Podcast Episode 2 – Alpha A35, Update your firmware, Partial Colour

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Welcome to the second episode of Alpha Tutorials. We are running a little later with this episode than we would have liked, winter chills brought flu fighting and a week of having almost no voice. In this episode we are going to take a close look at the recently announced Sony Alpha SLT-A35. We will also show you how to update your A33/55 and NEX-3/5 to the latest firmware versions that was released on June 20th. We will also try answer a question from Sherill Teodoro on Partial Colour photography.

(Please note this was shot in a different studio, the sound is better than Episode 1 but we are still working to improve the lighting etc, always a work in progress.)

News / Gear Feature

Last time we mentioned the release of the new Sony Alpha SLT-A35 and NEX-C3. We thought for this show that we would look at the A35 a little closer.

In essence what Sony have done with the A35 is take the A55 and remove the flip and rotating screen plus the 10 frames per second. It has a the same 16MP Exmor HD sensor that the A55 has but unlike our A33 here, it lacks the versitility that the flip out screen had. This may be a step to cut costs but to be honest, the difference that 2 more megapixels makes is not really noticeable enough to make us jump for joy. Our advice would be, grab yourself the A33 while stocks last and upgrade the firmware to the latest version. The benefits of enhanced picture styles etc which the A35 offers over the A33 and A55 is fixed with the new firmware update which leads us into our tutorial feature.

Tutorial

I often find people get very nervous when you start talking about updating a cameras firmware. With the new Sony SLT cameras like the A33 and A55 plus the NEX range, updating firmware is far easier than it was before. Since both the A33 and NEX cameras go through the same method of updating, we will just take you through the process on our A33.

• First thing you want to do is head to your local Sony website. For us that is http://sony.co.za
• Next you want to click on Support
• Search for the product you are wishing to get support for.
• When you have found the product you will have several options which include things like downloading the instruction manual, Picture Motion Browser software and the latest firmware.
• We can see that for the A33 the latest version of the firmware is V2.0. First check on your camera under menu then setup and then firmware version, to see what version is currently on the camera. If the version is older you can go ahead and download the latest version of the firmware.
• Now you want to make sure that you have a fully charged battery and the supplied USB cable from when you bought the camera.
• Open up the downloaded software and follow the instructions.

There you have it, plain and simple. We now have all the new firmware features that the A35 has on our A33. Which brings us to our Viewers Question.

Viewers Question

Sherill Teodoro asked us on our website how to take a photograph where the bulk of the image is in black and white but one single colour still shows.

With the new A35 or V2.0 firmware running on your A33, A55 or NEX cameras you will find in the Picture Style mode an option for Partial Color in Red, Blue, Green and Yellow. In these modes the scene will be given in black and white except for the colour selected in that mode.

If you have a camera that does not have this mode then things are a little trickier. The best way to achieve this effect will be using photo editing software like Adobe Photoshop. The one benefit is that you will have more control however it will take more time. With Photoshop one can take several routes to get to the same result. One way to do the partial colour effect is to create a new layer over your image and apply a black and white conversion to that layer. Then you can go and erase the effect on that layer allowing the colour from the original image to come through.

Best is to research the various methods out there and give them a go till you find what works best for you.

Conclusion

That about brings us to the end of another show. Be sure to check out our website http://alphatutorials.co.za for more articles and information. For example there are three articles following our first show each on one of the areas of exposure, ISO, Aperture and Shutter Speeds. You can also send your questions in to us on the the site. We are also pleased to announce that you can now subscribe to this podcast from the iTunes store as well.

Till next time, keep clicking, shooting, whatever you want to call it, just as long as you don’t stop taking photographs.