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SilverFast has recently updated their scanning software from v. 8 to v. 8.5. If you already own version 8, this update is free. There are some improvements to existing features, nifty new features are, well, they are new. Some of the new features include:

1. You can now save high-color high bit-depth images in the DNG format.
2. The Job...

A teleconverter, also known as an extender, acts as a magnifying optic for a lens, increasing the focal length that lens can provide. Using an extender exacts a small price: the increase in focal length is accompanied by a decrease in the light-gathering ability of the lens proportional to the square of the magnification ratio. Typical extenders offer a 1.4x increase, a...

It's been said that the excellent sometimes stands in the way of the good, and after more than a year since our last posting of image stabilization results at Imaging Resource, we have to admit that this been the case with our prior IS testing methodology.

While our previous approach for IS testing produced truly quantitative measures of IS shake reduction performance (as...

Updated February 19, 2010: We've added some additional reading relating to other variation sample testing done on an external site, diglloyd.com. To skip to this new section, click here.

Introduction

As with most test organizations, the combination of time and resource constraints and relatively limited access to the review samples means that most of the time we can...

Updated February 19, 2010: We've added some additional reading relating to other variation sample testing done on an external site, diglloyd.com. To skip to this new section, click here.

Updated February 5, 2010: Dave's added some commentary about the practical impact of this test. To skip to this new section, click here.

Introduction

As with most test organizations,...

Image stabilization is a hot feature in the world of photography, with multiple manufacturers offering a wide range of stabilization systems. Both lens-based and body-based (sensor shift) stabilization systems are available from a number of companies, with widely ranging claims as to their effectiveness.

The huge popularity of image stabilization lenses and bodies has led...

There's no commonly-accepted way of describing the detailed behavior of image stabilization (IS) systems, so we at Imaging Resource have had to come up with our own. We have a more technical article here which explains in greater detail how we go about measuring and analyzing IS performance; but in this article, we just want to describe how to read and interpret the graphs...

At the heart of the lens testing we do here at The Imaging Resource lies some incredible mathematics and computer technology, developed by DxO Labs. DxO has developed technology that lets them characterize the optical performance of lens/camera systems with greater depth and breadth than almost anything that's gone before. Not only that, but their DxO Analyzer software...

Important points to consider in interpreting our test results

Test results are difficult to compare between different camera platforms

By its nature, DxO Analyzer is measuring the end results of the entire optical/image processing chain. The camera and its settings are therefore an integral part of the overall measurement. Different cameras and different settings will...