Royal Gold Barbs

Here are some of my Royal Gold Barbs, and a bit of my Siamese Algae Eater too.  Pic taken with the new lens; FA50/1.4.  The plants are barthii sword and valisneria.



These fish are speedy, and aggressive when it comes to feeding.  The keyhole cichlids and the Siamese Algae Eater still rule the roost and get their own way in any dispute with these barbs, but I think the barbs are very comfortable especially being a group of six that tends to school together.

Pentax FA1.4 vs A1.7

Here's my first humble attempt at a pixel-peeping lens comparison. Please leave your comments!

One macro subject certainly won't show all there is to know, but it does show up some differences.

I bought the FA 50 to replace my A1.7 chiefly for the autofocus, but before I get rid of the A1.7, I thought it would be fun to compare the two very similar lenses optically.

It turns out that the two lenses have slightly different focal length - the FA is a bit longer; maybe it's really a 50.9mm and they rounded down. Perhaps this is the reason that in the F4 shot, the A series lens shot at 1/15 sec vs. 1/10 for the FA. Shots were taken on the tripod with no SR. I set the focus point at the centre.

Here are the full frames from the new FA lens, at F1.7, F4, F8, followed by 100% crop comparisons with the A lens. Click each one for the large view (the first three images are downsized to 1.6MP).

Updated: Lots of talk right now about fast 50s since the DA*55mm F1.4 SDM was announced. Personally I might be more interested in the DA* 15mm F4 ED AL Limited, but not till I know the price. Cheers.

FA50/1.4 at F1.7:



F4:



F8:



Personally I prefer the FA1.4 in the centre crop, it seems to have more contrast. Click to open 100% crops.



Below you can see the difference in number of aperture blades.



Looks to me here that the A1.7 is the sharpest in the corner at F1.7:



Overall, they seem very similar to me. Both very good! The FA 50mm 1.4 will be a great new partner to my A 28mm F2.8, which continues to be my primary lens.

I have a few photos from the A 50/1.7 up on Flickr - click here for the slideshow. Better yet, see images for this lens from all over Flickr. And here's Flickr with FA 50mm/1.4.

Happy lens hunting!

Chevy Volt Revealed

The GM-Volt blog has official pictures of the production Chevy Volt design here.

GM is throwing major resources at trying to get ahead of the curve with a car that drives the first 40 miles on electric, then switches to gas.  Their stated plan is to have them on the general market by end of 2010.

The Atlantic published an in-depth story about GM's effort in their July/August issue.  The full article is on the web: Electro-Shock Therapy.

DSLR lens attach rate

As more Photokina announcements come out like the Sony A900 and the Nikon D700, and everyone debates who will win, I can't help wondering why there's so little talk about the lens "attach rate".

In Xbox 360 vs. Playstation 3 discussion, the attach rate, i.e. the average number of games sold with a platform, is one of the bragging points for the system.

Similarly in HD DVD vs Blu Ray, the attach rate of movies bought with the player was considered an indicator of buyer confidence in the system.

Thinking about which camera lens mount system has the brightest future, a topic most camera gear fanatics think about from time to time, I'll usually factor in which camera will sell the most lenses.  As the digital era progresses and competition heats up, I suspect we'll see more use of the term, "attach rate".