http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/the-most-powerful-photos-of-2011
Touching and impressive photos, which record some special happenings of 2011 and the history of mankind. Yes, that's the power of photos, and true photos (not samples).
Tuesday, December 06, 2011
45 Most Powerful Photos of 2011
http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/the-most-powerful-photos-of-2011
Touching and impressive photos, which record some special happenings of 2011 and the history of mankind. Yes, that's the power of photos, and true photos (not samples).
FA77 Limited Lens with Serial Number of 77
(Source Page: http://www.ebay.com/itm/260903810268?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649)
Normally I just won't help other to promote anything here but with that marvel, I just can't help myself and I have no more to say! (The pictures speak themselves!) :-D
Monday, December 05, 2011
Sigma Starts to Drop In-Lens OS Support for Pentax
http://www.dpreview.com/news/2011/12/02/sigmanonOS1750F2p8
Well, maybe because the in-body SR of Pentax is so good! So why OS lenses? ;->
Related:-
When OIS Lenses are Put onto Sensor-shift IS Bodies..
In-Body Anti-Shake Patents Fully Dissected
Sensor-Shifted IS Heats Up the Sensor Much More Than the Video Mode Itself! :-o
When Our Video DSLRs Have High Fever.. :-o ;->
Saturday, December 03, 2011
Pentax UK and Pentax Germany Admitted K-r Tungsten Front Focusing Issue (But there is No Solution, as Both Clearly Told)
See these two reports and threads. They are 100% self-explanatory, with direct quotes from those Pentax officials:-
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1036&thread=39947770
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1036&thread=39975810
Btw, for what I have tested scientifically, that "specific spectrum of light" is called Infra Red. Red light does NOT cause any FF problem to the AF of the K-r, neither does the Green light, which *implies* Yellow light should NOT cause any problem neither! But since tungsten light sources do come with also strong IR spectra. So, it should be the real cause. I have also checked that adding a stronger Skylight 1B filter, which moderately suppresses both Green and Blue lights as well as IR, could lessen the FF very slightly. Thus, the dominant IR in environment should be the root cause to the problem as it is verified and re-confirmed.
After all, it seems that the AF sensors of the K-r are just too sensitive to IR but yet the IR cutting filter used in the AF module is either non-existent or is not strong enough and thus causing this problem - which could never be cured via firmware as it is a *hardware* issue, as I predicted on day one! (but then fanboys rebutted with NO ground and jumped on me, as usual!)
In fact, I confirmed this tungsten AF FF issue at the beginning of this year shortly after I purchased my K-r. I, as many other K-r users who have been suffering from the problem, of course was/were much disappointed for this step back of the SAFOX IX, especially for those who "upgraded" from a previous Pentax DSLR like the K-x and K-7, which do not have this severe issue.
Frankly, Pentax should have created a SAFOX IX-(minus) system instead of what is called the SAFOX+, adding what so-called an additional yellow-light detector won't help them and we end-users, BUT SIMPLY adding an IR cutting filter would! >:-(
Last but not least and still, here is my (repeated) advice for an interim measure to the problem: 1. Turn off the "AF Assist" light in the custom function and then 2. Set "AF Fine Adjust" to -10 (maximum value, my K-r usually focuses somehow acceptably at 0 under daylight for most of my Pentax lenses) and DO *remember* 3. Disable "AF Fine Adjust" after you return to non-tungsten environment and BEFORE you shoot! Easy Enough? :-o
Last Related:-
Still Annoying K-5 and K-r Old Issues, Users are Pissed Off!
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1036&thread=39947770
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1036&thread=39975810
Btw, for what I have tested scientifically, that "specific spectrum of light" is called Infra Red. Red light does NOT cause any FF problem to the AF of the K-r, neither does the Green light, which *implies* Yellow light should NOT cause any problem neither! But since tungsten light sources do come with also strong IR spectra. So, it should be the real cause. I have also checked that adding a stronger Skylight 1B filter, which moderately suppresses both Green and Blue lights as well as IR, could lessen the FF very slightly. Thus, the dominant IR in environment should be the root cause to the problem as it is verified and re-confirmed.
After all, it seems that the AF sensors of the K-r are just too sensitive to IR but yet the IR cutting filter used in the AF module is either non-existent or is not strong enough and thus causing this problem - which could never be cured via firmware as it is a *hardware* issue, as I predicted on day one! (but then fanboys rebutted with NO ground and jumped on me, as usual!)
In fact, I confirmed this tungsten AF FF issue at the beginning of this year shortly after I purchased my K-r. I, as many other K-r users who have been suffering from the problem, of course was/were much disappointed for this step back of the SAFOX IX, especially for those who "upgraded" from a previous Pentax DSLR like the K-x and K-7, which do not have this severe issue.
Frankly, Pentax should have created a SAFOX IX-(minus) system instead of what is called the SAFOX+, adding what so-called an additional yellow-light detector won't help them and we end-users, BUT SIMPLY adding an IR cutting filter would! >:-(
Last but not least and still, here is my (repeated) advice for an interim measure to the problem: 1. Turn off the "AF Assist" light in the custom function and then 2. Set "AF Fine Adjust" to -10 (maximum value, my K-r usually focuses somehow acceptably at 0 under daylight for most of my Pentax lenses) and DO *remember* 3. Disable "AF Fine Adjust" after you return to non-tungsten environment and BEFORE you shoot! Easy Enough? :-o
Last Related:-
Still Annoying K-5 and K-r Old Issues, Users are Pissed Off!
Friday, December 02, 2011
Calibrating (Colour Correcting) Your Monitor Using This Blog Page
About three years ago, I updated the colour scheme of my Blog. The look of the "new" colour scheme is not only about aesthetics, but there is a little secret that I have not told before.
That is, my Blog page could be used as a simple quick test target for colour calibration of your monitor! :-D
Now just note that the main text background of my Blog is in pure yellow in lighter/brighter tone. As such, it represents specific highlight colour accuracy in that colour. Pure yellow colour contains only Red and Green. So, you shouldn't see any colour cast except yellow if your monitor is colour corrected and the yellow should look as pure as possible.
Next, the Blog heading/title bar/area in in deep grey and the above principle also holds. Deep grey is one of the shallow representations. It should display equal Red, Green and Blue if the display device is colour corrected. If you have seen any colour cast in the title page, it simply means that there is colour errors with shallows of your display device!
As for the other minority colours of my Blog page in smaller areas, the remaining are light grey and white. Again, they should contain "no" colour~
Nowadays, most people use LCD monitors. And for most LCD monitors, there are settings for controlling the overall (backlight) brightness and the individual brightness (gain) of the R, G and B primitive colour channels. So, try to adjust all these four to get the best colours of my page, then you're almost close to a more colour-correct(ed) display for viewing images than what your monitor originally could do for you!
If your monitor also has the contrast (i.e., the back level) adjustment also, try to adjust the most suitable contrast and brightness first with a grey scale chart like that displayed in every DPR camera review. Then adjust the RGB gains and colours.
If you see that the (high)light colours of my Blog page contains more cast than the subject title area (for deeper tones/shadows) or vice versa, that means that the colour display errors of your monitor is not linear against the brightness (from dark/shallow to bright/highlight). So, you have to make the compromise and find the balance point. At the end of the day, there is not much to do unless you use an external hardware monitor colour calibration device to do the adjustment further.
After all the pure text talks above, let's look at the following screen capture of the "LUT" (stands for Look Up Table, download a LUT management utility here) colour correction curves of an eye-adjusted EIZO monitor of mine using my Blog page as target below:-
With the best factory colour profile without any "human" colour correction, the Spyder measured LUT table actually looks like this:-
Note about Green and Red are suppressed so as to compensate for the yellow cast which is caused by the aging of my that monitor, which has been used for prolonged time of more than 3 thousand hours over years, particularly, the "white" fluorescent backlight source could become more yellowish.
So, it leads to an important tip for hardware calibrating monitors, i.e., one should *always* try to adjust the monitor to a better display status as far as possible by *own eyes* before hardware calibrating the display. The above example shows that the final display accuracy of the former hardware calibrated monitor is yet better than the latter. The difference is indeed quite obvious. It is because the lesser the original errors for correction, the better the final results will be - simple logic? :-)
Last but not least, you can see that the "better" RGB correction curves coincide with each others very well, that means that my eyes had actually been really accurate and the Spyder actually supports my judgement! ;-D However, do note that the gamma and contrast have still been adjusted and compensated by the Spyder somehow, as it can only be measured and corrected via the ICC/ICM profiles (i.e., the LUT table) by using the Spyder (or any other hardware monitor calibration device).
Read Also:-
My Spyder2(Pro) Retired..
Blueish "LED" Screens? (How To Make Them Colour "Correct"!)
Testing the Colour Accuracy of Your Display and Eyes!
That is, my Blog page could be used as a simple quick test target for colour calibration of your monitor! :-D
Now just note that the main text background of my Blog is in pure yellow in lighter/brighter tone. As such, it represents specific highlight colour accuracy in that colour. Pure yellow colour contains only Red and Green. So, you shouldn't see any colour cast except yellow if your monitor is colour corrected and the yellow should look as pure as possible.
Next, the Blog heading/title bar/area in in deep grey and the above principle also holds. Deep grey is one of the shallow representations. It should display equal Red, Green and Blue if the display device is colour corrected. If you have seen any colour cast in the title page, it simply means that there is colour errors with shallows of your display device!
As for the other minority colours of my Blog page in smaller areas, the remaining are light grey and white. Again, they should contain "no" colour~
Nowadays, most people use LCD monitors. And for most LCD monitors, there are settings for controlling the overall (backlight) brightness and the individual brightness (gain) of the R, G and B primitive colour channels. So, try to adjust all these four to get the best colours of my page, then you're almost close to a more colour-correct(ed) display for viewing images than what your monitor originally could do for you!
If your monitor also has the contrast (i.e., the back level) adjustment also, try to adjust the most suitable contrast and brightness first with a grey scale chart like that displayed in every DPR camera review. Then adjust the RGB gains and colours.
If you see that the (high)light colours of my Blog page contains more cast than the subject title area (for deeper tones/shadows) or vice versa, that means that the colour display errors of your monitor is not linear against the brightness (from dark/shallow to bright/highlight). So, you have to make the compromise and find the balance point. At the end of the day, there is not much to do unless you use an external hardware monitor colour calibration device to do the adjustment further.
After all the pure text talks above, let's look at the following screen capture of the "LUT" (stands for Look Up Table, download a LUT management utility here) colour correction curves of an eye-adjusted EIZO monitor of mine using my Blog page as target below:-
With the best factory colour profile without any "human" colour correction, the Spyder measured LUT table actually looks like this:-
Note about Green and Red are suppressed so as to compensate for the yellow cast which is caused by the aging of my that monitor, which has been used for prolonged time of more than 3 thousand hours over years, particularly, the "white" fluorescent backlight source could become more yellowish.
So, it leads to an important tip for hardware calibrating monitors, i.e., one should *always* try to adjust the monitor to a better display status as far as possible by *own eyes* before hardware calibrating the display. The above example shows that the final display accuracy of the former hardware calibrated monitor is yet better than the latter. The difference is indeed quite obvious. It is because the lesser the original errors for correction, the better the final results will be - simple logic? :-)
Last but not least, you can see that the "better" RGB correction curves coincide with each others very well, that means that my eyes had actually been really accurate and the Spyder actually supports my judgement! ;-D However, do note that the gamma and contrast have still been adjusted and compensated by the Spyder somehow, as it can only be measured and corrected via the ICC/ICM profiles (i.e., the LUT table) by using the Spyder (or any other hardware monitor calibration device).
Read Also:-
My Spyder2(Pro) Retired..
Blueish "LED" Screens? (How To Make Them Colour "Correct"!)
Testing the Colour Accuracy of Your Display and Eyes!
K-r Discontinued Completely (Official)
The news about K-r's discontinuation was first reported here on Nov. 8 (standard black and colour versions first, quoted) and verified on Nov. 23 (at B&H). Today, Pentax Japan has announced at Twitter that the last order for the K-r will be accepted until December 9, for the custom colour versions, after which order will not be accepted. That means that the K-r will be discontinued completely. (Credit: VoiceOfReason)
But once again, I feel obliged to point out that it is rather an uncommon practice and really abnormal for first discontinued a product but without any replacement of it, which has never happened before for Pentax no matter who owned the brand. So, what has Ricoh been thinking and planning for the time being? :-o
After all, here comes the most worrisome thing: Considering that K-r is the ONLY Entry Level DSLR model in the Pentax DSLR lineup, is that simply hinted that actually the lineup is being aborted? Oh, NO! Tell us something more please, Ricoh! Please *kindly* clarify! >:-(
Thursday, December 01, 2011
Sensor Used in the K-r and K-x (Sony IMX021 APS-C CMOS)
First of all, let's look at the original official product press release:-
http://www.sony.co.jp/SonyInfo/News/Press/200708/07-072/index.html
(in Japanese, Excite English Translation Here)
With a 12-channel output architecture, the IMX021 has a maximum frame throughput rate of 10.39 frames per second at full image resolution in 12 bits. So, the K-r has a maximum frame rate of 6 fps for maximum resolution JPEG (which is converted from 12-bit RAW sensor data down to 8 bits per colour channel of the JPEG format) which has not yet fully utilised the full potential of the sensor indeed. Of course, the bottle-neck for this maximum camera shooting rate is not at the sensor anymore.
Other feature of the sensor is a built-in programmable amplifier up to a maximum gain of 24dB. The rated output voltage (sensitivity) of the sensor (at f/5.6 with yellow light source of green colour signal) is in 500mV (or 0.5V, average figure) and the maximum saturated voltage is 1100mV (or 1.1V, minimum figure). If this is compared to the specs of the ancient 10MP CCD sensor ICX493 used in the K10D/K200D/K-m, it could be noted the improvement is not by that much indeed as whilst the IMX021 has slightly better sensitivity (so that there will be slightly less noise owing to less amplification required), the saturation level per pixel is close and similar. As such, it should say that actually the IMX021 is even more vulnerable to suffer from charge overflow which will result in highlight clipping of the pixels and then in the final image. But of course, the better image processing technologies and techniques of the later could always help, so as to compensate for this deficiency and to produce better results ultimately.
Besides, it is interesting to see that the initial set selling price, back to 2007 when it was first announced, of the IMX021 was in 40,000 Japanese Yens, which roughly equalled to be about US$400 by that time. Indeed, it was surely not cheap for the total cost of an entry-level DSLR body. I still remember that when I bought my K-x almost two years ago, it costed me for something just more than US$600. So, the profit margin by the camera manufacturer was really not that much, even though the price of the sensor could have been dropped and that in volume order that it could be cheaper.
For more details about the sensor, here is the product catalogue in pdf:-
http://www.sony.co.jp/Products/SC-HP/cx_pal/vol74/pdf/imx021.pdf
Unfortunately, the catalogue does not contain more information on the video recording part but only mentions once that the sensor supports it. Otherwise, I shall see if it is possible to record 1080p video like what older Canon APS-C CMOS sensor could actually do!
Related:-
Myth? CCD Has Better IQ Than CMOS? (A K-m Vs K-x Shootout and Riddle)
The Secrets of the K10D (Part 1 of 3) - The Heart: CCD Imager
K-r and K-x are Much Different!
Heart of the Pentax Q - Sony IMX078CQK Imager
Inside the Nikon D7000: The K-5 Sensor is There! ;-)
D-mount CCTV Lens on Pentax Q (Elgeet 1/2" F1.9 12.5mm)
See the latest test report at the DC Watch:-
http://dc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/review/dressup/20111201_494517.html
Note also that the above Q is made up with one of the leather stickers in different colours that can be purchased at Japan:-
And this is the D-mount to P/Q adaptor the author used:-
Some full samples are available for download, you can view them, but don't have any higher hope on the Image Quality, as I don't think neither the body nor the lens used could produce higher still image quality and thus it is just impossible for this combo afterall!
Related:-
C-mount and D-mount Adaptors for Pentax Q
Software "Deblur"/Shake Reduce an Blurred Image via Post Processing
http://www.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~leojia/projects/robust_deblur/deblurring.htm
Before:
After:-
I haven't tried the software myself and thus have no comment on the performance. Do note also that this software is of a trial version which supports photos up to 800 x 800 in pixels, which would be just fine for web displayed ones.
Lastly, do note that the software supports specific NVIDIA GPU-equipped display cards and the GPU will be utilised to accelerate processing speed if it is compatible. Seems nice~
DxOMark for NEX-7 (Sony New 24MP APS-C Sensor)
(Credit: Jimmy Yen's Blog (Traditional Chinese))
Click Here for a direct comparison for A77 Vs NEX-7 Vs the K-5.
It seems that the new 24M sensor of Sony has been able to maintain its Image Quality whilst packing more pixels (hence higher resolution) into the same APS-C size. Not bad. Hopefully and possibly this new sensor will be incorporated into upcoming new Pentax DSLR flagship, if any.
Related:-
K-5 Replacement Coming?
K-5 Replacement Coming? (Continued)
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