Photo Accessory News

Among our favorite portable hard drives for backing up photos on the road are the sleek and mobile My Passport line from WD. To celebrate the 10^th anniversary of these little drives, WD just unveiled the My Passport Ultra – Metal Edition and the My Passport Ultra Anniversary Edition drives, which feature new designs in different colors.

Manfrotto Distribution recently introduced the latest addition to Lastolite’s popular line of photography products: Out of Focus Backgrounds. So, in other words, you don’t need to shoot wide open with a fast aperture lens to create a blurred bokeh background look when shooting portraits. Just stand your subject in front of a Lastolite Out of Focus Background and shoot.

Tamron recently added the SP 150-600mm f/5-6.3 Di VC USD (A011 for Nikon mount) and the 16-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II VC PZD macro (B016 for Canon and Nikon mount) to the lens profile for aberration correction offered for Adobe’s Photoshop CC, Camera Raw and Lightroom 5. The lens profile will be bundled with the Camera Raw 8.5 update and Lightroom 5.5. Customers who use these lenses will be able to utilize the software for easy correction of lens distortion, chromatic aberration and peripheral light fall-off based on design data.

I’ve had to replace a failing computer hard drive more often than I’d care to remember. Fortunately, I’ve learned my lesson: my workstation now includes external drives as both backup and primary storage. I routinely move content from the computer onto one external drive and back up to a second drive. (I usually prefer to transfer memory card files first to the computer, so that my backups will include these; then I move those files to the external drive when a project is completed, making sure that they are synced to Lightroom.) Unfortunately, the cost of all this may amount to the price of a second camera body or new lens, but it’s money well spent, as you’ll realize the first time a drive goes down.

Hoya PROND Neutral Density Filters
Created with still photography and HD-SLR video in mind, the new line of Hoya PROND filters (2 to 6, 6 2/3, 7 2/3, 9, and 10 stops) use ACCU-ND technology to provide a true neutral color balance that does not add any noticeable color cast to your images while effectively reducing the amount of light entering the lens. The filters feature a low-profile one-piece aluminum frame and clear optical glass with a metallic ACCU-ND coating on the front and back. The filter rests securely over the lens, parallel to the sensor, and can also be used with super-wide-angle lenses.

Rogue Safari Pop-Up Flash Booster
Designed for use with most modern Canon APS-C or Nikon DX sensor cameras with telephoto zoom lenses (100mm and longer), the Rogue Safari Pop-Up Flash Booster is lightweight and easy to use. This attachment concentrates the light from the camera’s pop-up flash to provide more illumination on subjects as far as 60 to 70 feet away. The light adds up to 8x more than what the unassisted flash provides. Crafted from durable impact-resistant polycarbonate materials, the Rogue Safari Pop-Up Flash Booster does not require batteries and has a retail price of $34.95.

Rokinon recently introduced their 16mm T2.2 Cine lens, a wide-angle lens for D-SLR and mirrorless cameras in both APS-C and Micro Four Thirds formats. With its fast maximum aperture, the lens allows for an impressive range of depth of field and with its smooth operating manual focus, it offers high sharpness and clarity. It features de-clicked apertures and follow focus compatibility that is ideal for video. It uses 13 optical elements in 11 groups with two aspherical lenses. Rokinon provides a wide range of mounts for Canon, Canon M, Fujifilm X, Nikon, Pentax, Samsung NX, Sony, Sony E, and Micro Four Thirds cameras.