Category: Equipment
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How to Ruin Your (or Our) Gear in 5 Minutes (Without Water)
If there hasn’t been a Color Run 5k or 10k race near you, there probably will be soon. And with all that color, you certainly want to take some pictures, right? Not with your camera you don’t (and not with ours either). I’m never one to worry much about lens dust. I’ve written about why you…
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First Look: Rokinon 24mm f/3.5 Tilt-Shift – Part 2.
When we optically tested the RokiBowYang tilt shift, I mentioned that my recommendation was tempered by wanting to see how it was built. Parts and repairs, at least in the U. S., are nonexistent and the price is a bit high for me to consider it a disposable, like the 14mm RokiBowYang. So first…
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Zeiss ZE 135mm f/2 vs. Canon 135mm f/2L
We had a chance a few days ago to look at the first copy of the Zeiss 135mm APO-Sonnar CP.2 lens, but today received several copies of the 135mm APO-Sonnar in ZE (Canon) mount. I’ve been wanting to play with it personally, of course, but more to the point wanted the chance to test multiple copies,…
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Roger Buys a Camera System: Refining My Choices
In the earlier portions of this process, I have: 1) Gotten a quick idea about the relative importance of lens versus sensor resolution 2) Screened for camera systems that might meet my needs 3) Investigated the rough cost of candidate systems After some preliminary screening I had decided to…
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Roger Buys a Camera System: So What’s This Going to Cost?
* Lensrentals, 2013 * In my last post I made a preliminary list of systems I was going to consider. Some people are a little surprised I’m considering crop sensor cameras. I’m surprised that they’re surprised. I’ve shot with a micro 4/3 system for months and it certainly met 80% of my needs, so an…
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Roger Buys a Camera System: Screening for Candidates
As I mentioned in my last post, I have more time for photography now than I have for the last several years so I’m buying a personal camera system. While I can ‘borrow’ stuff from Lensrentals for a specific shoot I can’t just take a system and keep it at my house permanently. My rule of thumb has…
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Quick Resolution Tests on Two New 70-200s
We got stock on two new 70-200mm lenses this week: the Nikon 70-200 f/4 VR and the Tamron 70-200 f/2.8 VC. I would have loved to do some side-by-side comparisons. They’re priced similarly and I expect a lot of Nikon shooters will be choosing between these two since both are quite a bit less…
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My Search for the Perfect Micro 4/3 Zoom . . .
has no limits. I mentioned not too long ago that when considering mirrorless cameras, I made my judgements largely based on native lenses. I do enjoy slapping an M-mount lens in front of my mirrorless camera once in a while, don’t get me wrong. But I don’t consider putting a large legacy zoom on an…
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Guest Blogger Aaron Nace | How to Capture the Real & Surreal with a Superlative Lens
_Today’s Guest Blogger Aaron Nace is going to show you tips on creating and compositing fantastical images with a lens he considers to be one of the best._ _Aaron is a Chicago-based photographer and retoucher who combines elements of reality and fantasy to create his images. Aaron has taught…
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Gear Up for Vacation!
One of the things that is often great (but sometimes terrible) about working at Lensrentals is that you get to talk to lots of photographers all across the country. This time of year, we get tons of phone calls asking for gear recommendations for the big summer vacation. Sadly, we also get a few…
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The Care and Feeding of Your Tripod
Being a good photographer, you have a tripod. Maybe two tripods. Maybe even a big, heavy duty one for your big lenses, a standard one for everyday use, and one of those small, cool ones that folds up like a road map and you can carry it in your back pocket. Wait, I just realized 50% of the people…
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Greetings from the Island of Misfit Toys
When I was a child (not _childish_, which would be now, _child_ which is decades before now) Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was the movie I looked forward to every Christmas season. The best scene in the movie was actually not in the original version; the Island of Misfit Toys was added during the…