NEW YORK – A new lens arrived today: a Leica 50mm Summicron Asph. Leica announced this lens last year. It’s specs are daunting: it is diffraction limited at f4.0 and nearly so at f2.0 and f2.8 across the full 35mm sized frame. “Diffraction limited” means that it has the highest resolution permitted under the laws of physics. It’s also tiny, about the same size as my Leica 50mm Summicron.
Here’s an image with it from today taken outside our office. I’ll be using this lens a lot over the next month. “Induro” is evidently a new restaurant – I think of Induro as a brand of high end carbon fiber tripods.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – We had dinner with some friends at Pizza Fresca, a local pizza joint in the ’20s with a truly remarkable wine list. Snapshot with my Leica Monochrom and 50mm f.95 Noctilux lens.
Pizza Fresca
NEW YORK NEW YORK – We had a dinner at a local restaurant with Kimball Chen. He is serious about his wine so the table setting was dominated by glasses and bottles:
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Fuji has furnished a firmware update for the XPro-1 which I installed last night so I took the Fuji out for a spin today. The autofocusing is improved as promised. The problem with this camera, though, is that there are not a lot of lenses for it – the 50mm equivalent is terrific but that’s about it. Later in the day I met up with Maria and some friends for dinner and carried my Leica Monochrom and an f.95 Noctilux lens. The Monochrom fits my shooting style much better than the Fuji – I suppose that I’ll be putting the Fuji up for sale soon.
First with the Leica Monochrom:
iPhone lightCandle lightYou’ll need a bigger one than that to impress her
NEAR NASHVILLE TENNESSEE – We woke up after a monumental night’s sleep to a lovely, soft, late spring day. I spent an hour in the morning shooting around Gary and Diana’s house before we took off looking for cowboy boots and barbecue. This was with my Sony Nex-7 and 50mm Leica Summilux lens.
Tennessee
So after driving a while we found a joint (actually a dive) that advertised barbecue. Here’s their sign. This struck me as pretty promising and not bad for an April Fools day (of course the joke is on the pig).
BBQ Joint
Inside it was clear the the ole boys who populate this place are drinkers (quiet and deliberate), not foodies. The barbecue was very disappointing – it completely failed to live up to the low-down vibe. You just can’t trust appearances any more.
BBQ Joint
Later in the evening I experimented with photo booth (an app) on my iPad and with some of Gary’s local whiskies. This is how my head felt.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – We stayed in town tonight (rare for us on a Friday) to take some Swedish friends to the Red Rooster, a restaurant owned by celebrity chef Marcus Samuelsson. “Celebrity chef” is used without irony here. Marcus is a sensation and his success is well-deserved. Think of the dinner as an “event” in very poor light. I shot the following with my Sony Nex-7 waring a 50mm Leica Summilux lens.
Owner of the Red Rooster`Dinner at the Red RoosterWine list at the Red RoosterDiscussion at the Red Rooster