflectance of bare silicon wafers with no backside layers or materials from 46 % to a few %. For image sensors a sensitivity invrease of 30% is estimated”
Thanks source for this!
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For more info: Scientific Papers about this: United States Patent 6,080,683 Maria Faur, Mircea Faur, D. Flood, S.G. Bailey and Horia M. Faur June 27, 2000 “Room temperature wet chemical growth process of SiO based oxides on silicon.” C. Vineis, M. Levy-Finklshtein, J. Carey, G. Knight, E. Wefringhaus and R. Harney, “Ultrafast Laser Texturing for Enhanced Solar Cell Performance and Lower Cost,” http://www.sionyx.com/pdf/solarcellperformancewhitepaper.pdf United States Patent 7,456,452 D. Wells and S. P. Leiphart Nov. 25,2008 “Light sensor having undulating features for CMOS imager.”“
This one is a terrific deal for European readers: The Zeiss 24mm f/1.8 APS-C E-mount lens is selling for 450 Euro only at Amazon Germany (Click here). Only 9 left in Stock now!
Sony’s 18-105 f/4 did the business for me at a recent presidential campaign rally, but when I used it to shoot my latest review (first time I’ve ever used it for this purpose: a tightly controlled, familiar environment), I noticed significant pincushion distortion. Whaaat?
With my a6300 [B&H|Amazon] mounted on the gimbal I was reviewing a few days ago, I decided I’d use the Sony FS5 [B&H|Amazon] loaner I have on hand with the PZ for the talking head portion of the review. That’s when I was astonished to see what I can only call severe pincushion distortion, something I hadn’t experienced with Sony’s E 50mm f/1.8.
Seeing the Problem for the First Time
I decided to shoot a different subject to replicate the issue (an incredibly photogenic mid-century garage door which looks like it hasn’t been painted since 1954 – I think maybe that’s right) and compare the result with Sony’s 90mm f/2.8 Macro G OSS [B&H|Amazon].
Results
Even if it’s 60+ years old, I’m telling you: the garage door doesn’t look like this. It’s square.
Yes, in this day and age it’s often the case that lens imperfections can be corrected in-camera through software, but the PZ didn’t give me that option when I mounted it on the a6300 (the E 50mm f/1.8 did). If the FS5 has lens compensation, I couldn’t find it. In this quick test it was therefore native lens performance vs. native lens performance, 18-105 vs 90.
Would you expect to see differences?
Of COURSE!
The 90 is a macro, after all, and it is an optimized single focal length lens twice the price of the 18-105. Again, to my eye, the 90 exhibited absolutely no distortion. On the other hand, to the 18-105’s credit, there was little to set them apart for center sharpness.
I just didn’t expect to see this much curvature.
Takeway
Sony’s E PZ 18-105mm f/4 has a much more useful zoom range for APS-C and Super35 cameras than another Sony lens I do love, the FE PZ 28-135mm f/4. It’s also much lighter, much less conspicuous, and 1/4 the price of its much bigger brother. In a live, fast-moving event, I didn’t even see this imperfection and hope it’s a copy-to-copy variation. I suspect it is not. I do have a note into Sony about it.
Even so, I’ll keep my “it does the business for live events” recommendation for the 18-105 because out in the real world of people, I didn’t notice the distortion at all.Still, I also wanted to share with you this new learning — and maintain my “I’m a prime kinda guy” bias.
Oh – one other thing: even though the Sony 90mm f/2.8 G Macro OSS is magnificent, sliding the focusing ring into manual focus mode doesn’t change the fact that it’s fly-by-wire with a very short throw. It isn’t an alternative to Veydra’s silky smooth 85mm T2.2 Mini Prime in E-mount [B&H|Amazon] — though on the flip side, the Sony doesn’t have the minor-but-visible-without-pixel-peeping lateral chromatic aberration I saw. Again, I hope this was the result of copy-to-copy variation, but without additional samples, I can’t tell.
Closing Thoughts
Fascinating. With Sony’s current line-up, their absolutely best glass (e.g., FE G-Master series, 90mm f/2.8 Macro, FE 28mm f/2.0) is optimized for their full frame cameras rather than their more expensive dedicated video cams.
And their best sensors are in their hybrid cameras (the a7 series and the a6300).
Gawd, I’d love to be a fly on the wall of their product roadmap and long-term strategy sessions. I think lighter weight, high-quality crop sensor primes would sell like hotcakes, but maybe that’s not the goal.
Meyer Optik launched a Titanium version of their 100mm E-mount lens. It comes in both Silver and Gold color option. Below you can read the full press text:
Sigma MC-11 super test! 24 Canon fit lenses tested
2016 Roundup: $1200-2000 Crop-Sensor Interchangeable Lens Cameras (Dpreview).
How to use the Godox Witstro AD360 HSS (SonyAlphaForum)
A Look at the New Sigma MC-11 Lens Adapter (Lensrentals).
RX100m4 review by SonyAlphaLab.
Review: the sigma mc-11 mount converter for sony full frame e-mount cameras (Resourcemag)
Brian Matiash travelled to Cuba with three of our ZEISS Loxia and Batis lenses (Zeiss Blog).
Shafiur: “I thought you might be interested to know that in a recent sensitive project in northern Kenya for a Danish media organisation, I, as the photojournalist and documentary maker, was instructed to bring only “tourist type and small” cameras. This was arising out of concerns of being stopped at the airport and because the pastoralist peoples we were going to be speaking to were not comfortable with cameras at all. And so, believe it or not, my main stills camera was the Sony RX100 iv. The 40 page report has just come out slating the development project’s legality and impact on the local people. I thought your readers might want to see a few photos taken with this amazing pocket camera. http://srdocs.net/portfolio/lake-turkana-wind-power“
Zoom lenses do have strengths and weaknesses in their performance, but there is little to complain about with this Sony G Master. Any sacrifice in the bald figures is more than made up for with the convenience and versatility a zoom lens represents, and there are precious few sacrifices. Sharpness at its best is excellent to outstanding, CA and distortion can be addressed in software, although centrally CA is very well controlled anyway. Flare is non-existent. And the bokeh is indeed beautiful, quite sublime. So visually the overall “look” of the images from this lens is highly impressive.