Amidst all the world’s turmoil, and the destruction being wrought by the disgusting man serving as president, life goes on.

And for those who follow some of my photos here and over on Facebook, this is a little update.

I bought myself a new camera for Christmas in 2024. My choice at that time was a full frame Sony A7cii or the Panasonic Lumix S9.

The Sony had better specs and a longer track record, more lens choices, but cost substantially more. The S9 was smaller and lighter, and although missing several features, I decided their absence didn’t bother me. And Panasonic was a founding member of the L-Mount Alliance, a group of companies now producing lenses for cameras using Leica’s L-mount design, started along with Leica and Sigma to produce lenses that can be used on all of their cameras.

So I’ve had the camera now for about 14 months and feel like I finally figured out the basics, and my photos–these days featuring lots of dogs, cats, and colorful sunrises–are generally looking better.

This week I added another lens, built by a relatively new company, TTARTISAN, which has been producing lenses in Shenzhen, China, since 2019. At first, they sold primarily manual focus lenses, but recently have added several auto focus products.

I decided to try their 40mm f/2.0 lens for L-mount. It is one of the smallest lens available for the S9, and is available for less than 1/3 the price of it’s closest competitor made by Sigma. I took it out this morning for the first time, and came back very pleased!

For the price, it is a very, very pleasant surprise! Here are a few photos from this morning’s first time out.

FYI, it is also available for Sony E-Mount and Nikon Z-Mount.