Today only: Save big on Lexar SD cards sold by BHphoto

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Todasy only you save big on five different Lexar SD cards sold by BHphoto (Click here).

Reminder: Skylum announced the new “Neo” software will arrive this winter. They also launched a special offer on current Luminar (Click here and add checkout code “SAR” to get an additional $10 discount). It runs only for the first 30k preorders and you will get the new “NEO” software for free once it’s released. It’s their lowest price ever on Luminar!

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New release: Sony Electronics’ “Visual Story™” Version 2.0 App Adds Compatibility with Video Content

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Press text:

Today, Sony has released an update to the company’s Visual Story, a mobile application for professional event photographers – and now video creators – that simplifies the process of delivering photos and videos to their clients immediately after an event through gallery creation, AI (artificial intelligence) assistance for easy image selection and web delivery.
The new Visual Story 2.0 adds the ability to automatically upload videos and images over WiFi, allowing for remote delivery of photos and videos during or after an event.
The app is available on the Apple App Store here. Visual Story Version 2.0 is available to download for free HERE. An Android version of the app is in development.
Learn more about Visual Story HERE.

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Sony announces it will hold a press conference on Sunday, October 10 at 9am PT/12pm ET

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Sony officially pulled out of the NAB and Infocomm show due to Covid concerns. The good news is that Sony told at Petapixel:

Sony Electronics has been closely monitoring the evolving situation of the COVID-19 Delta variant. With October on the horizon, we’ve considered the unprecedented circumstances and made the difficult decision that we will not be participating in person at next month’s NAB Show or InfoComm. While these events are an important forum to reach our customers and introduce new products, this is a choice we made to ensure we’re putting our employees’ and our partners’ health and well-being first.  As the world continues to grapple with the pandemic and businesses adopt digital alternatives and online opportunities to prevent the spread of the virus, Sony Electronics will continue to communicate and engage with our customers and partners in interactive, accessible ways that allow us to safely deliver exciting product news and updates to a wide online audience. We’ll continue to monitor the situation and look forward to participating at industry events in-person at some point in the future.

Additionally, we’re excited to announce that Sony will be hosting a press conference at NAB Show, in conjunction with the NAB, prior to the show’s opening.  Please join our online event on Sunday, October 10 at 9am PT/12pm ET at NABShow.com/Live and pro.sony, where we’ll unveil and showcase Sony’s latest professional innovations.

I don’t think they will announce the new A7IV on October 10. It will be some other Cine gear…

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Laowa Argus 33mm F0.95 review by Marc Alhadeff: “the best 33-35mm F0.95 for Sony APSC camera “

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Lens at BHphoto and Venuslens.net (worldwide shipment).

Here is Marc Alhadeffs take on this lens:

Build quality is top notch , weight (580g) & price (500$) are quite high for an APSC lens

The sharpness is already good wide open with a good contrast. Corners are weaker than the centre as expected but their behavior is but much better than on the 7 Artisans 35mm F0.95 or the Mitakon 35mm F0.95 Mark II, which make the Laowa more versatile than its alternatives

The Laowa 33mm F0.95 will be excellent for portraits and objects details, with a beautiful rendering for skin tones, good sharpness wide open and creamy background blur, nice bokeh balls; at F2.8 the lens is tack sharp.

It will be also ideal for street photography when you want to isolate your subject and have the rest of the street in the blur (very nice 3D effect). For photography in dark situation it’s F0.95 will help not to increase too much ISO, but pay attention to direct light sources has the resistance to flare at f0.95 is weak with big halo effect.

Alternatives

  • The 7 Artisans 35mm F0.95 : 250$ is a budget lens providing similar sharpness in the centre, same creamy background blur and excellent color rendition at half the price and a much lesser weight. But this lens exhibit much more color fringing at F0.95 and has much weaker corners
  • The Mitakon 35mm F0.95 Mark II (600$) is not a bad lens : it has similar sharpness in the centre and nice background blur, but its show its age with weak corners, some color shift and much less good color rendition

Globally the Laowa is the best 33-35mm F0.95 for Sony APSC camera

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Samyang AF 85mm f/1.4 FE test at Opticallimits: “a true value king”

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Opticallimits reviewed the Samyang AF 85mm f/1.4 FE lens and concluded:

The Samyang AF 85mm f/1.4 FE has been substantially improved compared to the older DSLR variant. The resolution is still not impressive at f/1.4 but fit-for-purpose if you intend to use it for portraits. You just may not want ultra-sharp results in this case. However, if needed the Samyang can give you that when stopping down a bit. The quality is already very high at f/2 and downright great at medium aperture settings. Image distortions are a non-issue even in RAW files. Typical for such lenses, the vignetting is a bit on the high side at f/1.4 but most users will probably rely on auto-correction which reduces the light falloff to an acceptable level. From f/2 there isn’t anything to worry about here. Lateral CAs are low. The same can’t be said about axial CAs (LoCAs) which can be very pronounced in certain scenes. Axial CAs are very difficult to remove in post-processing. The quality of the bokeh is pretty good overall. The general quality of the out-of-focus blur is pretty silky, especially in the critical background. Out-of-focus highlights are very nicely rendered in the image center but the circular shape is falling apart rather rapidly beyond.
In terms of build quality, it is the best Samyang lens that we tested to date – the metal body feels very sturdy and Samyang implemented some degree of weather sealing. An internal focusing mechanism is also maintaining a constant lenght throughout the focus range. The AF is not the fastest around though. It has to shift quite some weight due to the heavy glass elements but there’s room for improvement here. The rather noisy aperture mechanism isn’t ideal either.
The few weaknesses have to be balanced with the price tag of the lens and the Samyang AF 85mm f/1.4 FE is hard to beat in this respect – a true value king.

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