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Articles and ReviewsRecent Reviews
Future Review Items
Edwin's Potpourri of Thoughts Books currently on the night table for reading:
Magazine subscriptions:
Music rotation - actually none at the moment, too busy to listen other than on the commute to and from work Being the editor of NikonLinks, I receive link suggestions that at times, make me roll my eyes. Pages so lean in content that I wonder what's the point. Or regurgitation of spec sheets that anyone could get from one of the official Nikon websites. All in the name of content generation to get a link up and some traffic, which might get some hits on the ad links. Ten years ago, the Internet offered some real worthwhile content. Writers took their time crafting good reviews and articles. These still exist, but get lost in the endless number of everday blog sites and DIY gallery sites to post mindless snippets of mundane lives and God-awful digicam snapshots. |
What's New July 24, 2008 - I'm headed to Kansas City, Missouri in a couple of weeks. Just wondering if anyone knows of the local attractions. While I'm sure the hotel will offer an internet connection, I won't be travelling with a computer like I did to Victoria. An iPod Touch will be about it in addition to my Blackberry. The airplane ride down will give me an opportunity to use the iPod for its intended purpose of being a multimedia travel device offering music and video playback. I can also see how effective my Shure SL4 in-ear monitors work to keep the airplane noise at bay. July 22, 2008 - A kind reader sent me a link to an article about the WD VelociRapter drives. To refresh everyone else's memories, the new VelociRaptors are 300 GB drives claimed to some 35% faster than WD's previous generation 150 GB Raptor drives (two of which are used in my desktop for OS and scratch disk). The VelociRaptor is somewhat unique being a 2.5-inch drive, but needing a massive heatsink to keep it cool, which physically makes it the same size as a 3.5-inch drive. However, as the article points out, the VelociRaptor does not have the same configuration as regular 3.5-inch drives for power and data connections. Depending on your computer, this may make for some difficult installation. I'm thinking most PC users using readily accessible drive cages and bays won't find much issue since the cabling is generally free and loose in most cases. However, not so for a MacPro Tower, which most people would use one of the four standard trays, which seem to require plain Jane, 3.5-inch drives with standard data and power connections. The article also made me aware that MacPro Towers actually have six SATA connections and all are available immediately instead of having to jump through hoops and hurdles, and then sacrificing a chicken and spilling its guts to read the innards to see if the PC Gods have been appeased, before you might be able to access more than four SATA ports on a PC motherboard. I have six SATA ports on my Intel server board, but the PC Gods help me if I can actually get the last two working without having the whole box freeze up. Using a third-party kit, I can install two non-standard VelociRaptors in the space allotted for a second optical drive in a MacPro Tower. With a RAID card installed, I could set up a 600 GB RAID 0 boot disk! If I want to get really stupid and crazy, I could setup another 600 GB RAID 0 scratch disk and still have two drive spaces available for data, which could be setup as another 600 GB RAID 0 array. If you don't need an optical drive at all, you could install up to eight hard drives inside a MacPro Tower. I believe the configuration would be six SATA drives and then two IDE drives (using the two IDE slots available for the optical drives). This could actually be reasonable since you can always install an optical drive in an external case and connect with USB or Firewire. I used to have one of my spare optical drives mounted in an external case and never had any issues with burning via USB 2. July 21, 2008 - Thanks to those of you that responded to my query about configuring a Mac. The answer, as can often happen, is simple and I over thought what I need to do. Now, if only Apple would announce a new MacBook Pro, I'd be set to begin my journey to the dark side with Darth Jobs 8^) Short book review: Single Exposures: Random Observations on Photography, Art & Creativity by Brook Jensen For those of you that enjoy black and white photography, you no doubt know about Lenswork, a magazine devoted to fine art B&W photography. Brooks Jensen is the editor and publisher of Lenswork and regular readers will know that I listen to his podcasts whenever he finds the time to record them. Single Exposures is a collection of the first year and a half of those podcasts, covering February 2004 to July 2005. To my surprise, I found myself recalling the original podcasts for almost all of them in the book with only a handful that did not twig the old grey matter. To my chagrin, I was astonished that it’s already been four years since Jensen’s first podcast, because it just means that I’ve gotten older, greyer, and miserably fatter in those years. I think I have some ability to talk competently about the technical aspects of photography, but I wished that I were only half as good as Jensen is in talking about the creative aspects of photography. While it’s certainly easy enough to go the Lenswork webpage that links to all the podcasts, having a collection in a small novel sized book is actually more convenient. You don’t have to click and then listen to each individual podcast in one go. You can sit and take your time whenever it suits you. There’s no need for the computer, AC power, and the internet to access Jensen’s thoughts. While not new content, I found myself enjoying them as much as when I first heard the original podcast. Single Exposures is available directly from Lenswork and if you buy all three books offered, you’ll get a discount and each book will be signed by Jensen. I'm now onto Letting Go of the Camera, which is a collection of essays written by Jensen over a 10-year period. The very first essay is a great intro about becoming an artist and it's the kind of jaded sarcasm that only an old hand at the craft like Jensen can offer. One interesting comment that Jensen makes in the second book is that the first 15 years of his photographic life is not worth much and it wasn't until after 15 years that he finally found his groove. Hmm, I've been doing and following photography for 11 years now, so it seems that I have another four years to go before I find my groove. This seems to make sense since the last few years have been rather dry in me being anything but a photographer and I find it a constant struggle to keep at the craft. July 20, 2008 - A question for the Mac users out there about cloning hard drives. If I use an application such as SuperDuper or Time Machine (?), can I create a mirrored clone on a separate hard drive that can be used to replace the original drive? To break it down, here's what I'm thinking:
Although this seems like a weird question coming from a PC user, I'm sure you can read between the lines of what I'm thinking about doing. However, this is not something about to happen in the short term (next month or two), but more middle term (within next year). July 19, 2008 - Reader's comment:
Okay, I think we need to calm ourselves down and not get ourselves messed up thinking about what Nikon might or might not do ;^) There's a lot that we "think" Nikon should or could do, but at the end of the day, Nikon is a business and it's going to produce products that help the bottom line. Although, the idea that Nikon's board of directors is taking a more aggressive stance is very promising and hopefully that will allow for more creativity for the engineers. July 18, 2008 - Reader's comment:
Aw shucks, this ain't a zero sum game, we just having a nice little conversation about Nikon's next camera 8^) Seriously though, no matter what camera Nikon comes out with, whether it's a 24 MP D3X or a 24 MP D700X, we Nikon users are going to end up being winners. With some comments indicating that a D3X version will be priced at $6000, heck, even Canon users thinking about buying the 1Ds Mk III should benefit, because there's not a snowball's hope in hell that Canon would be able to justify an $8000 price tag for a camera that won't be able to match up to what we expect from Nikon. Assuming that the $6000 D3X price holds, I wouldn't be surprised to see the 1Ds3 being dumped down to $5000 very quickly. The idea of Nikon producing a D700X version later on is a nice one and I would love to see this happen, but we don't actually have precedent for this. Nikon is still a newcomer to the world of FX format and we cannot assume that a D700X is in the works. If we look to the past and say that the D1X begat the D100; D2X begat the D200; the D3 has begat the D300 and the D700. That's already one more than expected and who's to say that the D700 isn't actually supposed to be a match for the coming D3X even though there's a mismatch in resolution. With three high level SLRs introduced in the past year, expecting another one relatively soon is optimistic considering that a D700X would likely be produced at the already full capacity Sendai plant. At best, I wouldn't expect such a camera to be announced until close to the 2010 Olympic Games hosted by my home city, Vancouver. This would give Nikon some time to sell the D3X just as the D3 had some time all to itself before the D700 arrived. So, with Nikon going gangbusters with SLRs (consumer models expected to be refreshed by mid 2009 if you read between the lines of Thom Hogan's recent comments), the Coolpixes getting their regular annual updates (whether needed or not), what about the lenses? We have two new pro zooms, three new specialized PC-E lenses, three new prime super telephoto lenses, and one higher end consumer zoom lens. These include, respectively:
The current lens lineup looks like this (manual focus lenses have been ignored):
Ignoring the duplicates that I think will soon be removed from the current list of lenses, we have 45 lenses. Add in the PC-E lenses and we have almost 50 AF lenses. This is a nice amount and pretty comprehensive to cover a range of price points and quality; however, a significant number of these lenses need a refresh and there needs to be a few more additions made. DX Lenses Where I think improvement is needed is for that fisheye to be AF-S and the 17-55 to have VR, just like the Canon 17-55 has IS. While Nikon is moving full steam ahead with FX, there are still a great many DX format users out there and many would appreciate it if Nikon would offer them a prime lens or four instead of forcing them to look to Sigma for some gratification. DX format 13mm, 17mm, 30mm, and 60mm primes would be nice to see (give or take a mm or two) and having them as f2 lenses would be even nicer. Zoom Lenses The 17-35 lens is still highly regarded, but a Mk II version would be nice since it's now almost a decade old. The 18-35 is a nice little lens, but a refresh and constant f4 aperture would be preferred. The two older 24-XXX lenses should be morphed into one 24-105 f4 AFS VR lens. The 70-200 is rumoured to see a Mk II version introduced. Meanwhile, put the elderly 80-200 on a diet to make it a smaller and lighter f4 version with AFS and VR. I understand the need to offer consumers a cheaper 70-300 alternative to the newer 70-300 AFS VR version, but at least give it an AF-S motor. The 80-400 should become a 100-500 constant f5.6 AFS VR lens. I really don't see the point of any lens starting at f4.5 and ending at f5.6. There are some other fanciful ideas such as 300-600 f5.6 lens, but now we're treading on territory owned by Sigma 8^) Wide and Normal Lenses Seriously though, what can I say, but the entire group here needs to be redesigned and given AFS motors. The 14mm lens seems out of place now with the 14-24 lens available, although the prime is smaller and lighter, but I don't think it's much cheaper though. It may seem foolish to put an AFS motor in a fisheye lens, but I'm just going for consistency, because I want all lenses to be updated to this standard (PC-E lenses excepted). The old 18mm lens is gone and I'm not sure a new version really needs to be resurrected, but the 20mm should be refreshed, as should the 24mm. A faster 24mm f2 version has long been wished for, but I think I'd rather see a 24mm f1.4, but I don't know if this is feasible with the F mount. If no 24 f1.4 then bring back the 28 f1.4 to go with the refreshed f2.8 version. While we're on a f1.4 kick, get some major brownie points with a 35mm f1.4 to go with the f2 version. The two 50 lenses are getting really old and tired and while a 50 f1 would be phenomenal, I think the F mount will only allow for a f1.2 version, so why not? Telephoto Lenses I don't know that the two DC lenses are big sellers, but they are considered very sharp lenses, so it would be nice to see AFS and VR updates. Same with the very elderly 180 lens and while the 300 f4 lens is not that old, for the life of me, I do not understand why Nikon did not give it a VR motor. This is a no brainer and I suspect that if the original AFS version had VR, I'd own one by now (same could also be said of the 80-400 lens). The rest of the super telephoto lenses are all good since they have all the best technologies, but I think we'd be happier to see a 400 f5.6 AFS VR or thinking a bit more boldly, a 500mm f5.6 AF-S VR lens added to the mix. In a keeping up with the Jonese and then blow by them move, I want to see Nikon make big statements with the super, super telephoto range. A 800 f5.6 AFS VR is a given, but let's show that Sigma isn't the only innovator here and produce a 300-800 f5.6 AFS VR along with a 1500 f5.6 and while we're at it, how about something completely mind boggling and a big FU statement with a 2500mm f11 lens. It matters little that only the FBI, the CIA, NASA and the Sultan of Brunei would be able to afford it. It's all about perception and size matters baby 8^) Micro Lenses Teleconverters and Extension Tubes Speaking of macro (or Micro) how about those dual element close-up lenses like the much loved 6T, but bigger like 77mm to fit the popular 70/80-200 lenses? How many Nikon users have been forced to buy the Canon 500D, because we had no choice? The three teleconverters are fine, but while the TC14E has always been highly regarded, the TC20E and TC17E are less so. How about tweaking them to extract as much quality as we can from the telephoto lenses that we would usually use them with. For that matter, how about Thom Hogan's idea of VR enabled telecoverters? Is there a way that in-lens VR could work with a VR TC to offer SVR (Super VR). Or, carrying this idea to logical conclusion, how about in-camera VR working with in-lens VR for the same SVR? Conclusion So, I get a call the other night from the person lending me the 40D, wondering when the heck Canon is going to annouce the 5D replacement. He's chomping at the bit to get one like right now. Unfortunately, there's been nary a peep, but then I don't cruise the Canon forums so I have no idea what kind of rumours are floating around out there. The desire to buy is getting bad enough that he thought maybe he should just buy the tired old 5D now, but I told him no. The camera is at the end of the life cycle and there's just no point spending good money on something that could be replaced anytime. However, the little devil sitting on my left shoulder poked me and made me tell him about this lovely new, state of the art SLR that just got announced and should be available in August. The price, resolution, and specs are all right up his alley. Of course, it means he would have to become a Nikon user...as I chortled my evil laugh. This just might come to fruition and damned if I didn't wish I was on the take with Nikon, because of he converts, it could possibly translate into some good sales of multiple cameras, lenses and accessories. Speaking of being on the take, don't forget the support that B&H Photo provides to this website. Go on, spend some money. It will do you and me some good ;^) What's New Archives for 2008 - July to December What's New Archives for 2008 - January to June |
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