Another example of what SFX is capable of. A nice dramatic monochrome conversion, maybe I was a little heavy handed on this one, but that was the look I was after. I've also exagerated the vignetting somewhat to guide the viewers eye to the center of the image. Nicwe little trick that works on most images even if the vignetting is not so pronounced as in this image.

My true love is photographing landscapes much like the image above. I'm not saying I'm any good at it but that's the sort of photography I love doing. This was taken in the Dolomite region of Italy and for those who have never been there, you should go. Amazing lanscapes to be photographed and scenes that you will never forget. Unfortunately this was quite a hazy day but when your up that mountain at 3000m you really don't care. Some people never get to see these scenes from this height and it really saddens me because I believe everyone should get the chance to see things from a different perspective. When you're up there and just look around, you realise just how small we really are.

Taken with the mZD 75-300 at 171mm and f8. Converted with Nik SFXII, the best converter on the market today.

What an excellent lens this is. Much prefer it over the Panasonic 100-300. This was taken at 75 at f8. I'll be posting some shots taken at 300mm soon so watch out for those. Yes, it's dearer than the Panasonic but well worth it in my opinion.

This isn't so much about the camera lens combination but more about the image format. I think this is the first trip I have ever made only using the squre format for 90% of my images. I like it, I can compose easier that with the 3:2 format (which I dislike) and even better than using the 4:3 format. The only other format I used quite a bit was the 16:9 because I wanted to get that panorama feeling to the images.

If you're looking for a bargain lens for the m4/3 system, then look no further. The 45 f1.8 is small, fast to focus and delivers extremely sharp images. This is a medium tele lens in 35mm terms (90mm lens) which is about my focal length that I like to use. A nice pertrait lens too and all can be has for less than €300. What more can one ask for.

If you read my last post you might have read me saying that I don't use Panasonic lenses on Olympus bodies, well this is the exception. I didn't want to take more that one camera on this trip but I wanted to test a few prime lenses, namely the Panasonic 14 f2.5, the Olympus 17 f2.8 and the Olympus 45 f1.8. In my opinion all those mentioned lenses performed very well indeed. Normally I'm not the wide angle lens sort of guy but I really did enjoy using the three lenses above. I forced myself to use them because normally I use zoom lenses for the convenience. There are circumstances when you just can't change lenses in the space of 5 seconds and this is where the zoom comes in. It's just more prctical for me.

Let's talk a little about the lens. This is the first zoom with a constant aperture of f2.8 throughout the zoom range that's been brought to market. The next will be the 35-100 f2.8. If the 35-100 is the same quality as the 12-35 then it's going to be a winner. The 12-35 is well built, focuses fast on the G5 and produces first rate images. I've seen some negative comments on the net regarding this lens, but most of those were using this lens of an Olympus body. As I've stated before, I tend to use Panasonic lenses on Panasonic bodies and the same goes for Olympus. I think that's the only way for you to get the ultimate image quality that one seeks.