Jon Sienkiewicz Blog

Many, many years ago a coworker at Altman Camera in Chicago showed me that it was possible to screw a Vivitar +10 Macro Adapter into a partially disassembled set of Nikon K-series extension rings and thereby build a soft focus lens that practically exploded with delightfully horrendous aberrations. It was fixed-focus, you had to bob to-and-fro like a drunken sailor to use it, but it was sensationally unsharp and I’ve been hooked on this genre ever since.

Many features of Photoshop Elements can be customized to suit your liking. Surprisingly, some experienced users overlook this powerful capability. A great place to start is at the Preferences menu. This screen shot is from the Mac version, but the same concept applies to Win as well as full-blown Photoshop products.

Adobe Photoshop Elements is a budget-friendly image editing package that’s designed for casual users and amateurs. Under the hood, however, there are dozens of advanced features and hidden capabilities that are accessible via plug-ins. Wouldn’t it be cool if you could unlock, say, 130 of those features with one add-on product that costs less than fifty bucks? Then here’s good news: you can. 

Leica Camera AG has released Leica LUX, an iOS app that enables smartphone shooters to experience prominent aspects of Leica photography. Dubbed LUX, the new app is available in both free and subscription versions with features divided accordingly. No additional accessories are required, and it's available from the Apple store now.

If you deal with more than a couple thousand images, you need a DAM, a Digital Asset Manager. Excire offers two solutions that fit the billing of "best ever."

The monochrome mode on most digital cameras is a convenience that is best avoided. Conventional wisdom says that it’s far, far better to shoot Raw and convert to monochrome—or at least to start with a color JPEG. But Fujifilm suggests that their ACROS film simulation mode might even top the best Raw converters. Does it? 

Zorki Wins TIPA Award; White House Denies Russian Collusion
Members of the Technical Image Press Association (TIPA) today announced that the Moscow Zorki TTL, a newcomer on the digital camera scene, has won the 2018 award for overall best product. Second place in the voting is the Zenit A, manufactured by the same company which is located in the foothills of Mount Narodnaya in the Ural Mountains. Although some competitive camera makers allege possible vote tampering, the White House has issued a strong statement labeling the accusations a ‘witch hunt’ and fully denying the insinuation of Russian collusion.

For more news stories from 2018, click Continue Reading below.