The Olympus M.Zuiko 8-25mm F4 Pro has officially been launched this week, and 2 CRAZY expensive and legendary lenses are up for sale. Here’s the best news I’ve selected for “The Photography News Show”!

LENS NEWS

Olympus M.Zuiko 8-25mm F4 Pro Announced

In the last show, I shared with you a rumor about an upcoming Olympus lens, and it’s now official: the Olympus 8-25mm F4 Pro is out and it’s available for pre-order on B&H and Adorama.

It’s made for Micro Four Thirds cameras, so it’s an equivalent of 16-50mm on a full-frame sensor, making it an ideal choice for when you want a very light & compact kit.

Having a reach that goes from 16-50mm, can be all you need for a travel day:

Pretty wide to capture the whole scene, up to a more zoomed-in look for some tighter views.

It also has a pretty narrow minimum focus distance, so it can also work to capture some kind of macro shots.

Get your Olympus 8-25mm F4 Pro here.

Canon EF 1200mm f/5.6 Auction

The legendary and super-rare Canon EF 1200mm f/5.6 is THE LONGEST autofocus lens ever made.

It’s not clear how many of these lenses were produced, but rumors say about 20.

It weighs 36 lbs (or 16 kg), and the reason why it’s so rare is that it’s an extremely complicated lens to build; just to give you an idea, it took one year to build just one of these, due to the time required to grow its massive fluorite crystals.

It was available for sale just three times in the 21st century:

• In 2009 it was sold by B&H for $120,000
• In 2014 a British dealer sold it for £99,000
• In 2015 it was again B&H that sold it for $180,000

The auction for this unit will start on October 9th on Wetzlar Camera Auctions.

Zeiss Planar 50mm f/0.7

The Zeiss Planar 50mm f/0.7 was designed in 1966 for NASA Apollo missions to photograph the moon’s far side.

Only 10 of these were ever made:

• 6 were supplied to NASA.
• 3 to Stanley Kubrik, who used them in the filming of Barry Lyndon in 1975.
• 1 unit was left in the Carl Zeiss factory museum.

The auction started at €55.000 euros, and it closed at a whooping price of €180,000.

DRONE NEWS

Sony Airpeak 1 Released

After many rumors and previews, Sony has officially launched its professional drone, the Airpeak S1.

The big advantage of this drone is that it’s the smallest drone capable of carrying a mirrorless camera with a large prime lens, with a maximum payload of 5 lbs.

It can accelerate from 0 to 50 mph in 3.5 seconds, with a top speed of 55.9 mph.

It will retail for $9,000 but the gimbal is not included in that price. The gimbal should come a bit below $2,000.

At the moment it’s just compatible with selected Sony cameras, but the company says it’s possible that compatibility will be expanded in the future. 

Of course, this is a drone made for professional operators and pretty high-end productions, but I think this might be the 1st step for Sony entering the drone market.

Will we see some consumer-level drones from Sony in the future?

APP NEWS

Anti-Social Media App: Minutiae

Social media such as Instagram & Facebook started as a way of connecting with friends and posting random pictures from our daily lives, but they soon degenerated into a shallow view of reality, tons of ads, and mindless scrolling.

To combat this phenomenon there’s an app called Minutiae, which defines itself as “The Anti-Social Media Project”.

It’s an anonymous app, so there are no profiles, no likes, no comments.

Once a day, at a random moment, all the users receive an alert, and they have 60 seconds to snap a quick shot and explore the pictures of one random stranger.

It’s such a different approach to social media, and I think it can actually be good to practice your photography, as you’ll have just 60 seconds to come up with a picture, wherever you are.

RUMORS

New Sony GM Lenses Version II

Back in 2016, Sony launched its most famous high-end zoom lenses, the Sony 24-70mm F2.8 GM and the Sony 70-200mm F2.8 GM.

The latest rumors come from Sonyalpharumors, who was told by a reliable source that the next new lenses that we should expect are the Sony 24-70mm F2.8 GM II and the Sony 70-200mm F2.8 GM II.

It’s not clear which improvements they’ll have, but it’s reported that they will be significantly more compact.

They should both come later this year, so, let’s wait and see!