The D600: Proof Nikon is Asleep at the Wheel (or at Least Way too Complacent)

Yesterday, Nikon announced the D600, the world's smallest, lightest, and most affordable full frame dSLR. Unfortunately, the camera also signals the fact that Nikon has lost hold of its title as the leading photographer-orientated company to Canon as the D600 is really nothing more than a glorified D7000, which is clearly an amateur camera.

Long story short as to why the D600 is a disappointment: the control layout. By looking at the D600, one sees that ity is merely a D7000 with a larger sensor packed into a slightly larger body, clearly not the direct successor to the D700 many people were hoping for. As to why the D600 is is an amateur camera, just look at all of the dual function buttons on it vs. the layout on the D300s and up models, which all feature single function buttons, which are a lot more user-friendly. For a visual comparison, go to my D300s vs. D7000 comparison, which could very well be D800 vs. D600 today as the user interfaces are virtually the same.

As for why the D600 signifies that Nikon has lost its way or, at the very least, grown complacent, it is virtually the same story a was the case with Canon 5-6 years ago.

Once upon a time at the start of the digital a decade ago, Canon had the best sensors in the dSLR market, bar none. Result: Canon could sell cameras on image quality alone. At the time, Nikon had superior feature sets and ergonomics but it didn't matter because, at anything over ISO 400 (this was 10 years ago), the pictures were a noisy mess. Canon? Smooth as silk.

By 2005 and in order to try and close the gap, Nikon was cranking out what was essentially a pro-grade APS-C camera, the D200, and selling it for $1800 despite the fact that it was 95% of the $5000 D2 models. Canon? Still the undisputed leader in image quality, it was resting on its laurels, making only minor updates to its dSLR line while touting “a proven formula,” creating a FF Digital Rebel (the 5D), and keeping all the best technology and features in the top-tier 1D line so as to avoid cannibalizing sales of its flagship models.

Then came 2007 and the 1-2 punch of the D3 and D300.

Overnight, Nikon bested Canon on the image quality front. That, combined with Nikon's generosity in letting pro-grade features trickle down to sub $2000 models made Canon's anything but 1D offerings suddenly look like junk. Since then, Canon has had to play catch-up and has only now, as of 2012 and the 1Dx and 5D Mark III (which is the baby 1D many had been hoping for back in 2008), finally been able to be the equal of Nikon again.

Problem for Nikon was that they were asleep at the wheel.

Instead of continuing the generous feature trickle-down that had kept so many Nikonians loyal through the dark days of before the D3 and D300s, Nikon has apparently stopped this wise strategy with the D600. Before, Nikon's $1800 model has always taken design cues from the top of the line D# line. Now, instead, the D600 essentially becomes a FF D7000, a clear devolution in capability that now forces anyone wanting a serious current Nikon to pay at least $3000 for a D800.

Long story short: Canon and Nikon have flipped design strategies in that Canon is now being generous with letting high-end features trickle down to lower-priced models while Nikon is apparently looking to protect its top-tier lines by crippling an otherwise great D600 with lousy, amateur controls.

Now that each company has shown its hand in the FF war, it will be interesting to see what they do in regards to high-end FF (think D300 s and 7D replacements).

My bet: the edge is now with Canon for this generation of cameras.



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Remembering Neil Armstrong: an American Legend and Ideal Role Model

Neil Armstrong (1930-2012) in 1969.

Yesterday, the world lost Neil Armstrong, the first man to set foot on another world, thus achieving the, to this date, greatest feat of exploration in human history. While the tale of Armstrong the astronaut has been told over and over again and needs no repeating, it is the story of Armstrong the man that should serve as the real inspiration to the youth of American today.

From childhood, Neil Armstrong was fascinated with planes, taking his first ride in an airplane at age 6, which would have been in 1936, scarcely a generation after the Wright Brothers made the first heavier than air flight. At the time, aviation was hardly the routine, take it for granted practice that it is today. How much did Armstrong love to fly? So much so that he became a licensed pilot at age 16, which was before he even got his driver's license.

After finishing high school, Armstrong enrolled in college to study aeronautical engineering. However, come 1949, Armstrong was called to military duty with the Navy, where he served as a test pilot and later fighter pilot in the Korean War. In all, Armstrong flew 78 combat missions. After the war, Armstrong returned to college and eventually completed a master's degree, which was quite a rarity for the time. After college, Armstrong returned to the Navy as a test pilot before being selected to NASA's astronaut class of 1962.

During the middle 1960s, America was locked in what appeared to be a losing race to the Moon with the Soviet Union, which had already accomplished three important firsts: first satellite (1957), first man in orbit (1961), and first spacewalk (1965). After 4 years of training, Armstrong was selected to command Gemini 8. During the mission, which launched in March, 1966, Armstrong got America its first big victory in the space race: the successful docking of two space vehicles. However, the mission nearly ended in disaster when a rocket booster misfired late in the mission, with only Armstrong's cool head and flying skills preventing a tragedy.

As for Apollo 11, the tale has been told an almost infinite number of times and needs no repeating, but it is what happened afterward that merits some real attention, especially in today's world of instant celebrities and egocentricity.

Neil Armstrong, along with fellow crew mates Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins returned to Earth as heroes not just to America, but the world. Even the Russians offered congratulations (though probably grudgingly). Now world famous, Neil Armstrong could play his celebrity status to the hilt for personal gain.

He chose not to.

After flying to the Moon, Armstrong retired from spaceflight, staying with NASA until 1971, when he accepted a position as a professor at the University on Cincinatti. Armstrong would stay on there until 1979, when he decided to do something that seemed completely unexpected: return to his roots as a farmer. In the following years, Armstrong kept a low profile, refusing repeated urgings to run for political office and, after learning that signed memorabilia was being sold for profit, he stopped signing autographs altogether (think of how many current celebrities have signed stuff for sale on their websites). Armstrong was also careful with his name and image, refusing repeated offers (and probably handsome payments) from companies wanting to use either, even going so far as to sue when someone went on to ignore his wishes. In victory, Armstrong never kept any of the winnings, preferring to donate to charity instead.

For a life and career that could have served as the inspiration for many books and movies, Armstrong never wrote an autobiography nor signed any movie deals, either. It was only late in life that he finally agreed to work with author James R. Hansen, who wanted to write an Armstrong biography. Needless to say, by refusing such deals, Armstrong left a lot of money on the table, preferring to live the quiet life, instead.

After his death yesterday, Armstrong's family released a statement that read, in part "[he was a] reluctant American hero [and had] served his nation proudly, as a navy fighter pilot, test pilot, and astronaut. While we mourn the loss of a very good man, we also celebrate his remarkable life and hope that it serves as an example to young people around the world to work hard to make their dreams come true, to be willing to explore and push the limits, and to selflessly serve a cause greater than themselves."

For today's youth, such a concept seems almost foreign. Between self-worth being measured by the number of Facebook friends (and thus attention) one has, the instant celebrities who often do nothing of value yet serve as ideas of how to become famous (thing Kardashians and cast of “Jersey Shore” among others here), the idea that success should come easy (Neil Armstrong had to do a lot more than ace an interview to get to the Moon), and the all-important idea of “me first,” the current college-age and younger generation can learn a lot from Neil Armstrong the man, an American hero who set foot on the Moon yet never let the drive for fame and profit get the better of him.

RIP, Neil, we'll miss you.



For more coverage:
Examiner.com
NASA biography
Neil Armstrong tributes
Interview with John Glenn

Is NASA on the Verge of Another Golden Age?

In the face of extensive budget cuts that have forced the cancellation of the most ambitious interplanetary science probes, NASA scientists have found a new mission for the agency's Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars last week: prove to the American public that planetary science is worth funding at all.

So far, NASA has scored a slam-dunk with its Curiosity Mars rover mission, and the timing couldn't be better.

For NASA, there is a lot riding on Curiosity, far more than the mission itself. For starters, Curiosity is set to be the last flagship mission for the foreseeable future as these most ambitious missions, commonly costing over $1 billion, have been eliminated from NASA's future plans thanks to extensive budget cuts. For the record, Curiosity cost about $2 billion. However, there is hope within NASA that a successful mission may spur the public to be more interested in planetary science. The hope: greater public support in planetary exploration will spur Congress to allocate more funding for NASA, which is to see its planetary science budget drastically cut for the 2013 fiscal year.

So far, things are looking good.

Not since America's return to Mars with the mini Sojourner rover on July 4, 1997 has there been this much excitement about a NASA mission. Like it or not, the public is fickle.

In 1961, President Kennedy announced that, by the end of the decade, Americans would go to and return from the Moon. In July, 1969, the goal was achieved. By 1972, the Apollo program was over, seen as a waste of money since the Space Race had been won, America's prestige lifted (sorry), and science was not perceived as a worthy goal in and of itself. Now, over 40 years later, Americans no longer have a way to go to the Moon let alone colonize space (or, for that matter, even get into space without hitching a ride with, of all people, the Russians).

In the mid 1970s, NASA launched its Viking missions to Mars as the first robots to touch down on the Red Planet. The main goal: see if Mars was home to and/or is hospitable to life. In terms of the mission, Viking was a smashing success. Unfortunately, the stationary landers found no signs of life and, as a result, NASA would wait nearly two decades for another Mars mission.

People are fickle, especially when it comes to things that cost money.

With Sojourner in 1997, the public was, once again, excited by planetary science. At the time, the whole rover concept was a new idea that captivated the public's imagination. Think of it: a RC car-sized, mobile science lab rolling around Mars. If the rover itself weren't enough of a novelty, the method of its landing, namely bouncing in airbags after being dropped from a parachute, was a curiosity in itself. Result: a brief flourish of high-profile, high profile planetary missions, including the Twin Mars rovers, Cassini-Huygens, and New Horizons (still on its way to Pluto).

Unfortunately, come the economic meltdown of 2009 and the non-existent recovery continuing into 2012, the government has had to make cuts to its budget, NASA included. Of its three main spending areas: human spaceflight, planetary science, and maintaining current missions, planetary science found itself on the chopping block. Result: pared-down missions and outright cancellations. When NASA's 2013 budget was announced earlier this year, many space science enthusiasts were left wondering whether planetary science was dead.

Well, hopefully, the Curiosity mission will breath new excitement into the idea of exploring other worlds in our solar system. So far, Curiosity has succeeded, firmly entering the realm of pop culture, even spawning a music video and making celebrities out of a few members of the rover team.

Now, while pop culture is all and good for PR purposes, hopefully, Curiosity's mission and cool science instruments (and, hopefully, exciting discoveries) will go a long way in helping persuade the public, and the government, that NASA is worth funding. With a successful mission and a little luck, a new golden age of planetary exploration could be on the way as, after all, there are a lot of interesting places we could go!



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'We're NASA and We Know It' Music Video a Viral Hit

Who says that NASA isn't hip? Well, they may not be real rocket scientists, but the music parody group Satire dressed up as the Curiosity team and created a nearly 3-minute video based on the Curiosity mission with the lyrics a spoof of LMFAO song “Sexy and I Know It.”

Go here for a link to the video on Youtube. So far, it has over 350,000 hits since Wednesday.



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NASA's 'Curiosity' Just Landed on Mars, See the First Pictures

NASA's latest generation of Mars rover, the $2 billion Curiosity, has just safely landed on the surface of Mars after surviving “7 minutes of terror” and a final descent by “sky crane.” The landing took place as scheduled, at about 1:30am EDT (10:30pm PDT). For the rover itself, the very act of getting to Mars in one piece was in itself an accomplishment for a mission that stood over a 60% chance of failure. For even more good news, the first pictures have already arrived back on Earth.

Needless to say, these are exciting times for NASA and space enthusiasts in general, too.

Curiosity Rover Stands a More Than 60% Chance of Failure

The odds are stacked against Curiosity.

Tomorrow, NASA's Curiosity rover will, hopefully, survive its '7 minutes of terror' and touch down on the surface of the Red Planet after a journey of nearly 9 months. Unfortunately, the odds are stacked against NASA's $2 billion rover. When looking back in history at all the attempted missions to Mars, only 30% make it to the destination.

top officials at NASA are banking on Curiosity in more ways than one. First of all, the multi-billion dollar rover is the most ambitious mission to Mars to date, being to Spirit and Opportunity what the twin rovers were to the first generation Sojourner rover: a big step-up in scientific capability. Amazingly,Opportunity, which (along with Spirit) was given a mission life of 90 days, is still operating as well as ever on the Martian surface more than 8 years after touchdown (Spirit lasted 6 years). Needless to say, coming in the shadows of these better than wildest dream success stories, Curiosity has a lot to live up to on the science and exploration end of its mission.

Unfortunately, we Earthlings have a very poor track record of getting to Mars, 14 for 40 to be exact.

Last year, Russia lost its Phobos-Grunt mission, which was to land on Martian moon Phobos and return a sample to Earth, after a booster rocket failed to propel the probe out of Earth's orbit. Result: arguably the most ambitious planetary science mission in history burned up in Earth's atmosphere. However, Phobos-Grunt was not the first high-profile failure.

In the 1998-99 mission window, NASA was rocked by back-to-back failures as it lost both its Mars Climate Orbiter and Polar Lander, which carried a separate probe, Deep Space 2. After a post-failure investigation, it was determined that the Polar Lander's rocket engines fired at the wrong time, result: the probe smashed into the Martian surface. As for the Climate Orbiter, the cause of failure was nothing short of embarrassing: human error in the form of different measurements being used by the probe and ground control.

In 1992, nearly 20 years after the successful (but with very disappointing results) Viking missions to Mars, the United States decided to go back to the Red Planet again for the first time since then. Result: the highly-anticipated Mars Observer was lost in-route to its destination.

As for Russia, it has bore the brunt of the failures. Russia (then the USSR) launched its first Mars mission in 1960 but would endure a 11-year (and 11 mission) wait before it finally achieved success with its Mars 3 Orbiter/Lander in 1971. In the next close Mars approach, 1973, Russia would achieve a total and partial success. Since then, no Russian Mars probe has survived, a nearly 40 year 0-for streak culminating with Phobos-Grunt last year.

As for other space powers, Japan's one and only attempt to go to Mars failed and the European Space Agency (ESA) is 1 for 2.

Now, while things look bleak, there is good news: until Phobos-Grunt, every Mars mission since 2000 has been a partial or total success, which does bode well for Curiosity as the track record, while overall poor, is much better for recent missions.

As for Curiosity's (hopeful) landing, it will take place at about 10:30pm Pacific Time on August 5 (or about 1:30am Eastern Time on August 6).


For more:
A complete list of Mars missions (as of 2007)

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How Do I Photograph Fireworks Without an Expensive dSLR?

It is a common myth that a dSLR is required to photograph fireworks. In reality, nothing could be farther from the truth.

On Wednesday, I went out to see fireworks but didn't feel like carrying my expensive Nikon D700 with tripod around amongst a huge crowd of total strangers.  End result: I went out to see fireworks with my pocket cam, an Olympus Stylus 550WP (review here) instead. Still, despite the fact that the Stylus can only go 1/2 second at minimum shutter speed, has no manual focus, and I had no tripod, I was still determined to try and shoott he fireworks.

To my surprise, things went very, very well (all things considered, of course!).


Yes, the photos I took are, compared to properly shot firework photos, not overly spectacular. On the other hand, I was quite impressed. For only exposing for 1/2 second, the bursts were surprisingly full as recorded. To get optimal aesthetics, snap your picture just as the burst starts to go off. Depending on your minimum shutter speed, you may have to wait a little into the burst itself (like I had to do with my 1/2 second-capable camera). Second, the AF accuracy was not bad for focusing on the fly and in next to no light, though I suspect that the lights out in the field helped AF accuracy a lot. As for having no tripod, I used my knee instead, which was still good enough to negate using the useless (for fireworks) self timer.

So here's some advice for anyone wanting to take a cheap P&S camera to a fireworks show. First, use a tripod if you have one. If not, brace against something, like your car's roof or yourself. Second, for focus, try and focus on something like another car, pole, or even distant trees. Depending on the brightness of your location and your camera, this may work after all. However, don't expect 100% AF accuracy but remain realistic! Third, set the ISO high as in 800 (yes, noisy pictures, but you can downsize them later) to gather as much light as possible in the short exposure time your camera is capable of doing. Try and set ISO so that the camera is at its minimum shutter speed, too.

One last thing, if you can shoot RAW to maximize your editing capability if you like to play around with your pictures.

So, cheap pocket camera firework photography is possible even though the circumstances seem to go against all photographic common sense. The only reason I know is that I was crazy enough to try it. So, if it worked for me, it may work for you, too.


Oh, yes, here's a sampling of what I got . . .

Not too bad for a $100 camera, are they?

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