Category: Equipment

The Nikon D700, announced on 1 July, ’08, and scheduled to ship by the end of this month, is a bit of a shocker, and indicative of a new, much more aggressive Nikon than we have been accustomed to during this digital decade.

In brief, it is a full-frame (FX) camera using the same 12 MP sensor and image processing electronics as in the Nikon D3, except in a body closer in size and weight to the Nikon D300. Remarkably, the D700 has as much as 95% of the goodness of the D3 in a camera that costs some $2,000 less. If that isn’t aggressive, I don’t know what is.

Check it out here.

In a much-anticipated move, Panasonic rolled out the latest version of its flagship advanced compact this morning, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3.

Replacing the LX2, the latest 10-megapixel comes packing some serious hardware, including a new wide-angle, a fast-aperture Leica lens and a completely redesigned sensor.

Check it out here.

The new Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3, successor to the now two-year-old LX2, sports a Leica-branded 5.1–12.8mm (24–60mm-e) ƒ/2–2.8 lens, which as far as we know is the fastest, widest lens yet on a small-sensor camera.

Check it out here.

July 14th will see the announcement of the Phase One P65+, arguably the most desirable medium format digital back yet. What makes it so?

Here’s the story…

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Along comes the 900. I’ve had two for a few weeks now, and the unit is, well, smooth. What can I say? Ed Fasano, a General Manager at Nikon, asked me what I thought after handling it, and I told him, “Well, if the SB800 is a real nice Chevy, this baby’s a Cadillac.”

Check it out here.

As nice as the new sensor sounds, the question is asked – Who needs a %$%#@ 50MP sensor anyway? In fact there are ongoing discussions currently on many web forums (including this site’s) on this very topic. It almost seems as if there’s a backlash underway against such a high resolution chip.

I find this hard to understand, but there may be two factors at work. The first is from within the DSLR crowd. 50MP is so far beyond what is now available in a 35mm format camera, and likely will always be so given the price, that there may be a bit of sour grapes at work.

Check it out here.

Hasselblad today announced a whopping new camera, the H3D11-50. That’s right, they’ve done it again. 50 megapixels of goodness this time around, creating a 300MB file with each click of the shutter

Check it out here.

I had brought a Nikon D300 on the trip with me, and when he saw it he asked if I knew the story of Nikon’s recent DSLR resurgence. Apparently, (at least according to my friend) in about 2005 Nikon’s board had a break with the company’s senior management. After some 50 years as a dominant player in the Pro camera market Nikon was losing not only marketshare but also “face”, because of Canon’s dominant position in almost every market segment, but particularly with regard to Pro cameras and Nikons lack of a full-frame competitor to Canon 1Ds series. In short – Canon had been cleaning Nikon’s clock, and the board was pissed.

It seems (or so the story went) that the board removed some of Nikon’s more conservative senior management and replaced them with more aggressive “Young Turks”, along with a mandate to rebuilt Nikon’s reputation and market position.

Check it out here.

Yesterday I took a trip to the Deutshes Technikmuseum Berlin, an oddity of a place containing all manner of weird and wonderful German technology, from a yard full of locomotives to an exhibition on cutlery and plates from railway dining cars. Unlike many science museums, the DTB doesn’t have a whole lot of interactive exhibits — just a few push buttons here and there — but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t full of screaming kids on a Sunday.
What it does have, though, is an amazing collection of historical German camera gear. The exhibit is full of retro gadgets, as you’ll see below, but the most interesting to me were the bisected lenses and cameras, the insides of which show the precision of a CAD drawing. Read on to see sawn-off gadgets, the origin of digital cameras and a secret doorway just for horses.

Check it out here.

Completing Nikon’s announcements today are two perspective control lenses, the PC-E Micro Nikkor 45mm f2.8D ED and PC-E Micro Nikkor 85mm f2.8D ED, which Nikon had indicated were in development back in January 2008.

Check it out here.

Here’s a site (Andreas Wolkerstorfer :: cameras) where the photographer runs film through all types of cameras so you can see what kind of pictures they take and although the general theme seems to be vignette with the older cameras, I still enjoy seeing images that aren’t perfect.

Check it out here.

I had an opportunity to spend a week working with the new Phase One 645 camera and a P45+ back on a shoot in Newfoundland. The camera I used was the first off the assembly line with final production firmware, and was provided for testing by Kevin Raber, Phase One’s Marketing VP for North America.

Check it out here.

Something weird is going on. When Sigma first announced the new 50mm f/1.4, I expected it to be smaller and cheaper than their 30mm f/1.4. Why? In 35mm world, 50mm lenses are *always* smaller and cheaper than fast wide-angle lenses — even when the 50mm lenses cover a full 35mm frame. It’s owed partially to the relatively simple glass arrangement that most 50s have been using since they became standard.
I was wrong. At this moment, the 50mm is more expensive, but that could make sense because it’s a new lens, and may see discounts from retail price upon release. What makes very little sense at first glance is that it’s huge. At 505 grams, it’s almost twice as heavy as the Nikon 50mm, and it takes 77mm filters — the same size as, say, 70-200mm f/2.8 lenses.

Check it out here.

Rumors are going wild about the release of the supposed Nikon D700, a full-frame DSLR that shares the same sensor and autofocus system of the wonderful Nikon D3.

Check it out here.

Well see if it holds this time, because someone has posted cell-phone shots of press materials for a smaller, cheaper 35mm-framed Nikon called the D700, and they have me totally convinced. There are a lot easier ways to fool people than to create your own offset printed brochure with out-of-left-field items like redesigned sync caps and totally new magnesium frame mockups. If this is fake, it probably means that Nikon is taking the Apple route and creating professionally made false materials to smoke out whoever leaked earlier products like the the D200.

Check it out here.

We read everywhere that new high resolution sensors put pressure on actual lenses. These comments arise copiously each time a new sensor with higher pixel counts appears. It happened with the 22 millions of pixels of the Canon 1Ds Mark III, and it will happen again when the 25 MP sensor by Sony comes to life into a new camera. Are this kind of comments accurate? There is no short answer to the question, because the subject is complex. However, we will try to summarize several basic rules and results

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The much buzzed about forthcoming camcorder from RED called Scarlet isn’t actually red or scarlet at all but – yes, you guessed it – black. The Scarlet isn’t cool just because of the way it looks – though it’s rugged, Alien/Terminator exterior is certainly eye-catching– it’s cool because of what it can do. First, some background.

Check it out here.