In Camera stabiliser systems

One thing I admire about Pentax  cameras is the excellent in camera stabiliser system.  This allows all those ancient, but excellent Takumar lenses to know be stabilised!  Very cool!  My Dad bought a classic 55mm f1.8 and a 35mm f3.5 new in 1960 with his Pentax S3, and they are now stabilised on his K7 DSLR!  Sure Sony D-SRLs do this too, but the oldest lens you can put on it dates from the late 1980’s.

I really wish Nikon followed this system, as it would have allowed stabilisation on this shot that I took with a 1960’s Nikkor 200mm f4.

Lights in the rain

Today I was in the Yonge and Eglinton area in Toronto, and it reminded me of some shots I took here a while back from my car is the rain.  I focused on raindrops on the car window and trying to get coloured lights out of focus with beautiful round circles.  There’s lots of traffic around here, as well as bright lights from shops, so it worked out quite well.

This was one of the first outings with the Nikon D700 after I bought it and I used a Sigma 24-70 f2.8 lens.  The Sigma has a lot of good points – constant aperture f2.8, centre sharpness wide open and general sharpness at medium apertures across the frame.  However, it has two things I don’t like though – its a little bulky, and there’s lots of light (and sharpness) fall off in the corners at f2.8 on 24mm.  

The first time I used one of these lenses was on my Dad’s Pentax K7, and it performed really well on the crop sensor format with no problems exhibited.  So I bought a second hand one, but full frame really tests a lens, and on the D700 it was a bit disappointing.