Visual Serendipity. Pretty Twins.

 

Discovering Oman and the United Arab Emirates. 101 Views.

 
Here’s a somewhat random selection of 101 images from a recent trip to the United Arab Emirates and Oman. From photographing the Royal Suite at a 7-star hotel, navigating Gold and Spices Souks, getting lost at Fish Markets, and witnessing the Arabian desert, abandoned copper mines and traditional Omani Bullfighting, I had a truly fantastic experience.

About half of these images were shot with the new Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 camera and the Panasonic Lumix G X Vario 12-35mm F2.8 ASPH Power OIS lens. I had plenty of time to play with the camera and will be posting my “review” and impressions here in a couple of days.

Feel free to click on any image to enjoy a much larger PhotoShelter slideshow.

Middle East – Images by Eduardo Angel

Visual Serendipity. Seeing Double.

 

Random Unpublished Images.

 
I was looking for something else, and realized that I had a ton of relatively new, unpublished images. I grabbed 40 from my PhotoShelter unpublished galleries to share with you today. I hope you like them.

Around the World II – Images by Eduardo Angel

Visual Serendipity.

 

The iconic Empire State Building as seen from the also iconic New York Public Library’s Main Reading Room.

Meet the Alpa 12 FPS. The Ultimate Open Platform.

 
The Alpa “12 FPS” (for Focal Plane Shutter) is the best example of both “modular” and “open platform” we have seen. The concept is fairly simple: take a small sliding back adapter and attach a digital “brain.” In reality, it is obviously way more complicated than that.

On the front, the system can take virtually any lens (with the corresponding adapter), including Nikon and Canon lenses, Hasselblad V, Mamiya M, Leica S, view camera lenses from Schneider and Rodenstock, and even Cine lenses from Zeiss.

On the Back, the system works with pretty much any Medium Format Digital Back. What makes this system unique and brilliant is not only the amazing flexibility but the “brain” that can be configured to control shutter speed, aperture, bracketing, (even for HDR) and flash-sync. I was told that the very well finished prototype I saw was finished just hours before Photokina started.

The system configuration I played with had the FPS body, a Leaf Digital Back with a Zeiss 21mm CP.2 lens and was being triggered with Pocket Wizards…a true digital Frankenstein!

I can see an important demand for this system from landscape and architectural photographers, as well as rental houses all over the world. More images and complete tech specs are available here. If you are truly interested, here are the prices.

UPDATE 20121207 We attended a great event this week by Andre Oldani at Foto Care and learned a lot of new and interesting things. Just a couple of months after we first saw the FPS system at Photokina, Alpa has clearly worked hard and fast to finalize some loose ends and deliver a truly impressive platform.

These are a couple of images from Oldani’s presentation.