If you are a regular visitor the Lenscraft website or this blog you will have noticed the recent changes. The site now has a new structure, navigation and an improved look (at least I think so). This is the first part of my plan. I now intend to build more content, which under the old site was proving a little difficult for people to find. I will also be adding more content to the Members area to give some real value to my members. With my first building block in place, I can now return to blogging on a more regular basis.

 

For this blog I wanted to share a recent image (which also appears in the recent images gallery). I am doing this because I really like this image, but also because it has brought home to me just how good some of the camera equipment is now.

 

I shot the image on a dull cloudy morning in a country lane in Clapham in the Yorkshire Dales. As I walked along the lane the sun broke through just for a moment and I managed to grab one shot with my GF1 and 14-45mm lens. Had I been walking with my SLR I doubt I would have captured this as I might not have had time to react. I would probably also have had a bad neck from the weight of the camera.

 

To my mind there is a huge advantage to be gained from using small light weight equipment that you can carry around easily and which allows you to be ready to react to changing circumstances. Now the worry I have always had with these small cameras is that they have limited pixels (12Mpixels in the case of the GF1) and a small sensor meaning the quality just wouldn't be there for larger prints. Well this image proved to me once and for all that I am worrying over nothing and also that the lenses with these Micro 4/3 cameras are superb.

 

When I print this image at native size I need to use A3 paper but there is a boarder which means a small amount of up scaling would be required to fill the paper. Conventional wisdom says this won't be as good as the original and the up scaling process can't add detail that isn't there. Now when I look at the image on the screen at 100% there is a huge amount of detail present as the lenses are just so sharp and resolve so much. When I compare this to the native print from my new Canon 9500 set to its finest printing, I can't see the detail that's present on the screen. The printer just can't print that fine a detail as is present in the image. In order to see this detail, I actually need to enlarge the image and print it larger than A3. At about 100% size increase the detail becomes visible. If you add to this the viewing distance (we don't want to view every print with our nose pressed against the paper) you can understand why 12Mpixels is enough. Providing of course that your lenses are sharp and capable of resolving the detail.

 

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the picture and the new site layout.