Fake Tamrons and a big Sony update – the photo news of the week 41/2024

Counterfeit products, gray imports, products available ahead of schedule – monitoring your own supply chains is not easy for any company. If, there is no other way to call it, organized crime comes into play, things get really bad for the company concerned and its customers. This is what happened at Tamron in China. The lenses themselves weren’t counterfeited there, just the packaging. Apparently used optics also came onto the market as new goods.

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On his channel on the Chinese social network Weibo, Tamron warns against these falsifications. The criminals are said to have imitated the original packaging, right down to the security seals, and then offered all kinds of lenses in it. The adulterations are said to have ranged from gray imports to used goods including homemade accessories such as lens caps. In short: Anyone who bought such a lens in good faith had no way of knowing beforehand what was in the box.

Several batches of repackaged Tamron lenses

Such actions obviously damage trust in a brand, especially when, as Tamron writes, there are “multiple batches.” It probably wasn’t just a few hobbyists in the basement who glued the boxes together out of printer paper. Professional printing on cardboard and the precisely cut seals require a larger counterfeiting workshop. As Tamron rightly recommends, you can only protect yourself by buying from a specialist dealer named by the company. This applies in China as in the rest of the world.

In addition, you should probably pay particular attention to suspiciously cheap lenses from extremely private sellers in the near future. Unfortunately, the serial number, provided the seller provides it, is not a protective mechanism. You can check this on Tamron’s warranty extension page, but that only says that there is a lens with this serial number and that it has not yet been registered. Since organized counterfeiters often have access to original goods in the supply chain, they can also collect serial numbers from devices that have not even been sold to the end customer.

Firmware for A7 IV makes remote control easier via app

To save yourself trouble, you should perhaps wait a few days before installing the current firmware update to version 4.00 for the Sony Alpha 7 IV. Sony has often had problems here that could even lead to non-functional cameras (“bricks”). This was most recently the case with the A7R V, for which there is now a corrected version. So, at your own risk for now: Update 4.00 for the A7 IV can be found on Sony’s download page along with instructions.

The update is particularly attractive if you want to use a smartphone or tablet with “Monitor & Control” from version 2.1.0 to remotely control the camera. Then, among other things, you can view the live image from the camera and adjust exposure and other settings. And with the, unfortunately separate, “Creators App” from version 2.5.0, images can also be sent wirelessly to the mobile device directly after they have been taken, so that they can be edited and sent there. With the new firmware, this should continue even if the connection is interrupted, then the system should then forward the missing images – and only these – automatically.

Adobe’s Firefly has expanded video and audio

After our column took a critical look at Adobe’s licensing policy last week, it’s time to praise it again. Because what Adobe really does with its AI functions for practical use is not only technically impressive, but also useful. This can now be seen in beta versions of Premiere Pro under the simple term “generative expansion”. This means that both the image and sound of a video can be extended using the AI ​​“Firefly”. If that sounds too unspectacular, we recommend taking a look at Adobe’s example video.

The feature can eliminate the need to reshoot scenes. An actor believes in the wrong direction? The rhythm is wrong, would a two second longer shot be good? No problem, the AI ​​does it. Experienced editors, as the editors want to be called today, may still smile at this, because this AI also has no human feeling for the design of a film, only: the results are usable for pre-production, playing with lengths and settings.

Cutting to music is no longer allowed

One aspect that requires a lot of experience can turn video generation around completely, namely “cutting to music”. If the AI ​​doesn’t mess up a well-known piece of music – you can clearly hear that – then the length of the music no longer determines the need for video, it can also be the other way around. So far this has worked quite convincingly with orchestral pieces, including typical film soundtracks. And because Adobe is aware of its professional target group, it is immediately emphasized that the training data for images and sound should not consist of copyrighted material. Therefore, the use of the function is safe for the company even for commercial productions.

Review of the Nikon 1

Nikon was one of the first manufacturers to venture into a mirrorless format for system cameras 14 years ago. However, the “Nikon 1” series was not a success and was quietly discontinued in 2014, ten years ago. In terms of price and function, the cameras were between the compact cameras that were still popular at the time and the large DSLRs, although they were technically leading. Things like phase change measurement directly on the sensor were first offered by the Nikon 1, which is now one of the requirements for most autofocus systems. DPreview explains why that’s not the case, and the article is our recommendation for a long read for the weekend. It comes from a series celebrating the 25th anniversary of the popular camera website, which it almost didn’t see. And, at the very end this time: We have already presented in detail the most interesting camera of this week, the Fujifilm X-5M, which is not only designed for vlogging and comes with a kit for less than 1000 euros. Shortly afterwards, Fuji also announced two new lenses, making the APS-C market even more exciting.

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