BTM_Pix

It will use Bluetooth LE to communicate with my controller so a smartphone app could equally be used. My personal view of that though is that its a bit of an overkill way to do it, especially considering the size and cost of the smartphone even though you might already have it. Using something like a small Bluetooth LE controller (a keyfob sized remote control similar to smartphone shutter release for example) is, to me at least, a better way to control it as the beauty of doing it that way is you don't have to fire up an app on the smartphone so its a bit more instant, not to mention tactile ? There'll be options for both though.

I quite like this folding one. It folds down to about 6 inches wide for travel and is both USB and bluetooth so you can use it wired with the F8n or wireless with your iOS devices when you're using the app so its a very flexible device. I used to have a similar one in my bag permanently as my old MacBook had a tendency to throw its hand in keyboard wise when it got damp (which it would frequently do pitch side in English winters. And English springs, summers and autumns ) and it was a god send. http://amzn.eu/grqeFFy

The Sony 400mm f2.8 is a shot across the bows rather than a direct hit below the waterline for Nikon and Canon. It takes away the single non-negotiable denial of entry point for Sony into professional sports but the A9 itself will still hold them up for now. The fps thing is a bit of a red herring by the way because it can only hit that using the electronic shutter (which has known issues with LED ad boards at stadiums) and can actually only do 5fps with the mechanical shutter. There are a number of other factors like infrastructure and other mundane stuff that all add to the difference between it being something with a fantastic spec and something which is actually then used and adopted in real professional environments. The next version of the A9 though might well be the one if Nikon and Canon don't pull their fingers out.

This will get you far closer to that as it will track the aperture (and shutter speed if you wanted it to I suppose) and you then set a conservative limit on the auto ISO so it will constantly be doing the offset without large changes in the ISO. You would deliberately set the base exposure to be a stop or two away ISO wise from the limit you'd set for the auto ISO so it had some range above and below to work in. For example, if your base exposure is 1/50th, f4 and ISO640 then you'd set up the ND to add enough to make that exposure at ISO320 instead and set the auto ISO limit to be ISO800. That will take care of a reasonable change in light as the auto ISO can range above and below that point and the ND will track the changes from the aperture point of view to keep that initial base exposure constant as far as the auto ISO can see. It depends on how much swing you expect to have within a single shooting scenario but configuring it like that would take away a lot of manual intervention. It can be done exactly like that now with any ND either fixed or variable but the difference is in the tracking of changing aperture which would otherwise require a manual change in ND level. Otherwise you'd be looking at a Sony FS5 which will work in full auto mode as it has a built in variable electronic ND. No, what I've done here isn't groundbreaking or original so manufacturers are able to do this themselves if they want and, as above, cameras like the FS5 already do. This is more about being able to add that style of functionality to any camera, especially when integrated with my controller, and at a reasonable price. As I say, it depends on how changeable conditions are going to be within the same shooting period but I think its possible to get pretty close with an ND filter that can track aperture changes. Or take the full creative control option and buy an FS5

Nicely done.

What I was referring to regarding the stops was measured stepping between values. If you want it to be user variable (there are 256 steps of adjustment) then it can be like that but from a control point of view it makes it easier to use if those steps are divided between stops as tied to the exposure you are setting on the camera using the controller. So if you set your base setting of f4 at 1/50th then when you changed to f2.8 or f5.6 it would automatically turn the ND up and down to maintain the same exposure. I'll give some thought to the interface for a standalone on regarding variable control. Probably a small joystick (like the controllers on a PSVITA) would work best I think. No, the box its in is purely to hold it while I was developing the code to control it. Its actually a cut up cardboard box from a USB power bank with a Cokin flat filter adapter grafted on to get it on to a lens as they were what was within my eye line when I was doing it! The filter itself is as thin as a regular filter. As a standalone unit it will obviously need some electronics to drive it so it will all be contained within a frame but it will be nowhere near as big as what you can see on the, erm, carefully constructed and lovingly sculpted housing its currently in.

Nice shot. It isn't necessary if you want to do it in post, no. It is more usual to get ND for free as it were by using low ISO (though I have used NDs for twilight traffic shots with wider apertures to get the exposure down to get effective streaks) but NDs can still often be necessary if you want to avoid diffraction if you have to step the lens down too far to make the exposure. The standard method now might be to use Photoshop but I'm an old git The ghosting is dependent on just how long you are prepared to make the exposure and I've seen some that are measured in minutes rather than seconds where its imperceptible. It throws up a load of other problems with trees and clouds of course which they then have to fix in Photoshop anyway so..... Agreed that it is becoming less of an issue with more recent cameras but I still have quite a few cameras in my collection that don't go beyond 1/4000th though and even those that do can't always make the exposure without some ND. Case in point even from yesterday is the SD Quattro for the DNG that @mercer wanted where I was also using a 1.4 lens but couldn't open it beyond 2.8 because of the light here in Spain and the camera maxing out at 1/4000th. This would've been your second 1/8000th at f2 shot and I think I only posses one camera that could've made a 1.4 exposure in that light (albeit with electronic shutter) which would be the X-T2 so while we've gained recently on the one hand with faster shutters we've lost on the other with faster lenses and a thirst for shallow depth of field. Of course I didn't follow my own advice and happily wandered out of the house without an ND filter (or sunscreen) Having said all that.... I wouldn't buy my own device for stills either as it is sledgehammer to crack a nut when there are enough existing cheaper and more appropriate solutions.

Yeah, I tried that a bit later and it just does the media offline thing. It didn't crash though so there is that 12.5 was suffering from my 'upgrade' to High Sierra. I swear I was only walking for about 90 seconds from my house so I'm pretty sure I was still in Spain but you know how time becomes elastic with advancing years No problem, it'll have to be tomorrow though as I'm out, erm, 'refuelling' at the moment.

Well that was a rabbit hole... I went out and took a few frames (of flowers obviously as I don't have a cat) and importing them crashed Resolve. I thought it was because I had an older version so I downloaded and installed the latest one. Still crashes it. So that would be a no ! Lightroom, Afinity Photo, Aperture etc opened it without issue.

The protruding wires are an essential part of my design brand DNA though

I haven't but let me go outside and take a picture of something and let you know Hang on....

The difference is in the remote control of it - especially if the camera is on a gimbal or jib - as part of the overall camera remote control system rather than just saving the manual turning of a variable ND (though I am lazy enough to think that an advantage as well ). So this means saving and recalling instantly with the rest of the settings but more importantly the auto tracking feature that maintains your exposure precisely when changing apertures rather than you having to adjust it manually (with the usual overshoots and re-adjustment as vari NDs don't have fixed points between individual settings). With regard to putting it inside a mount, I referenced the Aputure device and I think its a great solution but limits the mount options as it terminates in MFT and E mount only and isn't particularly cheap. The choice of terminating mounts is by and large fine because MFT and E mount cameras are ones that a lot of people use but it rules out other mounts that people use such as EOS-M, Nikon and even EF itself. Its also an either/or situation with a speed booster as you can't have both and if you have an MFT and an E mount camera you need to buy one for each. By putting the ND on the lens we can avoid all of that and you can use say a Canon lens on an MFT mount speed boosted, a full frame E mount without booster or on an EF system all with the same variable ND functionality. As for swapping it between lenses, the final form is unknown but if its a square format then it will drop into a matte box or Cokin style holder or via a magnetic filter hold system so it shouldn't be too painful. The halfway house solution though is to put it in lens adapters that terminate in different mounts other than MFT and E mount to provide a more flexible halfway house between something like the Lens Throttle and the Aputure. It will likely be cheaper than $200 as a front mounted system and certainly less than that within a mount.

The regular one. There was a used one at a daft price on my Japan trip and some equally cheap used lenses. The H one has a bit of a drawback (aside from the much higher price especially against used regular ones) in that lenses like the 18-35 vignette on it. The annoying thing is that the only mount converter you can get is an M42 one. Thats not a disaster in and of itself because there are tons of affordable great lenses from yesteryear in M42 but it would be great if you could get a C/Y or Nikon adapter. Leitax do a mount replacement for Leica R lenses but that then restricts you to only using the lenses on the SA mount. With a bit of fiddling and snipping you can mount PK lenses on it which opens up the possibility of using the PK mount as a conduit for other lenses via a C/Y to PK adapter etc. but its not something I've tried. The smart route really if you shoot video on Sony is to buy SA mount versions of the ART lenses and use the SA version of the MC-11 to put them on e mount. The SA versions of the ART lenses tend to pop up used or ex-demo at dealers for cheaper as well. As for the camera itself ? If you absorb the Foveon way and accept and work within those parameters (i.e. slow everything) then its a bit of a monster. Being able to use lenses with IS addresses one part of the slow though and it having the option to write DNG so you can have a workflow that doesn't include Sigma's own processing app addresses another part of it as well. Its build solidly, has great ergonomics and just feels like a proper camera.

I've seen enough waterfall, river and night time traffic headlight streak shots to suggest that they do They're also useful as a device to take out people in shots of busy sites with long exposures in daylight. People using faster lenses shooting wide open on cameras in bright light that don't have a high enough shutter speed to make the exposure is another one. By and large though, they aren't necessarily looking for variable ones but grads and big stoppers so, yes, they are already covered far more cheaply and compactly. For adapted lenses there is a really good solution for EOS to E mount (and MFT but its less so because of the crop) from Aputure that has both a variable electronic ND and a follow focus in it. It just needs that missing link of AF really which now there are companies like Viltrox (as well as Sigma) making cheap AF adapters might actually happen but I don't know where Aputure are at with it as an ongoing product. Having it in front of the lens in the form factor of a 4x4 filter is a way to get it for every lens native type on every system which is where I want to head with it but its not without its challenges. From a hardware and software control point of view its complete but I need to source some bigger pieces of the glass to sort out the optical end so its a way off yet. In its current format its too early to draw any conclusion. Light leaks and reflections inside the case are skewing things but to be honest it was just a way to hold it in front of a lens in some sort of sensible manner while I wrote the control code. Its as much a proof of concept and a component test in its current form so saying it gets darker and brighter on command is about all I'll commit to at this moment in time performance wise

I very much doubt that ! I bet you Einstein hasn't just forced an EOS to F mount adapter on to one of his favourite lenses so badly that he had to spend 2 hours cutting it off ! Would Albert have used an EOS to F adapter though? Probably more an E to MC kind of a guy.

So... I've been messing around with making a new add on for my controller system and this is it in its embryonic (cardboard and electrical taped chassis) form. It has 3 dedicated keys on the controller for incrementing and decrementing in stops (it goes to about 95% total blackout) and a clear function. Though this is not a full clear as there is about a half stop of ND at the lowest position. The level of reduction is actually fully variable but for the implementation I'm after it makes more sense to control it in stops. As with the other functions, it can be recalled within one of the 8 one touch recall global presets along with exposure, white balance and picture settings. I've also incorporated an automatic aperture tracking function. This means that you set the exposure and ND level that you want at a given stop (say f8) and it will adjust the amount of ND up and down as the aperture changes to keep the exposure constant at any aperture. Right, thats the good news out of the way.... The bad news is that the surface area is going to need to be a lot bigger (these things are usually mounted at the back of the lens but I'm after a front mounting solution for flexibility) to work properly. Quite a bit bigger and unfortunately that will mean quite a lot more expensive. The question is how big and how expensive would this be before you wouldn't want it, if you even want it at all? (currently its part of my controller system but I've already ported it to a small micro controller to have it be a standalone as well). The other question is would you want it within a lens adapter solution anyway rather than it being front mounted (as per the Lens Throttle EF to MFT) so it could be an electronically controlled version of one of those ?

I have an SD Quattro and the snout is not only big enough to contain a variable ND but the chicken dinner as well.

I am and I don't. But yes we are niche bordering on endangered species.

This is how I envisage Sony's planning meetings concluding for every version of the RX100

Full speculation mode on and all that but if they are both FF as its being suggested, I presumed at first that this means the 25mp would be the D5 equivalent for low light and throughput and the 45mp would be the D850 equivalent. But the price and the 9fps makes that seem doubtful, which would suggest that there may not be a plugin D5 (or even D500) replacement in the first wave. Which makes me wonder how good (or likely not) the AF is going to be for existing lenses via the adapter. Just speculation on a rumour of course but I think there'll be mirrors flapping for a while longer in Nikon cameras aimed at the D5/D500 user.

I think the cats are pissing on the cameras as some sort of unionised protest against being used as unpaid talent in every camera test on YouTube.

Unless you've got a cat http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?168589-The-Affect-of-Cat-Pee-On-RED-Accessories-(You-ll-want-to-read-this)

Ikea Malm chests of drawers. They're very solid and the drawers are deep, wide and tall enough to accommodate everything. I have a dedicated drawer for Nikon for work and then a draw for mirrorless, a draw for audio and a draw for live video. I use a combination of their dividers for making custom shapes for the longer lenses and the padded divider cases like these from Amazon. I store these in logical sets for different types of jobs I'm going out on and then that way I can just pull them out and put them into real camera backpacks, or Peli cases depending on what it is and where I'm going. On top of the Malm unit I also have a set of 18 plastic drawers for filters, lens adapter, straps, rig components, batteries, media, IT etc Its surprisingly well ordered but still doesn't stop me tipping the place upside down looking for stuff every time I'm doing something. Of course, we mustn't forget my DIY battery charging station

The publishers of the Michelin guide ?

If you are looking for a reasonably low cost way of getting into recording ASMR then the Roland CS10-EM combined binaural microphone/headphones is a decent option. They are around £80 and are also ideal for recording general atmos for your regular films too. As you wear them like headphones, they are pretty stealthy and of course as they actually are headphones then you get to monitor the audio as well into the bargain. If you have a look on YouTube there are a lot of ASMR videos recorder with them.