All Posts
Not Surprisingly, D600 Dust Issue Gets Better Over Time
A while back, I started an article on this topic with the sentence “We tend not to get too excited about sensor dust problems here; we clean sensors on every camera after every rental, so it’s just routine.” Unfortunately, it seems that everybody else did get excited. Some people freaked out and…
Six Degrees of Charles Darwin, and Rejlander’s Last Laugh.
## Six Degrees of Charles Darwin _Note: For those offended by such things, there is a small photograph reproduced below that has artistic nudity._ You’re probably familiar with the film-buff game, Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. If not, basically you name any individual who is associated with movies…
A Most Interesting Photographer
> _“I am going to make a name for myself. If I fail, you will never hear of me again.”_ Edward Muggeridge I love writing about great photographers. I’m sure there are some exceptions, but in general they tend to be among the oddest and most interesting groups of people on the planet. I thought the…
Sigma 35mm f/1.4 Arrives. Announces New World Order.
OK, I’m beginning to think maybe the Mayans were right. It appears the world is going to transition into something different in 2012. The photography world at least. About 5 years ago, I wrote a blog post explaining that quality control problems and horrid repair service meant we would probably…
The Great Hostess Snack Cake Shootout
It’s a sad and dark day here at Lensrentals. For years, we’ve worked really long hours fueled largely by coffee and snack cakes. Not just any snack cakes, of course. Hostess snack cakes. So today’s very sad news that Hostess is shutting it’s doorsis a devastating blow to us. First Kodak. Now…
Canon 24-70 Mk II Variation
A while back we ran Imatest resolution numbers on a few copies of the Canon 24-70 Mk II. That was right at release time and the resolution was most impressive, but we only had 5 copies available to test. Over the next couple of months a number of reviews came out. Most seemed to consider the…
The Panasonic 35-100 f/2.8 First Impression: The Glass is 87.6% Full
I’ve been waiting for the Panasonic 35-100mm f/2.8 OIS lens since, well, since the Panasonic 12-35 f/2.8 lens came out. Much to my surprise, Tyler had 7 copies sitting on my desk this morning. As usual when something like this arrives I only had a few hours before the packers would start screaming…
EOS-M First Impressions
*Connie hates having her picture taken, so we used that as a threat to get some EOS-Ms and lenses checked in fast.* OK, the usual applies. I am not a reviewer. I don’t even play one on TV. There are already some in-depth reviews out on the new EOS-M and more coming daily. But I handle a lot of…
Scoping Out Digiscoping
## Digiscoping I’ve always been a bit fascinated by digiscoping. For those who are out of the loop, digiscoping involves taking images through a spotting scope rather than a camera lens. The advantages are obvious. A spotting scope provides magnification equivalent to a lens of 1,250 to 3,000mm.…
Panasonic Pancake Dissections
Panasonic makes an excellent pair of micro 4/3 pancake lenses, the 14mm f/2.5 and 20mm f/1.7. While they look similar, there are several differences. The optical formulas are quite different, for example. *Optical diagram of the 20mm (left) and 14mm (right) pancake lenses* While the performance of…
D600 Sensor Dust Issues
We tend not to get too excited about sensor dust problems here; we clean sensors on every camera after every rental, so it’s just routine. When we started carrying the Nikon D600 they all arrived with a fair amount of dust, but that’s pretty routine, too. Manufacturing and shipping can be a dusty…
A Little More Sigma 200-500 Fun
SigZilla is gone now. You’ll be able to see it’s work in action if you watch the World Series. I wouldn’t be surprised if you might not catch an image of it. Before it left, though, we were able to (with a great deal of difficulty) get it mounted in the lab and run one basic Imatest series. When it…