Have Camera Will Travel Update: January 5, 2025
A new fastest SD card, hot-take mini reviews, digital darkroom updates, and bracing for a big snowstorm.
As the US East Coast braces for a big snowstorm coming later tonight, I thought I’d post some photos I’ve taken over the years of Washington, DC, becoming a winter wonderland in the snow.
// Gear & Stuff
New fast SD cards
There’s a new #1 in my SD card speed tests: the brand new SanDisk Extreme Pro that maxes out the SD spec’s 300MB/s write speed and 300MB/s read speed. In my tests, it actually was a smidgeon faster than the advertised speeds, which I always appreciate. SanDisk recycles their product names, so there are other Extreme Pro cards out there that aren’t as fast. This one is model number SDSDXDM, and they’re available now.
New Nikon D5600 & D500 firmware
Nikon released new firmware for two older DSLRs: the D5600 and D500. Before you get too excited, though, it's just a default password tweak.
// Hot Take Mini-Reviews
Canon SX740 compact camera
I love fancy camera gear as much as the next photographer. But I’m an even bigger fan of simple but effective solutions that does the job.
So I’ve been really impressed with the Canon SX740. It’s a small compact camera, and it’s not new by any means. But it does a nice job if you’re just looking for a simple but capable compact camera to take with you on your travels. No, it’s not the fanciest camera and its image quality won’t best your mirrorless or DSLR. But it does have a massive zoom, and it fits comfortably in your pocket. And there’s a lot to be said for the camera that you have with you, after all!
Likes: small, compact, simple to use, great all-around travel camera
Dislikes: image sharpness when zoomed right in is so-so; not so great in low light conditions
CygnusTech Macro Diffuser
These are made by Australian macro photographer —-. It wraps over your on-camera speedlight and attaches to the end of your lens
Likes: Really effective; once it’s set up, it’s easy to use and basically foolproof, well-made.
Dislikes: I wish it was more portable.
Another gear wrapper, this one water-resistant
They’re a staple in my bag, going all the way back to the Domke wraps. They’re endlessly versatile. And I already have a lot of them. So why would I get another one (actually, four)? Yet another gear wrapper might seem like reinventing the mousetrap. But I like these new ones from Spinn.Design, a small German accessories company. You can find them here.
Likes: water resistant combined with all-over hook-and-loop (other wraps have one or the other, but I’ve not come across one with this particularly good combination before)
Dislikes: not really a dislike, but I’d love it if it came with a toggle strap for extra reassurance.
// Digital Darkroom
On1 Lightpanel
On1 is branching out with a new product aimed squarely at professional photographers. It’s an AI-powered workflow tool that sits inside Lightroom and helps speed up culling, sorting, and editing. It’s especially aimed at high-volume wedding and portrait photographers and aims to cut this crucial but tedious part of the workflow in half. You can see a demo of it in action here.
DxO update
DxO added support for the new Fujifilm X-M5 and Leica M11-D to their suite of software apps. Read the details.
Radiant Photo update
Radiant Photo has released version 2. It has quite a lot of changes but is till fundamentally the same app. More. I use it mainly for quick, nearly automated image edits (for more advanced edits I use other tools like Nik Color Efex).
My top 4 picks for image processing apps not named Lightroom
Because Lightroom isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.
Capture One Pro. Top-notch quality, steep learning curve, not cheap, best for pros.
ON1 Photo RAW. Solid and innovative and improving all the time, cost-effective pricing.
Luminar Neo. Leading the charge on AI with features like sky replacement, solid image processing, cost-effective pricing.
Darktable. Old-school approach, sometimes lagging in features, but it’s open-source and free.
I have a much more detailed post on these here.
Lightroom Classic Update
Adobe has released the latest version in their December 2024 update (14.1). The most notable addition consists of some new lens bokeh shapes as well as additional adaptive presets for the blur background tool. There are also a number of bug fixes and new compatibility with the latest cameras and lenses, including the new Nikon Z 50 II and Sony a1 II (also a new Camera Raw update to go along with it).
// Other Stuff
The New York Times found in their photographic archives a bunch of "new" photos of Jimi Hendrix performing at Woodstock. The problem? The photographer, Larry C. Morris, had filed them under "Jim Hendricks." Read the story here (paywalled).
It's easy to be overwhelmed by the deluge of new content that floods the online world every day, but this is a really interesting article on the problem of how much is disappearing from the web.
There are Ansel Adams stamps (released in May) featuring 16 of his iconic photos. You can order them directly from the US Post Office.
I enjoyed these photos by Joe Wittle focusing on Native American communities’ relationship with the land and environment around them.
The latest issue of Black & White magazine is out (issue 170; Feb 2025). It’s the 2024 Single Image Contest Winners special issue and has some wonderful B&W images across a range of genres. You can see some of the images online here.
The newly restored Notre-Dame Cathedral looks stunning, as you’d expect. Can’t say I don’t miss the old patina, though.
One of several appealing things about BlueSky for photographers is that they explicitly don’t use your content to train AI. But that's not the whole story. Because of the API access, third parties can use that content in their own AI training.
Random travel photography tip: If your camera bag or backpack isn’t specifically waterproof, you can add some protection against rain and snow by treating it with NikWax spray. It’s designed for waterproofing tents and rain gear. It won’t make it so you can submerge it, of course, but it’s great for those walking-around run-ins with water from the sky. I’ve used it on all my canvas camera bags (and even caps) for a long time, and it works great.
// What’s On
The Australian National Maritime Museum (in Sydney) is running its Ocean Photographer of the Year exhibition. You can see some of the stunning entries here. I particularly like the ones of the seagull on the turtle’s back and the freedivers hanging out under the boat. It runs through April 27.
