Touit

All posts tagged Touit

Durr’s Back, at CP+ 2016!

Posted by Matthew Durr on February 27, 2016

Posted in: General Photography, Ramblings. Tagged: 135mm, 16mm, 24-70mm, 32mm, 70-200mm, 85mm, A7rII, CP+, f/1.4, f/2.8, GM, Japan, NEX-7, Otus, Pacifico Yokohama, Sony, Speedmaster, Street Photography, Touit, Voigtländer, Yokohama, Yokohama Porta, Zeiss, ZY Optics. 4 Comments

The Future of Optics? We’ll see…

Well hello there, what a long time it’s been since I’ve written to all you awesome readers! Last time I checked in, I was already on my way to basic training to join the United States Navy. Fast forward nine months, and I’ve found myself stationed smack dab in the middle of any photographer’s/tech geek’s heaven, Japan! I couldn’t have been more excited to actually live in another country, in all its 14-hour time jet-lagged glory. Finally, I can experience a whole different society, culture, and region that is farther than I could have every hoped to travel to in the U.S.

Though I will not turn this post into a traveler’s experience, I will say I love it here in Japan so far. The food is always great, the people are ridiculously nice and amiable, the weather is mild, and there are an infinite amount of possibilities to spend my free time amid a language I…unfortunately…am still far off from understanding. Oh, and the technology, Japan has lots of that too, which brings me back to the post at hand. There’s a lot to get through, from the guns-blazing Sony GM lineup, to compact primes, to the ridiculous ZY 135mm f/1.4, so grab a seat and let’s all geek out over photography gear after the jump! Continue Reading

2014 Project 52, Third Quarter

Posted by Matthew Durr on August 16, 2014

Posted in: 2014 Project 52. Tagged: 105mm, 105mm macro, 200mm, 200mm f/2.8 AI-s, 32mm, 32mm f/1.8, 400mm, 4th of July, 50mm, Abstract, AI-s, Animals, B&W, baby robins, Birding, Birds, Black and White, black eyed susan, Clouds, Colorful, f/1.8, f/2, f/2.8, Farm, Fireworks, Hummingbird, Lady Justice, Lightning, macro, Nashville, Nature, NEX-7, Nikkor, Nikon, Project 52, Sunset, Sycamore, Touit, vinyl, Zeiss. Leave a comment

To continue on with my yearlong project of topic-driven photography, weeks 27-39 threw even more creative challenges my way that unfortunately forced me to do some photographs outside their original time slot. Turns out, it is pretty difficult to manage personal photography pursuits on top of freelance assignments that have to come first. However, in these past couple weeks, I began to catch up in editing photographs for website posts here. To kick things off, let’s get up to speed on the third quarter of my 52 photographs:

#27-Easter

Hiding in Plain Sight
Nikon 400mm, ISO 400, f/2.8, 1/400

Adolescent rabbits are very fun animals to play around with. Depending on their age and fear of humans, you can walk right up to one and almost pick it up before it scurries off. This little guy didn’t know that even when hiding in tall grass with his ears back, a photographer can still see him! Continue Reading

2014 Project 52, Second Quarter

Posted by Matthew Durr on April 23, 2014

Posted in: 2014 Project 52. Tagged: 105mm, 32mm, 50mm, 85mm, Action, AI-s, Blurry, Clouds, Colorful, f/1.4, f/1.8, f/2.8, Flower, HDR, Landscape, macro, micro nikkor, Nature, NEX-7, Nikkor, Nikon, Off-Camera Flash, outdoors, photography, Snow, Sony, Still Life, Sunset, Touit, Transylvania University, Zeiss, Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8. Leave a comment

Now halfway through my most current yearlong photography project (first quarter can be seen here!), the increasingly-varied topics for weeks 14-26 in my Project 52 made for some challenges in going out in the “Snowmageddon” winter that plagued much of the United States. Thankfully, the worst of it all is past, and rarely does it dip into sweater weather anymore in Kentucky. In an effort to keep with my original goal, all the shots in my project are captured with the Sony NEX-7, and with my recent exploration into studio lighting, I have new ways to light my photographs like never before. That said, descriptions accompany all the following images:

#14-Favorite Food

Balanced Breakfast
Nikon 105mm, ISO 100, f/16, 8 Seconds

When I had to pick a subject representing my favorite food, I realized that I couldn’t come to any one decision on a dish that I craved more than any other. So in an effort to make the choice a little easier, I picked my favorite meal of the day. Though many in the world today skip breakfast to save time in the morning, I find making an effort to get filled up on all the right stuff rewarding in its own right for the health and energy benefits. It is all about balance, though. If I do not offset those toaster strudels with good choices like fruit and wheat cereal, I would only be making it harder on myself. 🙂 Continue Reading

Site Update, FF-NEX Thoughts, and a Project 52!

Posted by Matthew Durr on September 24, 2013

Posted in: General News, General Photography. Tagged: 105mm, 300mm, 32mm, 35mm, 36-72mm, 50mm, 85mm, a3000, Action, AI-s, f/1.4, f/1.8, f/2.8, FF-NEX, Flower, HDR, Landscape, Long Exposure, macro, Nature, NEX-7, NEX-9, Nikkor, Nikon, outdoors, Panorama, photography, Portraits, Project 52, Series-E, Sony, Sports Photography, Street Photography, Sunset, Touit, Update, Zeiss. 4 Comments

Not so hot-on-the-heels of my last post over a month-and-a-half ago, here I am making some time to address my blatant inactivity on the site. As it turns out, student teaching and photography don’t happen to mix very well. My particular placement and accompanying assignments give me next to zero free time for anything else. Seeing as the essentials—sleep, eating, and physical activity—take up the majority of that time, finding a slot to simply “go out” and make photographs is a near impossibility. This busyness has also forced me to cancel my anticipated pre-order of the new Zeiss 16-70mm f/4 OSS, a popular lens that I would have loved to review. That’s the bad news.

However, every now and then I still take photography assignments from my university for sports and other campus events. This, at the very least, helps keep my shutter finger trained and my manual-focus skills honed. Per the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, my student teaching will go only until this end of this calendar year. So in theory, next year I will be able to get back to my usual updating with photo-walks and all manner of lens reviews for you loyal readers to enjoy (many thanks for the recent subscriptions despite my absence). That’s the good news.

In…other news…if you have been living under a rock for the past couple months, there’s been a lot of buzz around the near-future of Sony’s E-mount. Some rumors are claiming Sony to introduce a whopping three E-mount cameras, all with a full-frame 35mm sensor! One is a supposed “NEX-9”—a camera I’ve dreamed about ever since the first time I shot with my beloved NEX-7—while another may be an ILC-9 or a9000 (a full-frame version of the already available a3000). Since that one will be relatively bulky with its pointless DSLR shape, it appeals less to me (well, the added grip of that shape gives it some relevance). Regardless, come mid-October, Sony has the very real chance of taking the mirrorless photography world by storm, and I’ll be watching avidly for pre-orders. 😉

Now, time for some photographs, right? Over the past year, I’ve taken part in my own Project 52, submitting one quality photograph for every week of the year under a supplied theme. My “supervisor” for the project is a local photography group that I’ve joined on Meetup.com, and the ability to see multiple other photographers’ work as the project progressed made the entire process more enjoyable.

All the following (52 in all, so yes, there’s quite a bit of scrolling ahead) photographs below are downsized to a web-friendly 2000×1333 ratio or similar to keep the site’s bandwidth from filling up. Most here are captured with the NEX-7, though a few captured with other cameras found their way into the project. A good number of these photographs have been featured elsewhere on my website in lens reviews or other photographic posts. Also, all photographs are in the ProPhotoRGB colorspace to get correct yellow saturation levels, so depending on your browser and viewing device (I recommend Google Chrome on a desktop computer), these photographs may have odd saturation levels on your screen.

Enjoy!

#1-Upside-Down

50mm, ISO 100, f/1.8, 1/640

#2-Dream

36-42mm, ISO 800, f/8, .8 Seconds

#3-Hidden

105mm, ISO 100, f/11, 1/200, 1:.88 Magnification

#4-Sweet

105mm, ISO 800, f/2.8, 1/1000

#5-Inspiration

105mm, ISO 100, f/2, 30 Seconds

#6-Fall

75mm, ISO 100, f/3.5, 1/1600

#7-Angle

50mm, ISO 100, f/16, 5 Seconds

Lens Review: Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8

Posted by Matthew Durr on July 2, 2013

Posted in: Lens/Camera Reviews. Tagged: 32mm, 35mm, Blurry, Clouds, Colorful, f/1.8, Flower, Focus Speed, HDR, Landscape, Lens Review, Long Exposure, macro, Nature, NEX-7, outdoors, photography, Sony, Sony 35mm f/1.8 OSS, Sunset, Touit, Zeiss, Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8. 76 Comments

***October 2017 Edit: I have used this lens for over four years now, and it is still my go-to choice for a “normal” APS-c lens. Firmware updates over the years to both Sony bodies and the lens itself have made all focus accuracy issues go away, though the motor itself is still noisy. Regarding sharpness, the lens performs better on the more recent a6500 due to a better on-sensor microlens design. Throw in the in-body image stabilization the camera sports, and it makes the Zeiss another clear winner.***

Click here for my first impressions of this lens. IMPORTANT! If you are unfamiliar with my lens review style, please reference THIS POST first! If you are only interested in my comparison of this lens to the Sony 35mm f/1.8 OSS, scroll down to the bottom of this page. 🙂

Well it’s about time! Ever since Sony released the specifications for the E-mount in April of 2011, NEX photographers have longed for attractive alternative lens offerings from third-party lens manufacturers such as Tamron and Sigma. Sony liked Tamron’s more-compact 18-200mm so much, it was rebranded as the SEL18200LE. Sigma’s low-cost, zero-frills 19/30/60mm f/2.8 primes all provide outstanding image quality for their price. Even Rokinon/Samyang/Bower/(you name it) surprised everyone with their surprisingly affordable and high-quality 8mm f/2.8 fisheye!

It’s better to arrive late to the party rather than never at all though (the Zeiss 24mm f/1.8 is a Sony-branded lens so it doesn’t count), and Zeiss decided 2013 was the year to introduce their new “Touit” (pronounced like “too-it”) line of lenses for both E-mount and X-mount. In addition to the 32mm f/1.8, a super-wide 12mm f/2.8 is available now, and a 50mm f/2.8 Makro-Planar (how Zeiss spells “Macro”) should be available by fall. These lenses are all designed with the serious mirrorless shooter in mind, providing optics that are lightweight and compact, yet powerful enough to resolve fine detail across the large APS-C sensors found in the tiny camera bodies.

What many wonder though: are these premium lenses worthy of the Zeiss name, usually associated with outstanding overall optical performance, loads of micro-contrast, and stellar build quality? I can’t say much about the 12mm f/2.8 (other than that it looks very nice), but let’s take an in-depth look at its more “normal” brother! Continue Reading

Reader Mini-Review: Zeiss Touit 12mm f/2.8

Posted by Matthew Durr on June 22, 2013

Posted in: Lens/Camera Reviews, Reader Review. Tagged: 12mm, architecture, Colorful, f/2.8, Landscape, NEX-7, outdoors, photography, Reader Impressions, Reader Review, Sony, Street Photography, Touit, Zeiss, Zeiss Touit 12mm f/2.8. Leave a comment

The following is a short guest post on the other new lens in the Zeiss Touit lineup, the 12mm f/2.8. This ultra-wide comes in at an even more premium price tag of $1250 compared to the $900 asking price of the 32mm f/1.8. With that high price you get an extreme 99-degree diagonal angle-of-view to create a unique perspective for many subjects. Just like the 32mm, the 12mm f/2.8 also comes in X-mount with an aperture control ring:

I’ve had the Touit 12mm f/2.8 for about ten days now, but have had little free time to try it out. This morning I took it with me and snaped some shots of the famous Fox Theatre in Bakersfield in good early morning light, and then out at one of our local parks I got to play with its bokeh, which isn’t easy to do at 12mm.

The lens handles very well, though the hood is very light and easily snaps out of its locked position, which causes vignetting. The focus ring feels great, just like on the 32/1.8, though I still have to give the nod to the Sony Zeiss Sonnar 24/1.8 for build quality, if just barely.

The lens does have that unique Zeiss color, though I must confess that it is far wider than anything I’ve ever used before, and I’m just barely into what I expect to be a significant learning curve.

I believe that the lens has distortion correction programmed into its firmware as Apple Aperture seems to apply whatever is in the camera. DXO relies on its own lens profiles and doesn’t have one for this lens yet, so the uncorrected image can be seen in DXO. Correction appears minimal though as the lens seems to be well-corrected optically.

Not much more that I can say yet as I’ve barely used it. Fortunately I have until the spring to learn fully how to handle such a wideangle before my next trip to Asia.

Andrew

For all you pixel-peepers out there, I’ve posted his titled examples at full-resolution, click on each for maximum detail. All shot with a NEX-7 in RAW, and converted straight to JPEG in Aperture 3 with no post-processing:

Hope
12mm, ISO 100, f/5.6, 1/800

First Impressions: Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8

Posted by Matthew Durr on June 16, 2013

Posted in: Lens/Camera Reviews. Tagged: 32mm, 32mm f/1.8, Clouds, Colorful, f/1.8, Flower, HDR, Landscape, Lens Review, Nature, NEX-7, outdoors, photography, Preview, Sony, Sunset, Touit, Zeiss, Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8. 9 Comments

I don’t like buying new lenses. Not only are they less tactile in use, weaker in build quality, and–in the case of E-mount–often relatively worse-off in image quality compared to my AI-s’, but new lenses are also expensive! Okay, sure, a lot of the money for a lens can go to fancy features like optical stabilization and autofocus, but for my style of shooting, these features always play second-fiddle to what really counts: image quality.

What’s nice, then, about the Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8, is that it tries to go against some of the conventions of new lenses–sans the expensive aspect:

The all-rubber focus ring is an absolute treat to turn. It’s a real shame that, like all autofocus mirrorless lenses, the focus is fly-by-wire, because I’ve never turned a smoother focus ring, including every Nikkor I’ve ever used.
The build quality and overall aesthetic of the lens is beautiful. Though there are some polymer parts on the inside to help reduce weight, the entire body of the lens is of a very nice semi-matte metal. Though the lens hood is plastic (again, to cut down weight), once it locks in, there’s no play.
Unsurprisingly, this is the first native e-mount lens I’ve used that performs notably well on the NEX-7. The sheer resolving power of this lens, thanks no doubt to the Planar design, is impressive.

Though I did give high marks to the Sony 35mm f/1.8 OSS, and I still stand by what I said, the Zeiss is in another league in areas of performance like sharpness and aberrations. I currently have both lenses, and plan to do a direct side-by-side comparison at the end of the Zeiss’ review (to come hopefully in a week). It’s still a toss-up whether the Zeiss 32mm ($900) is worth twice the price as the Sony 35mm ($450).

Until then, I’ve taken some time the past few days to make some photographs with the new Touit. All ten below captured with the NEX-7:

Abandoned
32mm, ISO 100, f/8, 1/125

Hands-On: Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8

Posted by Matthew Durr on June 13, 2013

Posted in: Lens/Camera Reviews. Tagged: 32mm, Blurry, Colorful, E-Mount, f/1.8, Flower, Fuji, Nature, nex, NEX-7, outdoors, photography, Preview, Sony, Touit, X-Mount, Zeiss, Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8. 21 Comments

Well, it’s official, I’m now a Zeiss guy. Er, well, at least I’ve gotten a brief chance to use one of their highly-touted optics. Up for near-future review is the brand-new Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8, a fast “normal” lens for Sony E-mount and Fuji X-mount mirrorless cameras. I wouldn’t even consider this post a “first-impressions”, as I typically write, because I have only shot with it for about 20 minutes so far. The weather today hasn’t exactly been kind for photography either; one minute the winds are blowing too hard to keep flowers still, the next it’s a torrential downpour, and the next the bright sun washes out any color. Not too happy about that. Continue Reading

Coming Soon…

Posted by Matthew Durr on June 13, 2013

Posted in: Ramblings. Tagged: 32mm, f/1.8, Touit, Zeiss, Zeiss 32mm f/1.8. 4 Comments

I’ll be reviewing the lens on the left. Image from Zeiss’ website.

After a good long wait, some time today I’ll be receiving the brand-new Zeiss Touit 32mm f/1.8 for E-mount. I’ve been looking forward to this lens ever since catching wind of early rumors, and even more-so after finding it to be even cheaper than the Zeiss $1100 24mm f/1.8. After extended shooting with the Sony 35mm f/1.8 OSS, a lens I do like, I’ve found myself needing more sharpness and less lateral out-of-focus fringing at wider apertures. The Sony just isn’t cutting it on the resolution-monster NEX-7.

In steps the 32mm f/1.8, a lens Zeiss coins the “Magician of the Moment”. Sporting Zeiss’ proven “Planar” optical design, this lens may prove to be a powerful optical powerhouse in a compact design. I have extremely high hopes for this one. More to come soon. Depending on how much I can shoot with it day-of-arrival, I hope to have a hands-on video and/or some first impression photographs to share within the next couple days. Check back often or follow me by clicking the orange “Follow” button on the right of your screen.

Matthew Durr Photography

Because great photographs don't make themselves