Emerald Bay Photography News and Updates

Just recently, I've written about the Lensbaby. It's a little lens with a bellows for SLR (and dSLR) cameras that brings one area into sharp focus while creatively blurring the rest of the photograph.

Fresh off the Photography Blog RSS feed though, comes the announcement of Lensbaby 2.0.

Lensbabies Launches Lensbaby 2.0 for Brighter, Sharper, Faster Selective Focus Photography

March 21, 2005, Las Vegas, NV. Today at the WPPI trade show, Lensbabies launched Lensbaby 2.0, a second-generation selective focus SLR camera lens, bringing brighter, sharper, and faster selective focus photography to professional and avid amateur photographers.

"Lensbaby 2.0 has proven to be a wonderful creative tool for demanding photographic assignments. Compared to The Original Lensbaby, Lensbaby 2.0 has a greater range of aperture settings, a much sharper 'sweet spot' of focus, and a new levitating magnetic aperture system, which makes it a snap to change apertures," said Craig Strong, the inventor of the Lensbaby and Co-CEO of Lensbabies, LLC.

Lensbaby 2.0 and The Original Lensbaby bring one area of a photo into sharp focus, with that 'sweet spot' surrounded by graduated blur, glowing highlights, and subtle prismatic color distortions. Photographers can fluidly move the sharp area around the photo by bending the flexible lens tubing.

Lensbaby 2 features an f2.0 aperture setting, plus f2.8, f4.0, f5.6 and f8.0. Lensbaby 2 is available for sale now at http://www.lensbabies.com for $150.

Sounds like an improvement, but there's still no mention of the fact that you have to move the bellows around MANUALLY - which can be somewhat of a problem for dexteriously-challenged photographers. The price point however had me shudder. $150 for a tiny plastic lens? Come on ...

Labels: photography, photography gear

Thanks to all the contributors, participants, and bringers of delicious food items, the First Ever Bend Slideluck Potshow last Friday was a resounding success!

Far more people than expected showed up (a random count put the number around 25 - when at most 15 were expected) - standing, crouching, and squishing themselves into the cozy living room at our host Matt Preusch's house to catch a glimpse of the outstanding eye candy so many contributors served up.

And they've proven once again, that we photographers really aren't solitary creatures, but rather beings who become social under the correct circumstances - such as having the possibility to talk shop with a peer, ogle someone else's work, or simply feast on free food and drink in combination with all of the above.

A few special thanks go out to these folks:
1. To Matt and Diane, who so graciously and generously hosted the event in their home. I hope no red wine was spilled ... ;-) ... and to Matt for bringing the idea down from Seattle in the first place ...
2. To Tom Merrow, without whom this event would not have been possible, for he provided the hard-to-find digital projector that allowed everyone to show their work (and in addition, he even wowed us with his beautiful work).
3. To everybody who brought food and drink. This potluck rocked! I've hardly ever been to one that furnished so much delicious and various foods.
4. And finally to Sol Neelman who let me fondle his brandnew, 2-day old Canon 1Ds Mark II, and provided the evening's most memorable quote:

Rob Kerr to Sol: "So have you broken her in yet?" (referring to Sol's new camera)
Sol (grinning) to Rob: "Yeah. I popped her cherry at a news conference yesterday."

- proving once again, that (male) photographers don't view their cameras as mere work tools, but rather as .... uhhh ... companions.

Equally surprising was also that most folks dished their images up in digital form. Which was damn lucky for me - for my old and trusty Sawyers Rotomatic 600 A slide projector of course picked this very day to croak ...

So to wrap it all up: Slideluck Potshow rules! Suggestions for next time's date and place are being taken now (email them to me). We're also looking for a fitting theme - something photographers can (but don't have to) abide by when selecting slides for their show. It can be nature-related, travel, political, whatever. Again, email me for suggestions.

Labels: photography