A Sigma lens more expensive than the Canon equivalent lens? Not possible, you say. Consider the new Sigma 50mm f/1.4 lens expected to be in retail shops in July. The lens effectively becomes an 80mm medium telephoto lens (35mm equivalent) on digital cameras with APS-C size image sensors.

The Sigma 50mm f/1.4 has a minimum focusing distance of 45cm (17.7”) and has maximum magnification of 1:7.4. A HSM (Hyper Sonic Motor) ensures a quiet and high-speed AF as well as full-time manual focus override.

The lens also features a 9 blade aperture with a f/22 minimum f-stop. The filter attachment size is 77 mm. Dimensions are 84.5mm × 68.2mm. Weight is 520g. It will be available with Sigma, Canon, Nikon, Pentax, and Sony mounts.

Sigma lists the following distinguishing characteristics:

• Standard lens with large maximum aperture of f/1.4
• Creates sharp images with high contrast and ensures superior peripheral brightness
• Incorporates molded glass aspherical lens, perfectly correcting coma aberration and creating superior image quality
• Super multi-layer lens coating reduces flare and ghosting
• Hyper Sonic Motor (HSM) ensuring silent, high-speed AF

Sounds good so far. However, the pre-order price (in stock) for the new Sigma 50mm f/1.4 is US$499.00 US$479.00 on Amazon USA.

Canon already has four 50mm lenses. They are listed below with prices from Amazon USA for comparison.

Canon EF 50mm f/1.2 L USM – US$1,300.00
Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM – US$325.00
Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II – US$89.74
Canon EF 50mm f/2.5 – US$255.98

Canon’s ‘plastic fantastic’, the f/1.8 version, has long been a favorite with budding Canon photographers thanks to it’s large aperture, pleasant bokeh and low price. However, it lacks the Canon USM motor and metal barrel causing more experienced photographers to go for the more expensive f/1.4 version.

Sigma’s HSM (Hyper Sonic Motor) is on par with Canon’s USM. The Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 is smaller at 73.8mm x 50.5mm, weighs less (290g), and has a low-cost 58mm filter size. Will the Sigma 50mm f/1.4 lens performance relative to the Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 justify the extra size/weight and a whopping US$174 price difference? In the end, performance will be the deciding factor for most photographers.

Note: Photos have already been posted on DPReview. Bokeh looks very smooth. You be the judge.

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Here’s a useful YouTube video on Travel Photography Tips from Nigel Atherton. Nigel has been a pro photographer for 10 years and a well-respected photojournalist since 1994. He is currently the Editor of several photography magazines including What Digital Camera?. He is also co-author of: An Illustrated A-Z of Digital Photography: People and Portraits (see link below).

Nearly 70,000 attendees descended on the Singapore EXPO June 19-22 for Asia’s largest infocomm and media trade exhibitions – CommunicAsia 2007 (running concurrently were EnterpriseIT, InteractiveDME and BroadcastAsia).

Of the total number of visitors, 50 percent were overseas visitors from over 100 countries across the Asia-Pacific region, as well as Europe, the USA and the Middle East. Spread over eight halls in the EXPO, nearly 2,500 exhibiting companies from 65 countries demonstrated solutions throughout the value chain of communication technologies. Singapore lead the show with the largest contingent of exhibiting companies. Made-in-Singapore technologies from local companies could be found in the Singapore Pavilion straddling Halls 2 and 3.

Chinese telecom equipment maker Huawei Technologies unveiled its current portfolio of 3G music phones targeting the music-savvy mobile users in Asia; while Korean handset maker, Samsung, showcased its latest phone from the Ultra Edition II series. LG made a big splash as usual with a massive booth staffed by 21 booth babes promoting the new phones from it’s Shine and Prada series. Models painted and dressed entirely in silver were available to take photos with customers.

A large number of new phone and gadget introductions were introduced by other companies as well. CNET Asia’s 5 top picks are as follows:

NTT DoCoMo P904i
Sony Ericsson W910i
Huawei U550
Samsung Ultra Edition 12.1 (U700)
LG KU950

You can click on the thumbnail of local favorite Kanny Theng at the booth of Saft Power Systems Pte. Ltd. More photos are in the gallery.

See also my write-up on CommunicAsia 2006.

The Thai government has banned access to Google’s YouTube website after it broadcast material critical of the country’s King… reports the BBC.

Thailand is everyone’s favorite destination for shopping, nightlife, beaches, etc. Easy-going Thais tolerate a wide-range of behavior from visitors arriving from all parts of the globe. There are exceptions, however, and the monarchy is one of them. The current King has achieved near cult status after nearly 57 years on the throne. Minor indiscretions such as putting your beer glass down on a Thai banknote will get you a quick reprimand. More egregious offenses will land you in the hoosegow.

Evidently, the Thai government asked Google to remove the offensive material and they declined. The ban in Thailand follows recent bans in Turkey, Brazil, and Iran …for separate issues.

Update June 25th, 2007: The ban has been lifted.

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Improvements in dSLR frame rates and buffer capacities have made time-lapse photography possible. One can then combine the images to emulate video. This is one of the best examples that I have seen. It was made with a Canon EOS 20D and some custom controllers. These scenes shot around LAX airport are really fantastic! The original can be found at 599 Productions. They are a new production company based out of the Los Angeles, California.

I have not tried it but apparently the Canon TC-80N3 Timer Remote Controller can used for time-lapse photography. However, better control is possible using a labtop, a USB cable and software such as Breeze Systems’ DSLR Remote Pro 1.3. For sustained time-periods, stick to small or medium-sized JPEGs.

Per the comment below, also check out GBTimelapse from Granite Bay Software.

A series of coordinated small explosions (6) have taken place around Bangkok, Thailand about 7pm today (Dec. 31st). News services have reported two deaths. Authorities are cancelling the traditional New Years Eve Countdown at the World Trade Center.

Two more small explosions went off around midnight causing minor injuries. While the larger public celebrations were canceled, most pubs and bars were packed as they usually are on New Years Eve. Two deaths are tragic indeed. However, contrast the media attention that the exposions received compared to the Dec. 31st highway death toll (179 275 persons) mostly the result of drunk driving.

In the photo shown here (clickable), a female impersonator (katoey) rings in the New Year at the King’s Corner Bar located on the infamous Patpong Road in Bangkok.

A Canon EOS 30D and Canon EF 17-40mm f/4 lens was used to take this photo. The camera was set at ISO 800 in the Av mode. The built-in flash was used to augment ambient light.

Note: Photography is generally not allowed in Patpong Bars. Exceptions are made for fashion and cabaret shows.

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This month’s issue (No. 37, 4/2006) of Asian Geographic magazine features images of Singapore taken in 1950s, 60s, and 70s by the late Yip Cheong Fun. Mr. Yip photographed people and places in both Singapore and Malaysia from the 1930s when he saved enough money to buy his first camera, a Rolleiflex, until his death in 1989 at age 86 (still clutching a camera). Mr. Yip was designated ‘Outstanding Photographer of the Century’ by the Photographic Society of New York in 1980 for `Rowing at Dawn’. He was conferred the coveted Cultural Medallion in 1984 by the Government of Singapore “in recognition of his artistic talent, creativity, and commendable achievement in Photography.”

His son, Andrew Yip, an accomplished poet among other achievements maintains a small shop in Singapore’s Chinatown – 48 Pagoda Street – in the Chinatown Heritage Centre. There you can buy prints of Yip Cheong Fun’s famous images made from the original negatives. In the photo above (clickable), Andrew is holding the print ‘Braving the rain – Kreta Ayer Road’. This image shows the indomitable courage and quiet determination of the women in Chinatown in the 1960s.

If you are a visitor or a local in Singapore, go down to Pagoda Street and pick up a few prints. Aside from their historical value, Mr. Yip’s photographs are well-taken. And, you’ll have a piece of history!

Yesterday at Photoshop World in Singapore, Adobe announced that the Windows beta version of Lightroom(TM) had just been posted on the Adobe Labs website. At the conference, Ton Frederiks (Senior Application Engineer Adobe Systems Benelux, Holland) spent about one hour showcasing Lightroom. It is clear that Lightroom is aimed at heading off Apple’s Aperture; already making inroads with Mac users.

I was impressed! Lightroom gives us a hint of what we might see when Photoshop v10 is released. It has a totally different architecture than other Adobe products. The standard top menu bar has been replaced with snazzy right and left sidebars with collapsing menus and slick sliders.

The ‘black tie’ color scheme seems to be the new trend in commercial software. The are many enhancements and additions compared to the Adobe Camera Raw plugin (ACR). For example, the usability of the curves adjustment has been greatly improved through the addition of luminance and compression sliders. A cool ‘lights off’ feature dims everything but the preview window. Also, grayscale conversion has new colorizing options. And if I heard correctly, history states are saved with the file.

Of course, the raw conversion engine will ultimately determine the success of Lightroom. Adobe has already announced that they will use the recently aquired Pixmantec conversion technology in Lightroom.

At the conference, Adobe was pushing their ‘digital negative’ raw format (DNG) as a solution to the ever growing list of proprietary raw formats. The rest of the conference could have titled, ‘Photoshop Tips and Tricks’. Ton Frederiks and Marianne Young (Solutions Engineer Adobe Systems, South East Asia) showed intermediate and advanced techniques for getting the most out of Photoshop. While Photoshop is the ‘killer app’ for professional photographers and graphic designers, it can be perplexing to even skilled users. Towards the end of day, Ton Frederiks got lost in a myriad of layer stacks, alpha channels, and masks. I don’t feel so bad anymore!

Reference Link
Adobe Lightroom at Amazon.com

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Robert was at CommunicAsia 2006 at the Singapore Expo this afternoon. OK, there’s not much there for the photographer unless you are really into mobile phones and devices. Still it’s a massive IT and telecommunications show with total visitors this year expected to top 47,000. I took my Canon EOS 30D and there was really no need for an official press pass. The models were more than willing to pose either with or without gadgets in their hands.

The only camera manufacturer with an exhibit was Sony. They had a pretty model stationed at the Cyber-shot booth demonstrating Cyber-shot cameras including the 7.2MP DSC-T30. See the thumbnail above. Their Sony Ericsson division was featuring their latest pair of cellular offerings – the K610i handset and a white edition of the W810i that will include i-mode. Both phones have 2MP cameras. The K610i has a standard VGA dual camera. The camera in the W810i, however, comes with autofocus, a 4x zoom and flash. Cool!

Samsung announced a new line of ultra slim mobile phones at the show. Dubbed the ‘Ultra Edition” the line-up includes these phones:

Ultra Edition 6.9 (X820)
Ultra Edition 12.9 (D900)
Ultra Edition 9.9 (D830)

The X820 include a 2MP camera while the D900 is packing 3.1MP (2048×1536 pixels + video). They had a section of their exhibit demonstrating streaming television and movies on specially equipped phones.

LG had a huge exhibit packed with pretty models for the launch of their Chocolate Special Edition. The ‘Chocolate Zone’ was themed around their premium Chocolate Phone, which has become incredibly popular because of its sleek design and sophisticated technology. In addition to the Chocolate Phone, they showed phones with cutting edge features such as 5MP cameras, digital mobile TV (DVB-H, MediaFLO, T-DMB, and S-DMB), and Bluetooth stereo capability.

Motorola was heavily promoting new color editions of their mobile phones. New phones announced at CommunicAsia 2006 included a color V3x, new colors for the W375, and new colors for the W208. Pretty models were wearing skin-tight body suits in the same colors as the phones.

Click on the thumbnail for more photos from CommunicAsia 2006.

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In Asia, you can still find extreme religious festivals either forgotten or banned in other parts of the world. Local photographer and good friend, Stuart Clyne, recently traveled to San Pedro Cutud (San Fernando), Philippines to shoot the annual Good Friday re-enactment of Christ’s final hours. The Lenten ritual drew a large crowd this year that was estimated at about 30,000 including 400 police and volunteer guards.

Scores of penitents, inflicting self-flagellations using glass-spiked leather thongs on their bare backs, trail a “Christ”, a Filipino penitent, who bears a heavy wooden cross during the trek to the makeshift Golgotha (calvary). Upon arriving, the women kneel at the feet of the makeshift cavalry and wail a version of the Gospel of Seville Passion. Spectators watched devotees being crucified in batches, their palms and feet attached to the crosses with 10-centimeter nails soaked in alcohol to prevent infection. Some repeat the ritual year after year. This year’s ‘Christ’ was on the cross for his 20th time.

Some reasons penitents give for enduring the crucifixion include asking for forgiveness for their sins, praying for peace, and asking for good fortune. The Catholic Church disapproves of these acts and distances itself from them saying it is a misrepresentation of the faith.

Stuart shot under the hot sun all day with a Canon EOS 30D and a Canon EF-S 10-22mm lens. He also carried a back-up body, a Canon EOS 300D with Canon EF 24-70mm lens. A preferential vantage point was difficult to find, so Stuart tried and succeeded in registering with local authorities at the last minute to gain access to the enclosure. Click on the thumbnail to go to Stuart’s PBase galleries for this event.