Moon Over Bourbon Street

Zürich, Erlenbach, 2013-12-09. With Sony Nex-5R and Nikkor 300mm f/2.8 AI-s.

Moon over Bourbon street-Sting

Thalwil at Night

2013-11-24. With Sony Nex-5R and Leica Summicron 50mm f/2.

Wuff

Zurich - Erlenbach, 2013-10-31. With Sony Nex-5R and Minolta MD 135mm f/3.5.

Touch God

Zürich, 2013-10-28.

With Sony Nex-5R and Minolta MD 50mm f/1.7 (my very first lens:).

Full-Frame Camera Mind Share

For the ones not into digital photography, full-frame is today's name for a digital sensor size that has the same size as the effective picture size of the traditional 35 mm film rolls. If you subtract the perforations of the 35 mm film at the top and bottom, then a 36x24 mm area remains for each photo.

With the advent of the digital sensors, such big sensors had been too expensive to produce in the beginning. The bigger the area of the sensor the higher the chance a single pixel is corrupt, resulting in much lower yield rates in production.

The standard sensor size for DSLR (digital single-lens reflex cameras) has therefore become the so called APS-C image size, which is 24x16 mm. Most DSLRs use sensors of this format. BTW, each side of the full-frame format is 1.5 times bigger than for APS-C format. But the area of a full-frame sensor is 2.25 times as big as an APS-C sensor (OK, you do the math).

Since the advent of the Canon 5D, digital cameras with the bigger 36x24 mm sensor size have become available and affordable for serious enthusiasts and of course professional photographers.

I took a look at a Flickr statistic and summed up the average daily users (as of 2013-10-09) who use a full-frame camera:

http://www.flickr.com/cameras/

I use this as a proxy for possible market share of different manufacturers. Of course, this is just a rough idea, so lets call it the market mind share instead.

The Leica M9 actually is closer to USD 10'000 then 1'000. So it is no surprise, it has only marginal usage.

But what is also obvious, Sony has also only minuscule usage numbers. If we look only at the currently produced models, it becomes even more severe for Sony (BTW, Sony took over the camera business of Konica Minolta, which by itself took over the Minolta system).

And Nikon is catching up with Canon big time.

Who is missing completely on this list is Pentax. It has a digital medium format, which is even bigger in size then full-frame. However, besides this it has only APS-C cameras and had so big business problems, that they got bought by Hoya and then resold to Ricoh.

Who is also absent is Olympus. They today don't even produce cameras of APS-C sensor size, but years ago have opted for an even smaller image size (the Micro Four Third and formerlay Four Third format).

But the list also can change considerably very soon, as Sony is shortly before introducing new cameras without the traditional mirror box. It has a mount it uses for its smaller size mirrorless Nex line, the E-Mount. The Nex uses an electronic view finder or alternatively a back screen like a compact camera. There is no mechanical mirror needed anymore. That also allows to make the so called flange range, the distance of the mount from the sensor/film pane, much much shorter. Without a mirror in between, there is a lot of space that can be safed.

But also, that space can also be filled with a simple tube or adapter to create the exact flange range of some other traditional mount from Canon, Nikon or whomever.

That way any lens from any manufacturer can be used on a camera. And should this camera have a full frame sensor, these lenses would be used the way they were initially designed.

So lets wait and see when and with what Sony will come out and how it will change the camera circuit.

Fear Fork

(click to enlarge)

*For your daily dose of Dadaism...

With Sony Nex-5R and Olympus OM 90mm f/2 Macro.

Forest and Field Floret

(click to enlarge)

"Im Schatten sah ich
Ein Blümchen stehn.
Wie Sterne leuchtend,
Wie Äuglein schön."



(click to enlarge)

Appenzell, 2013-07-07

With Sony Nex-5R and Nikkor 35mm f/1.4 AI-s.

Nikkor Collection

(click into image to enlarge)

Starring from left to right in the foreground:

Nikkor 35mm f/1.4 AIS
Nikkor 55mm f/1.2 pre-AI
Nikkor 105mm f/2.5 AIS.

In the backgroud, lenses seen inside the foreground lenses, left to right:

Nikkor 28mm f/2.8 AIS (only its aluminum ring )
Nikkor 24mm f/2.0 AIS
PC-Nikkor 28mm f/4.0
Nikkor 24mm f/2.0 AIS (again same lens as seen to the left)

And for completeness sake, here is the whole gang:

Both pictures taken with Sony Nex-5R and Minolta MD 28mm f/2.8.

P.S. And there is a Minolta collection as well... I just hope I will never get the Leica bug.

Saturday Shopping

With Zara, 2013-06-22.


And the Sony Nex-5 and Nikkor 24mm f/2.0.

Red Poppy

Klatschmohn in Kohlkaul, Klausgarten, 2013-06-06.

With Sony Nex-5 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.4 Ai-s.

Deutsch Kinderleicht

Der, Die, Das.
Wer, Wie, Was.

Wieso, Weshalb, Warum.
Wer nicht fragt bleibt dumm.


Sesamstrasse - Ernie and Bert: Out and In
Lulatsch und das Krümelmonster: Here and There

Jim Knopf und Lukas der Lokomotivführer》）是德国孩的最 (Die Augsburger Puppenkiste)
Von Michael Ende

Der Räuber Hotzenplotz

Mit Gerd Fröbe.

Konstanz Bokeh

(click to enlarge)
Konstanz, 2013-05-10, with Sony Nex-5 and Nikkor 35mm f/1.4 AI-s.

Zürcher Schärfentiefe

Two depth of field exercises (with more, or less - last year for Marcel G.)...


From the entrance hall of the ETH Zürich main building, on 2012-09-14 (with Sony Nex-5 and Minolta MD 35mm f/2.8).


The small model at the Zürich Grossmünster church on 2012-09-15 (with Panasonic G2 and Olympus 9-18mm f/4-5.6).

BTW, Schärfentiefe is German for depth of field, in German also often called Tiefenschärfe. That last word doesn't make much sense however, language wise, as it would mean something along sharpness of depth, instead of the other way around. Like Dickenscheibe instead of Scheibendicke (die Dicke der Scheibe vs. die Scheibe der Dicke), it's just not the same etc. However, if a word is used long enough by enough people, it doesn't need to make sense anymore, it's just a new word (and everybody knows - Stundenkilometer [or Stuckis] is another one)...

Oh, and ironically, in English there is also depth of focus, which sounds more directly a translation of the German word to me, however, it again means something slightly different and is also sometimes falsely used instead of depth of field.

OK, genug der Belehrung:o).

Opera Ball

Zurich Opera House, 2012-09-22.

With Sony Nex-5 and Nikkor 105mm f/2.5 Ai.

Meiyintang Collection

Museum Rietberg, Zurich

2013-03-24, with Panasonic G2 and Minolta MD 50mm f/1.4.

UBS Late At Night

UBS Private Banking building at Paradeplatz, Zurich, 2013-03-09.

With Sony Nex-5 and PC-Nikkor 35mm f/2.8 non-Ai.

Go, Baduk, Weiqi

In Bonn-Beuel, 2013-02-23.



(With Sony Nex-5 and Nikkor 24mm f/2.0 Ai-s.)

Wednesday Lunch Walk

View from Hotel zum Storchen, Grossmünster in the background.


UBS next to Paradeplatz.

(Sony Nex-5 with Nikkor 24mm f/2.0 Ai-s.)

Tuesday Lunch Walk

Tuesday Lunch Walk

Da spring is coming! Do you know where the frozen spring in the background is?


Hey boss, little dove, how was your lunch!?

(with Sony Nex-5 and Nikkor 24mm f/2.0 Ai-s)