This is a deal you cannot miss: Tamron 28-75mm III lens for $699 only at Amazon US (Click here). This is the lowest price ever on an excellent and much beloved kit lens!
Preorders at Amazon, BHphoto, Adorama, FotoErhardt, FotoKoch, Calumet, WexUK, Amazon.
Marc from SonyAlphaBlog tested the lens and concluded:
The Sony FE 16-25mm F2.8 G (1399) euros is an excellent lens . It offer very similar performance to the Sony FE 16-35mm F2.8 GM II : excellent sharpness , AF, ergonomics, color rendition with on top lightweight, small size and “reasonable” price vs GM II. Its only weaknesses are the resistance to flare and distortion/vignetting
Its limited range is perfectly ok for landscape usage vs a 16-35mm. If you own the Sony FE 24-70mm F2.8 GM II it will be a very nice complement without overlap. Globally the 16-25mm F2.8 make more sense than the recent Sony FE 24-50mm F2.8 G
Alternatives
The Sony FE 16-35mm F2.8 GM II is the best in all domains except resistance to flare, it will offer more range, smoother background blur , less distortion less vignetting but similar sharpness
The Sony PZ 16-35mm F4 G is maybe the best one for video.
Sigma 16-28mm F2.8 DG DN Contemporary and Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 Di III RXD are clearly below on 61Mpix except maybe for resistance to flare.The price of the Sony 16-25 F2.8 (1399 euros) allow to get the performance of the GMII (2700 euros) at half of its price and considering the improvement over the Sigma and Tamron in term of sharpness, AF, ergonomics, color rendition it is worth the price difference (1400 vs 900 euros)
Highly recommended
And here is Jeven Dovey’s review:
Ther German company released the new Excire Foto 2024 update (Click here to get it).
Press text:
Excire Foto 2024 Update Adds Timesaving Features and Improved Search Functionality
PRC’s Revolutionary Photo-Organizing Software Receives Major Enhancements in Free April 2024 Update
Lübeck, Germany – April 23rd, 2024 – PRC, the AI company behind the award-winning Excire software, has today unveiled a major update to its flagship program, Excire Foto 2024.
Known for its futuristic image-management tools – including a prompt-search AI that allows users to instantly retrieve images by inputting text descriptions and an X-tetics AI that intelligently rates each image based on its aesthetic qualities – Excire Foto 2024 has propelled photographers into a new era of image organization. Now, thanks to enhancements included in the April 2024 update, Excire makes it easier than ever to find, cull, and catalog images so photographers can spend less time behind the computer and more time on their craft.
Improvements to Excire Foto 2024 include:
Smaller upgrades include:
Importantly, the update resets the 14-day trial period. Photographers who previously tested – but did not purchase – Excire Foto 2024 can once again download a 14-day trial of the program and evaluate the software’s updated features.
For customers who already own a copy of Excire Foto 2024, the April 2024 update is complimentary. Users will be prompted to download the update package upon launching Excire Foto 2024. It is recommended that users make a catalog backup before installing the new software.
Sony has launched a massive cashback action in Europe! check out those special pages at FotoErhardt, Fotokoch, Calumet, WexUK, Amazon DE, Amazon UK, Amazon FR, Amazon IT, Amazon ES (Note: Amazon stores don’t display the cashback info you will have to get here: https://www.sony.de/cashback/sommer).
Some special deal mentions:
There are big savings today on Lexar memory sold on Amazon US (click here) and also on that second deals page with SD cards (Click here). For us photographers, the most interesting offer is the lowest price ever on the 2 TB portable SSD storage drive (click here). Definitely useful for backing up images on the fly. And V90 fast 256GB SD card from Lexar is now available for $197 only at Amazon US (Click here).
You get this lens for $70 less on Amazon US than in any other US store.
It’s the first time in years this is happening: The A1 is out of Stock nearly everywhere in the USA:
You can still find a couple of refurbished Sony A1 at Amazon US:
Don’t know why this is happening as I don’t think the A1II is coming any time soon. Probably has more to do with a temporary production bottleneck.
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Thanks to the tipster!
Tamron Q1 financial report has been published. The operating Income increased significantly by approximately 1.7 times YoY with Significant record-high profits for the 1st quarter. Tamron writes:
Interchangeable lenses market showed double-digit growth on both volume and value basis, reflecting the strong performance of the camera market.
Those are their sales based on the region:
As you can see it’s Asia and Japan that are driving the sales. Europe and North America actually had a decline in sales.
And the forecast looks great too:
Both in Own-Brand products and OEM products, double-digit upward revision of Original Forecast to double-digit sales growth. Despite of increase in materials costs due to higher raw material costs, planned to achieve double-digit Operating Income growth with high profitability.
Tamron also stated that a total of 7 lenses will be launched in 2024. Two of them have been already announced:
I guess some of the remaining 5 lenses will be new Z/X/RF mount versions of current E-mount lenses. But hopefully they will also launch some exciting new E-mount lenses they patented in the past years:
24-110mm f/4.0
25-50mm f/2.0
28-100mm f/2.8
28-120mm f/4.0
28mm f/1.4
30mm f/1.4
35mm f/1.4
40mm f/1.4
50mm f/1.4
75mm f/1.4
60mm f/2.0 macro
70-130mm f/2.0
90mm f/2.8 macro
135mm f/1.8
150mm f/2.8 macro
180mm f/3.5 macro
350mm f/4.5
200-400mm f/4.0
200-800mm f/5.6
13mm f/1.8 (APS-C)
18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 (APS-C)
18-500mm f/3.5-6.5 (APS-C)
Fingers crossed 1-2 of those designs will be coming in 2024!
