Articles
New SilverFast release provides dust & scratch removal without infrared
Non-infrared Dust & Scratch Removal
LaserSoft Imaging's latest release of SilverFast AI 8.8 and SilverFast HDR 8.8 film scanning and image processing software comes with some very interesting new features. The most impressive one (in this free update to current version 8 owners) is the dust & scratch removal without the need for an infrared-capable scanner. In addition,...
9 Best Cyber Monday Camera Deals of 2015 (Some deals may still be valid)

We hope everyone enjoyed a nice Turkey Day, and if you perhaps didn't quite find what you were looking for on Black Friday, Cyber Monday is just around the corner here. As with Black Friday, we're compiling our favorite Cyber Monday camera deals of 2015. Get started with our favorite deals and savings below, but be sure to check this page...
Reflections on Adobe MAX 2015

This year's Adobe MAX conference was the largest of the four I've been to in my time. Some 7000 people attended hundreds of sessions with speakers and leaders from the every corner of the creative community
Adobe MAX originated with Macromedia, the company that gave us FreeHand, Dreamweaver and...
SilverFast(R) Archive Suite, version 8.5, New great features, but with bumps

SilverFast has recently updated their scanning software from v. 8 to v. 8.5. If you already own version 8, this update is free. There are some improvements to existing features, nifty new features are, well, they are new. Some of the new features include:
- You can now save high-color high bit-depth images in the DNG format.
- The Job...
The Impact of Teleconverters on Image Quality: a comparison between Canon’s Type II and III EF Extenders
A teleconverter, also known as an extender, acts as a magnifying optic for a lens, increasing the focal length that lens can provide. Using an extender exacts a small price: the increase in focal length is accompanied by a decrease in the light-gathering ability of the lens proportional to the square of the magnification ratio. Typical extenders offer a 1.4x increase, a...
Image Stabilization Testing, Version 2
It's been said that the excellent sometimes stands in the way of the good, and after more than a year since our last posting of image stabilization results at Imaging Resource, we have to admit that this been the case with our prior IS testing methodology.
While our previous approach for IS testing produced truly quantitative measures of IS shake reduction performance (as...
The Nikon 50mm f/1.4G AF-S: a multi-sample evaluation
Updated February 19, 2010: We've added some additional reading relating to other variation sample testing done on an external site, diglloyd.com. To skip to this new section, click here.
Introduction
As with most test organizations, the combination of time and resource constraints and relatively limited access to the review samples means that most of the time we can...
The Canon 50mm f/1.4 USM: a multi-sample evaluation
Updated February 19, 2010: We've added some additional reading relating to other variation sample testing done on an external site, diglloyd.com. To skip to this new section, click here.
Updated February 5, 2010: Dave's added some commentary about the practical impact of this test. To skip to this new section, click here.
Introduction
As with most test organizations,...
Image Stabilization Testing at The Imaging Resource
Image stabilization is a hot feature in the world of photography, with multiple manufacturers offering a wide range of stabilization systems. Both lens-based and body-based (sensor shift) stabilization systems are available from a number of companies, with widely ranging claims as to their effectiveness.
The huge popularity of image stabilization lenses and bodies has led...
How to Read our Image Stabilization Test Results
There's no commonly-accepted way of describing the detailed behavior of image stabilization (IS) systems, so we at Imaging Resource have had to come up with our own. We have a more technical article here which explains in greater detail how we go about measuring and analyzing IS performance; but in this article, we just want to describe how to read and interpret the graphs...
How we test Lenses at The Imaging Resource
At the heart of the lens testing we do here at The Imaging Resource lies some incredible mathematics and computer technology, developed by DxO Labs. DxO has developed technology that lets them characterize the optical performance of lens/camera systems with greater depth and breadth than almost anything that's gone before. Not only that, but their DxO Analyzer software...
Interpreting our Lens Testing results
Important points to consider in interpreting our test results
Test results are difficult to compare between different camera platforms
By its nature, DxO Analyzer is measuring the end results of the entire optical/image processing chain. The camera and its settings are therefore an integral part of the overall measurement. Different cameras and different settings will...
Focus Fallibility: Lens Testing Fallacies
It should come as no surprise that the expanding interest in lens performance generated by the digital SLR explosion has resulted in much greater testing and review of SLR lenses by various organizations. Unfortunately, as far as we can determine from published accounts of various testing methodologies, a lot of the test data being posted is of suspect value, for a very...