Happy New Year and best wishes for shooting even better photos in 2011 than you did this year!

Here are a few more sample images from the new smc PENTAX DA 35mm f/2.4 AL lens, which I was able to take during an afternoon walk on our beach trail. Photos shot with the K-5 at ISO 400 in RAW at f/5.6.

The New York Times published two articles today about the end of Kodachrome. Kodak actually stopped producing the film in 2009, but today marked the end of processing this film. I've provided links to both articles below. I thought this paragraph from the Sulzberger article was wonderful and have excerpted it here to hopefully encourage you to read the entire article.

"Demanding both to shoot and process, Kodachrome rewarded generations of skilled users with a richness of color and a unique treatment of light that many photographers described as incomparable even as they shifted to digital cameras. “Makes you think all the world’s a sunny day,” Paul Simon sang in his 1973 hit “Kodachrome,” which carried the plea “Mama, don’t take my Kodachrome away.”

Although I usually have time to shoot during a Holiday break - our travels, family obligations and the weather kept me from spending any serious time with the new DA 35mm f/2.4mm lens. Here are just a few photos that I shot "wide-open" at f/2.4 to get a very preliminary sense of how the lens performs - in terms of how it handles background blur and its color rendering of the out of focus areas.

Photos shot with K-5 in RAW and processed with CS4 to create JPEG's for uploading to Posterous. I've inserted the actual details for each shot in lower right hand corner of image.

I'm sure we weren't the only Pentaxians traveling over the Holidays. However, we certainly had our share of storms on both coasts. Snow in Connecticut that delayed our flight - causing us to spend a night at the airport in Chicago. And then arriving back to California for another round of rain storms coming off the Pacific today. Needless to say, being patient and staying calm is a virtue for travel these days.

iPhone photos processed with the latest release of Camera+ app which has a new series of borders including this "film" effect.

The house at the end of my father-in-law's street was aglow Christmas Eve with lights and an illuminated Santa sitting proudly in the front corner of the yard. I guess I understand the logic of turning your yard into an electric wonderland, but I thought the scene I found the next morning was pretty amusing - a deflated Santa face down in the grass probably feeling more akin to many of us after we've finished the mad dash to buy presents for all our loved ones.

Photo shot with K-5 and the new DA 35mm f/2.4 AL lens. Shot in RAW at ISO 400 and f/5.6. I converted the DNG file in-camera to the monochrome image using the K-5 digital effects. Having shot with Tri-x for years, I think I like the black & white rendering better, but I uploaded both files in case you prefer the bright red Santa better.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/26/weekinreview/26kamber.html

I'm at my father-in-law's house. In helping him locate his Christmas decorations, I found this nicely preserved 8mm movie camera in its original leather case. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! 

Camera+ app just released a new version of their software which includes this border called "Old Timey". I thought it went well with the subject matter.

Two snapshots I took over the weekend in Connecticut. They're simple images, but for me a nice reminder that the Holidays are primarily about the joy of having children.

iPhone images processed with Camera+ app.

Photo by Malanski

I came across this thread on dpreview. It's so appropos for the Holidays I thought I'd share it with you.

"Malanski" (his username on dpreview) lives in Lodz, Poland and his thread starts with the following teaser..."I don’t know how she did it but my girlfriend brought me some very exciting news today. It is a leak concerning a new Pentax DSLR camera. Not only did she provide the specifications but she actually had a highly advanced prototype with her - now it’s mine!."

Here's the link to his thread so you can read the "rest of the story":

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1036&thread=37231887