Clear Dark Sky: Accurate Cloud Cover and Visibility Forecasts for Photogs

The website Clear Dark Sky has been mentioned in a few tutorials posted here on PetaPixel, but if you’ve never heard of this incredible weather resource for photographers you’re in for a real treat.

Clear Dark Sky is a weather reference tool built for astronomers but used extensively by photographers. It does exactly what its name suggests: it predicts sky conditions for a given location at a given time. Look up the spot where you’d like to photograph the night sky (either by keyword or by typing in the coordinates) and you’ll be greeted by a chart that looks like this:

This chart shows you how much cloud cover there is (the darker the color, the clearer the sky), how much light you’re getting from the moon (Darkness), and even how water vapor in the air (Transparency) and air turbulence (Seeing) will affect your ability to resolve detail in the sky—all broken down into blocks by time.

But the site doesn’t stop with this info. There are a bunch of extra tools at your disposal like a light pollution map, sun and moon data, and a star map. And if you click on any of the colored blocks in your chart, a full map will pop up showing you the expected conditions at that time, overlaid onto the location.

Clear Dark Sky should be a part of every diligent night sky photographer’s location scouting and preparation workflow. Check it out for yourself here.

(via Fstoppers)

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Meyer-Optik Releases 3-Element 95mm f/2.6 Lens for Portrait Shooters

Meyer-Optik is on a hot streak—releasing lens, after lens, after special edition lens—and the newest piece of glass to get a USA release is their Trimagon 95mm f/2.6: a “dynamic modern lens” that features a simple 3-element design.

The Trimagon shouldn’t be confused with the 100mm and 50mm Trioplan lenses Meyer-Optik has released previously. Notably, this lens does not boast the Trioplan’s iconic “soap bubble bokeh.” It is, instead, a portrait lens for those “who value artistic composition,” features unique lens coatings and high-quality glass to reduce flare, and boasts “a pleasing circular bokeh” produced by its 15 aperture blades.

Meyer-Optik is also touting the lens’ sharpness, claiming it “is suitable for resolutions from 60 million pixels and even more.” And Alexander Henry, a photographer and author who has been shooting with the lens, said the lens, “significantly reduces the amount of post-production required.”

The manual focus only Trimagon 95mm f/2.6 was already released in Germany, but is now available in the US of A in Canon, Nikon, Fuji X, Sony E, MFT, and Leica M mounts for $1,700. Learn more about the lens or purchase one for yourself over on the Meyer-Optik website.

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Watch This: Rare Interview with Iconic Fashion Photographer Bill Cunningham

The passing of iconic New York Times photographer Bill Cunningham has been met with an outpouring of affection, remembrances, and more than a few tears. He was, in every sense of the word, an icon. And today we’re thrilled to share with you an incredibly rare interview with the humble, soft-spoken, and deeply-missed photographer.

The 2014 interview was made available to the public yesterday by 92y, part of their Fashion Icons series with Fern Mallis that is typically only available on demand. Fifteen minutes of introduction is followed by a full hour and a half of conversation.

It’s an interview Mallis had to all but beg for, and even then she only got it when Bill accidentally bumped her, causing her to spill her drink on a new dress. The horrified Cunningham, wracked with guilt—he had never made such a faux pas in over 40 years of shooting—told Mallis he would do “anything” to make it up to her. Mallis secured this interview.

Further introduction is unnecessary. If you’re a fashion photography fan, a street photography fan, or even just a fan of the enigmatic Bill Cunningham, you’ll click play up top without further ado.

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Testing the 2004 Epson R-D1: The World’s First Digital Rangefinder

When you hear the name “Epson” you probably think of printers, but if you’ve been around cameras long enough, you may just remember the Epson R-D1: the world’s first digital rangefinder and one of the coolest cameras that never got its due.

The folks at TheCameraStoreTV have been dying to get their hands on this camera for ages, and they finally found someone who would let them borrow his. Released in March 2004 before Leica debuted their digital M8, it’s an M-mount camera with Cosina Voigtlander roots, a 6MP APS-C CCD sensor and, as you get to see in the video, a lot to recommend it.

For film enthusiasts, the R-D1 is probably the closest you can get to a film experience on a digital camera. Center-weighted metering that’s easily fooled, no live view, and a shutter you have to physically cock between shots are just a few of the features that will force an R-D1 user to slow way down.

And if that’s not enough, there are the dials (or gauges or whatever you want to call them). They are, in a word, spectacular. Retro in a way that modern takes on “retro” haven’t yet touched:

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Now this might all sound a bit too much like hipsterlike adoration for a camera that is literally and unapologetically “vintage”, but the R-D1 deserves all the praise and admiration it gets in this video. And despite the fact that it never really sold well, TCS’s Chris Niccolls isn’t wrong when he says “modern manufacturers could learn heaps from this camera.”

Check out the full video up top and let us know what you think of the R-D1 in the comments down below.

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The Affordable Sigma 30mm f/1.4 is the Best E-Mount Lens DxO Has Tested

This is a big week for new top-tier gear at DxOMark. First, they crowned the Canon 1D X Mark II the best Canon sensor they’ve ever tested, and now the affordable Sigma 30mm f/1.4 DC DN Contemporary has been named DxO’s top-ranking Sony E-Mount prime.

The full review dropped earlier today, and if you’re looking for a super-sharp lens for your Sony E-Mount APS-C camera, you need look no further. According to DxOMark, the Sigma 30mm f/1.4 DN is “an excellent standard prime option for Sony E-mount cameras and ranks at the top for all lenses we’ve tested on the A6000.”

That might seem like a “so what?” statement at first blush… but then you see the price difference between this lens and the competition it outperformed. The Zeiss 32mm f/1.8 costs $720 and Sony’s 35mm f/1.8 is currently on sale for $400, but both fell short of the $340 Sigma. Not only does the Sigma have a wider aperture, DxO says it’s, “sharper in the center and more consistent across the frame.”

If you’re a Sony E-Mount owner and you’ve not yet purchased a lens in the 30mm range (45mm equivalent), it looks like you’ve got a very easy choice ahead of you. Check out the full lens review and dive into the specific performance of this lens here.

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