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Nikon D700: A Little D3

So, because we just had a call about this, I thought I’d throw it out here that in the world of Nikon digital SLR cameras, the D700 is seriously not all so different from the flagship D3. You got the same sensor, same AF, same lens compatability, same auto-cropping viewfinder when used with DX lenses. The changes?

  1. No integrated grip. Though, there is an available one (same as the D300, for convenience).
  2. Different continuous shooting rate (again, a la D300, and improved with the D3′s battery in the available grip).
  3. Built-in popup flash. This is here more as a wireless flash master than as a flash, before you all start ragging on the poor popup flash. Line of site remote TTL with Nikon flashes = awesome.

And… well, really, that’s mostly it. It’s been a while since I got to handle one, but it might only have 1 CF card slot. But, image-wise, you’re not looking at a heck of a difference.



Shutter Niftiness

OK, so, it’s no secret that I’m a big friggin’ nerd. I’m a webmaster, right? It’s part of the turf, really.

So, it should also come as no surprise that as I was making my daily rounds, I was excited by Digital Photography School getting their tutorial how shutter works up.

It should surprise you even less that when I found a link within that article that goes to an interactive slideshow that shows a physical, real-life D3 firing in astounding slow motion, that I was basically entirely too excited.

So, I’ve always had a vague concept of how first and second curtains work on cameras like Nikon digital SLR cameras and their ilk, but seeing it physically happen as fast or slow as I want to, frame by frame, certainly makes it make a lot more sense.

So, go ahead, get your nerd-goggles on and go check this out:

D3 Mirror and Shutter Firing in Slow Motion



Sony XR HD Camcorders raise the bar!

The new Sony XR high definition camcorders are finally available here at Roberts Imaging!  They include the top end HDR-XR520V, XR500V, XR200V, and XR100.

I have had a Sony HDR-SR11 now for about a year, and I have been blown away by the quality of that camera.  Having said that, playing around with the 520V/500V, I notice two major improvements.  The first is the image stabilizer.  Wow!  The stabilizer is so improved its hard to explain here.  I don’t know what they did, but the improvement is remarkable.  The second big improvement is digital noise in low light.  As good as the SR-11/SR-12 was, the new units are vastly improved.  I would put these against most 3 chip high def camcorders out there today.  I can see details in low light levels that I could never see with the SR-11.

Need GPS built into your HD camcorder?  Well, now you can.  The XR-520V/500V have GPS built in.  You will now be able to tell exactly where you were when you shot that special moment.

With capacities topping out at 240GB, storage will no longer be an obstacle.  (As if 60GB on my SR-11 hindered me!)  The smallest capacity being 80GB is no lightweight (XR-100).

Impressive as always.  Sony HD camcorders.  Come on down and give them a test drive!



More on the E-620

I tell ya, you spend half a week catching up the website’s FJ Westcott catalog (we now have around 240 Westcott products, all related to professional studio lighting, on our website. Booyah) and you find that your sales manager beats you to the punch on the exciting new Olympus digital camera.

So it goes, but I’m not about to let that stop me from throwing out a few of the interesting highlights of this product from a standing Oly user:

1. Form factor. Phil stated that it’s similar to a 520, which is true enough, but it’s also a bit smaller yet than that, kinda like a chunky 420, making it one of the smallest DSLRs going still, and the smallest going with in-body image stabilization

2. Addressing user complaints: Olympus has a long reputation of including small bits of pioneering, but the E-620 is also a solid show of addressing standard complaints with the intro E system bodies. It’s got a better viewfinder, bigger, with the info at the bottom and not on the right any more. Plus, they upgraded the old 3 point AF to a 7 point system (5 of which are full-time cross style)

3. Oly innovation. Like that swing swivel LCD that made its appearence on digital cams with the E-3. And, here’s my favorite gimmick I’ve seen on a DSLR since Nikon busted out the virtual level on its D3:

That’s right, backlit buttons. Does it add anything to final image quality? Not a lick. Did everyone in the office go “oh yeah, I’m surprised no one’s done that yet?” You betcha.

What Olympus’ plans for their 4xx and 5xx series cam is I’m not sure yet, and I doubt anyone will know until they finally present their Micro 4/3 offerings, but I gotta say, there were a lot of Oly users waiting for exactly this E-620. Good show.



End of the Year Ramblings

2008 is working its way to a close, and in the end-of-the-year fervor over Canon’s long-anticipated 5D Mark II and Nikon’s rather controversial (or so it seems on the forums, anyway) D3x, I’d like to take a moment to go over some cameras that, to my mind, didn’t get quite the recognition they really did earn out there on the market.

One is Nikon’s D700, the po’ man’s D3. Attacked on several fronts, mostly the decision to stick to “low rez” 12 MP and not to include video, somewhere in the shuffle I think the market lost sight of the fact that this is among the absolute best low-light cameras ever made (consistently getting the promised 2-stop ISO advantage over my own beloved E-3, in my own findings and comparisons). In addition, reputation has the weather-sealing on this up to snuff for pro use (even if the shutter is “only” rated at 150,000). All this for comfortably under 3 grand.
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Matrix Metering, Continued

Back here I started talking about matrix metering, but to keep your heads from exploding in boredom broke it into a couple posts. This time, though, we get to talk about the bells and whistles of modern matrix metering, instead of the humdrum of how it works.

Scene recognition libraries. This idea also dates back far longer than I can pin down with accuracy, but the idea is the camera compares your matrix to a library of saved matrixes to see if it can better understand what you’re shooting.

For example, if you’re trying to take a picture of your Aunt Bessie (and really, shouldn’t everyone have an Aunt Bessie?) out in some snow–nice, bright, white snow–you might get a metering that looks like this:

Matrix Metering
Under straight matrix metering, this exposure might not be too bad, the bright lights and darks already balance out close to a middle grey as far as its concerned. But, we know that dark blob is really your Aunt Bessie, and she will be quite unhappy if your picture of her relegates her to the shadows.

Metering libraries would take this and run it against some scenes they have, and it’d probably run up against a similar one that tells the camera to overexpose if it sees this. Why? The camera essentially “realizes” the scene is backlit and exposes for the dark area and not the scene as a whole.

Now, the champs of advanced metering tricks right now are the newest wave of Nikon digital SLR cameras with their 3D Matrix. It’s not just reading light, but they’ve combined it with their white balance system so it can measure colors, too. They also combined all this with auto-focus, but that’s a different story. But, thanks to the advanced metering in cameras like their pro D3, the camera can tell something is a face (two really white ovals–the eyes–in the middle of an oval of another color) and not, say, merely just a chair, which could in our last example be the difference between a a nice portrait and a stunning sihlouette (whereas just regular old scene recognition would probably see both your Aunt and the chair the same way, a dark blob in the corner, and expose them both the same).

Now, I’m not saying trusting your matrix metering is the only way or even the best way to shoot, there are a few other ways I’ll talk about, but if you like running your camera on Auto more often than not, I’d say the matrix metering method is one of the digital camera comparisons you’ll probably be wanting to look at.



Nikon D3x

D3x Nikon digital SLR cameraSo, while this is old news in the forum worlds, it’s new news in the official world: the D3x has been announced. 24.5 megapixel sensor as more-or-less widely expected. I’m impressed it can shoot 50 mb RAW files at 5 frames per second. Time to start stocking up on 16 GB compact flash memory cards, and lets hope Sandisk trots out some 32 GBs this season.

But, I think my favorite thing about this camera is how it’s clearly designed for a purpose. Yes, I’m talking about the new 100-1600 native ISO range. Yes, it can only push the ISO to 6400, low by today’s standards and seemingly against everything people want from full-frame sensors. But, it seems fairly obvious Nikon wasn’t intending this to be a low-light champion, there’s the D3 and D700 for that purpose. No, this is a new beast designed for work that more than likely already needs a camera tripod. Studio, landscape, macro, fashion– the D3x is claiming a dynamic range and tonality gradient that’ll go head-to-head with medium format.

And I say good for them, taking an 8,000 buck camera and pulling it out of the ISO war. It’s a nice reminder that cameras are tools, you pick the best one for your needs, and if you don’t need ISO 25,600 it becomes little more than a number on the spec sheet.



Industrial Design, Anyone Remember This?

http://robertsimaging.com/cmItemDetail.jsp?pid=12153So, month’s ago when the new Sony digital camera, the A900, was being introduced I wrote a blog where I started touching lightly on my love of industrial design and the different approaches to camera designs. I promised way back when I wrote that I promised I would discuss the that famous red triangle that adorns the grips of the Nikon digital SLR cameras.

So, let’s talk about automobiles. I’m sure everyone here has heard of the DeLorean (at the least everyone knows Doc Brown’s car in Back to the Future), and most probably know the Volkswagon Golf. These cars, as well as dozens of others (including many highly celebrated sports cars dating back to the 70s), have something in common with Nikons dating back to the F3. Namely, an Italian designer named Giorgetto Giugiaro.

Now, if you believe the internet (and for now we’ll assume it’s not lying to me too horribly), Giugiaro designed the first Golf, which used a red line around the grill and the headlights for emphasis. When he designed the F3 for Nikon, the brought that same simple concession to color to the world of black professional SLRs.

This line, once dated, would expand into the ellipse found vertically beside the grip on the F5 and the D1, and would with the D2 series condense into the red triangle that adorns so many cameras right now, including the D40, D60, D90, D300, D700, and the once-again Giugiaro-designed D3.

So, there we go, modern Nikon cameras come from a design heritage that also includes several iconic cars like Lotuses, BMWs, Alpha Romeos, Bugattis, Mustangs, and more. Addressing Nikon’s continued use of an element introduced back with the F3, Giugiaro said this:

“For the Nikon F3, I added a red line to the professional-use camera, which used to be entirely black. I sought to make that the hallmark of the Nikon F3 through a bit of graphic flair. In other words, I added a bit of fun to it. Fortunately, the company likes the addition of the red line. I am delighted that the company still uses it extensively to give a family feel to Nikon’s camera line.“

Next time, we’ll look at the history behind the current, sleek legacy of Canon digital SLR cameras, and continue my push into digital camera comparisons via industrial design.

Further reading on the Nikon designs can be found here and here.



Don’t Hate the Popup Flash

Pop-Up Flash on the E-3 I feel sorry for the pop-up flash. This appears to easily be the most hated of all camera features, and I just don’t know why.

For those not in the know, the pop-up flash is generally not considered a ‘pro’ feature, and therefore finds its inclusion on high-end cameras such as the D700 Nikon digital SLR camera highly criticized. I’ve also seen countless forum threads begging manufacturer X not to “mess the camera up” by including a pop-up flash.

But, no matter how you approach this, it just seems irrational to hate the pop-up flash.

Let’s start with the most common critcism: it’s not “pro.” IE, the highest end Canon digital SLR cameras and Nikon digital SLR cameras (like the EOS 1Ds Mk III and the D3) don’t have pop-up flashes. But, who’s to say that the no pop-up flash, integrated grip design is what makes the camera pro? Shutter life and body construction seem like better markers, and companies like Sony and Olympus and now Nikon (with the D700) are releasing pro models without integrated grips. So, it seems kind of picky to not like them just because they’re not pro.

Cost: Given that a $400 E-410 Olympus digital camera has a pop-up flash and the $5,000 D3 does not, I think we can safely say including a pop-up flash isn’t increasing cost.

Durability: Another popuar complaint is that they’re a weak point for durability, but I’ve ad a 17″ CRT monitor call over onto my E-3′s pop-up flash without it taking any damage (and, the E-3 also manahes to be water-sealed with the flash up, ruining the argument that it affects weather-sealing.)

So, where’s the harm in the pop-up flash? If you prefer a more powerful, less harsh light, using something like the SB-900 (in Nikon flashes) or 580EX II (for Canon flashes) is always an option and will over-ride the pop-up, but for users who don’t want the weight of a flashgun for some quick fill light or snapshots, the pop-up is useful to have around.

There’s so much in photography we could be focusing on, how about we stop complaining about the pop-up flash and see it for the value-added feature it is?



Nikon Days

Nikon Days

The next several weeks are going to be all the best kinds of crazy at Roberts as we have the hat trick of Nikon Days, Canon Days, and our Fall/Winter Expo in quick succession. This week is Nikon Days, and it culminates this Saturday at our Indianapolis downtown store where you can meet our Nikons reps and try out as much equipment as your little photog heart desires: including the newest wave of Nikon Coolpix cameras, the very best VR Nikon lenses, and the top-end Nikon digital SLR cameras like the D3 and D700.

We’ve apparently got quite a few specials going on all week, and I’ll be uploading graphics for them throughout today and tomorrow on our homepage, so you’ll probably do well to keep an eye on it as the day progresses.

Unfortunately, our next free Nikon class isn’t until January, but you can focus instead on our Roberts Raw Footage video blog, I’ll be stealing down to the floor and doing some product overviews for the S60 Nikon Coolpix camera (you might remember it from here), as well as a few other informative shorts and reviews. Want to see something in particular? Let me know in the comments and I’ll try and make it happen.




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