dSLR Gossip

Nikon Professional Services (NPS), have launched a new website and gone global. It’s a great start to put to rest some of the criticism for Nikon’s policies. Read more at NPS Global Home.

Highlights:

• Non-NPS members currently have access to all of the site except for a couple of articles
• Digital products are not yet covered by the Nikon Worldwide Service Warranty
• For digital products, NPS will service for 1-year from date of purchase
• NPS South Africa is left out, for now

See Thom Hogan’s tirade on this in his post titled “NPS Goes Global (Sort of)” in his website – http://www.bythom.com/

Sony has just unveiled a 35-mm sensor based professional camcorder. Sony quotes that the “New PMW-F3 joins F35 and SRW-9000L as latest S-35mm innovation, delivering high-end performance at an “indie” price”

Sony PMW-F3

Highlights:

• Records at 1080p at 1 to 60 frames/sec
• MPEG-2 Codec Long GOP 4:2:0 8bit, 35 Mbps
• Uses Sony’s SxS ExpressCard-based recording media format
• ISO 800, F11; and S/N ratio of 63dB in 1920×1080/59.94i mode
• PMW-F3′s PL mount adapter can accommodate both PL and zoom lenses

Two configurations will be available around January 2011

1. PMW-F3L body only
2. PMW-F3K with PL lens kit

More chatter about the new Nikon full-frame camera – it seems like it is going to be a Nikon D900 after all. Personally, I would love to see the 18 megapixel Nikon sensor go into the Nikon D900. It just makes more sense – it will not alienate the users who sold their kidneys to get a Nikon D3x .

There may be an explanation after all to the naming convention – D900 follows Nikon’s odd-even naming cycles. These 4 year odd-cycle started with the Nikon D3. What followed was D300, D90, D3000, D700 and D5000 – all non-zero odd numbers. Going with this rationale, Nikon D900 is the next to follow.

The next even-cycle will start with the Nikon D4, sometime around summer of 2011. And, soon we’ll see: Nikon D400, Nikon D800, Nikon D4000, Nikon D6000, etc.