The Hackers Who Recovered NASA’s Lost Lunar photos

First View of Earth from Moon - reprocessed

Wired has an article on The Hackers Who Recovered NASA’s Lost Lunar Photos :

[…] After the low-fi printing, the tapes were shoved into boxes and forgotten.

They changed hands several times over the years, almost getting tossed out before landing in storage in Moorpark, California. Several abortive attempts were made to recover data from the tapes, which were well kept, […]

Read it all, the effort is amazing. It doesn’t matter how you keep the medium, if you can re-read it or decode it, it is useless.

This is a shape of things to come. What will happen to all of those digital archives? These CD or DVD that will be unreadable because we no longer have the drives, or just decayed, these hard drives with obsolete connectors, which, if they ever start, might still hard to use in a few decades. And then what do we do with these RAW files that the camera vendor refuse to document?

These are all the questions we should remember to ask. The next Vivian Maier might never happen in the era of digital as we might unable to recover the content of the shoe box. Not everybody will have the skills of that team that recovered the NASA photos.

Leica T

Leica just announced the Leica T. Their new mirror-less system ; and by that I mean non rangefinder but really digital mirror-less with interchangeable lenses, APS-C sensor, with their own mount, and two new lenses including a 23mm f/2 (feels like a 35). Sadly it seems that the trend persists, there is no built-in viewfinder. Also it has a Leica price tag, even if no as high as Leica M.

On overall the Leica T seems to get somewhat positive reviews, and the design is slick, to not say outstanding on some aspects, and minimalist where all the complexity is in a touch screen. All in all it looks like Leica focused on the basics: photography, and let the gimmicks on the side. But, oh boy, why is it a $600 extra for an external electronic viewfinder?

Luminous landscape has to reviews up, where they have had the gear in hand. One by Michael Reichmann:

The camera itself has nothing like the range of features and capabilities that its prime competitors have to offer, but then it isn’t intended to. Thus any such comparison would be pointless.

The other by Nick Rains:

This is a very cool camera. The look is like nothing else on the market.

Now I wish I had a loaner to try to have a better sense of what it feels.

Leica’s website.

Sony Alpha 7

The Sony Alpha 7 and A7R have just been announced and feature a full frame interchangeable lens mirror-less camera for around $2000. This niche was held so far by the Leica M at a much higher price point. Unlike the Leica, this is not a range finder.

Brian Smith has a field test that show what we can expect: an IQ Sony style (pun intended), ie good.

I believe that for a modern design system, “full frame” is possibly overkill, and Fuji has shown us that you can get top notch IQ with an APS-C sized sensor. Most DSLR systems, like Canon EOS, Nikon, Sony or even Pentax were designed for 135 film, as well as their lens, hence the “full frame” bias. This is also why I considered the RX-1 overpriced and overspeced, even though some people have found it worth it ; and with a top image quality as well. At $2000 body only the A7 can even be cheaper than the RX-1.

But this Sony is an E-mount (like on the Nex), with a short flange distance, that allow an easy adaptation of older lenses via easily available mount adpaters, including M-mount. This is probably why this camera has a lead off the m4/3 or even the Fuji. You get the real deal, the same field of view on your older lenses as they were designed. The only other alternative today is the Leica M type 240, which is both much more expensive (several time the price), hard to come by, and for which adapted lenses require either the use or the rear LCD or the external EVF.

I do believe that the A7 and A7R will find their way in the hands of people that have a large collection of lenses to adapt, and we can be largely confident that the image quality will continue to meet the expectations. Sony has really shown leadership on a market that was dominated by Olympus and Panasonic, and show that Nikon and Canon have to worry given their disappointing incursion into mirror-less land.

Things about the X-E1

Tim Bray wrote a love letter to Fujifilm:

He starts with the conclusion:

It’s the best camera I’ve ever used: Light, wonderful in the hand, perfect controls, astounding lenses, pleasing pictures. So if you were thinking of buying a Serious Camera, this is totally one of the ones you should look at. Or maybe the X-E2; more on that below.

I’ll let you read the rest.

As an X-Pro1 owner I can tell that almost everything applies to it too.

Fuji XF23mm f1.4

Fuji announced the Fuji XF23mm f1.4 for the Fuji X series (like the X-Pro1)

This lens will provide a fast 35mm-like lens ; one of the favourite field of view of street photographers.

Thinktank Retrospective 5

Jorge Ledesma call the Thinktank Retrospective 5
The Best Street (Casual) Photography Bag for the Ricoh GR and Companion.

I’ve tried quite a few bags, too many to name, but let me tell that the Thinktank Photo Retrospective 5 has stolen my heart and the hearts of my two primary photographic tools — the Ricoh GR and the Pentax K5 IIs. Its like this: you know how you fall in love with a certain comforter and that’s what you like to sleep in all time. Well, its like that for the GR/K5IIs and the Retrospective 5. I can’t think of any other bag that has all the features that one needs to have while on the field photographing.

While I don’t have a Ricoh GR, I bought this bag over a year ago to use with my Fujifilm X-Pro1 – after having bought the Retrospective 30 – and I love it. It even fits the 5DMkII with the 24-105 or the 40mm pancake.

Retrospective 5 (Pinestone)
Retrospective 5 (Pinestone) by .:fotomaf:., on Flickr – cc by-nc-sa-2.0

Leica X-Vario review

I previously said the Leica X-Vario was a disappointment solely based on the price and the slow zoom lens (and the lack of viewfinder). I think I shouldn’t be commenting on gear like that.

We see some positive reviews flourishing, mostly based on image quality and ergonomics, two of the main reason to use one camera over the other.

Jonathan Slack, a Leica loyal (his words): The Leica X Vario – previously known as Paula:

Despite the yawns from some of the more technically minded on the internet this is pretty much a unique camera – being the only currently available APS-c sized camera with an integral zoom lens (the Canon G1x sensor is rather smaller).
[…]
So it seems to me that at the very least Leica have produced an interesting modern take on a popular design strategy.

And conclude:

However, over the months I’ve rather fallen in love with the simplicity of the X Vario – the logic of the controls is hard to fault, the image quality is really excellent and the fact of it being a simple one-stop package is really compelling.

Simply put he turns this one as the camera he has with him when he doesn’t have any other.

And if someone want to loan one to me, I’ll be sure to be fair with it.

Leica Mini-M: the disappointment

Two week ago, Leica started teasing us with the Mini-M.

The Phoblographer has the scoop, just confirming the rumors, and that is a disappointment.

The Leica X Vario will cost over $3200 (more than the Sony RX-1) a little more than $2800, roughly the same as the Sony RX-1. And I had two hypothesis of what it could be, and both were wrong. One was closer thought, but I was expecting a fast prime not a slow zoom lens. No viewfinder (there is the port for an EVF). Nothing. In short you can find a camera that has the same feature set, a faster lens, that can be changed, for much less money. There claim that it took Leica M as a role model is absurd.

The only thing that can be outlined is Leica still continue to push DNG for the RAW files. And they should be commended for that.

Leica is now in the market of making expensive luxury cameras, not performing and robust cameras. I am sure that if a photographer had only this camera he could make it work and take awesome picture, but for the money, I’d recommend something else.

(I haven’t seen the camera, this is all based on paper specs)

Update B&H has it in pre-order, adjusted the price mention to reflect that.