There is a new lens from Lensbaby and you can have it in native E-mount or A-mount versions at Adorama or Bhphoto.

Dan Mandell tested the lens and concluded:

“I could justify buying it simply because of its increased situational versatility. While you have the option to go full artsy with this lens, you can dial it down or season to taste if you prefer. It would have been interesting to really see how this lens works in even more diverse scenarios. Off the top of my head, I can think of a few things. There are probably ways to exploit what the lens does to create more targeted areas of effect. Using spotlights or fresnels, you could literally paint in or pinpoint areas of light that would receive the effect. Even light painting or long exposure shots have interesting possibilities here.

I’m happy to see Lensbaby making some moves in this direction. I look forward to more and more interesting entries into the market from them”

ThePhoBlographer tested the E-mount version:

The Lensbaby Velvet 85mm f1.8 is a great lens in so many ways. It’s surely an improvement over the previous offering and it fantastic for portrait photographers. If you’re a fan of the classic lenses in terms of build quality and image quality, it’s going to be very difficult to get something better than this. Can it be sharper? Sure; but I’ll be the first person to tell you that you can deepen the black levels, boost the clarity and raise the sharpness to enhance overall sharpness in a photo. Almost nothing on the market will give you colors like this though unless you know how to get them. And the honest truth is that you can walk into all these Facebook groups with images that people say look like real film, but they’re really not. This, however, gets close.

Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 Sports Review on Sony A6500 | John Sison

It’s a photo album… and a camera: the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-N1 (Dpreview).
Sony Expands High Speed Storage Lineup with Enhanced Hard Disk Drives
Viltrox EX NEX on A9 (Youtube)
Entaniya Fisheye 250 3.6 on SONY α7Rii (Entapano)
Asian women get their closeup in new push for Japanese cameras (Asian Review).
How To Choose the Perfect Lens (ALC).
Shooting Macro Close-ups with the Meyer Optik Gӧrlitz Trioplan 100 (Explora).

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Metabones released the new firmware update V0.57 for their Metabones Smart Adapter IV and EF-E Speed Booster ULTRA 0.71x. You can download the firmware for WIN and MAC.

• Benefits and improvements:
  • Added autofocus support during high speed and medium speed continuous drive (up to 10fps) on Sony A9 (“Green” mode only). Experiment with the “Priority Set in AF-C” setting for the best compromise between hit rate and frame rate for your shooting style. Overall performance depends on lens used. The camera does not use hunting while tracking is in operation. If subject movement exceeds the measurement range of the OSPDAF sensor, autofocus pauses. This is by design. The measurement range of the OSPDAF sensor decreases as the focal length increases. Except for the original Mark I Smart Adapter this feature is available for all subsequent Speed Boosters and Smart Adapters.
  • Enlarged PDAF area on supported cameras when adapter is in Advanced mode, with the advisory that AF performance may be unsatisfactory outside of the central portion of the frame.
  • Enabled AF illuminator (Advanced mode only).
  • There is an AF accuracy issue when using AF-S or DMF on Sony A9 and telephoto lenses with Metabones in “Advanced” mode, which affects this and all previous firmware versions. Green mode, which is set by default on Sony A9, is not affected (except for the original Smart Adapter Mark I, which does not support “Green” mode). A9 users are advised to not use “Advanced” mode but stick with the default “Green” mode. In addition, some telephoto lenses rarely exhibit this issue, such as EF 200/2.8L II USM, EF 400/5.6L USM and Tamron 150-600/5-6.3 VC USD A011. Investigation of this issue is still in progress.
  • Fixed AF issue with EF-S 10-18mm f/4.5-5.6 IS STM and EF-S 18-135/3.5-5.6 IS Nano USM lenses.
  • Fixed smooth iris support for 40/2.8 STM, 50/1.8 STM and Sigma 50-100/1.8 DC HSM Art 016.
  • Fixed CN-E 18-80 T4.4 L IS KAS S servo zoom used by the camera’s zoom rocker and the lens’ rocker in alternation.
  • Fixed CN-E 18-80 T4.4 L IS KAS S auto iris when adapter is in Green mode, where extremely bright conditions no longer causes the iris to close completely.
  • Fixed aperture display with Canon EF 300mm f/4L IS USM lens and Kenko Pro 300 teleconvertter.
  • Corrected W-T zoom scale display in “Advanced” mode for Speed Booster and Kenko Pro 300  teleconverter (except Mark I/II/III and original Speed Booster).
  • Faster aperture diaphragm for still photography in Advanced mode when Live Vide mode is set to Setting Effect OFF.
  • LED (if available) now shows solid magenta when adapter is connected to USB waiting for Metabones App to run.

–

found via Brian Smith

Sony announced a new 1 inch sensor with all-pixel global reset function (specs here). This will allow to drastically reduce rolling shutter. The sensor size and megapixel number suggest that this sensor may be used on a future RX100VI camera.

Sony also announced a Four Thirds sensor with an interesting Quad Bayer COding HDR function (specs here). It allows to take instant HDR pictures on moving objects too.