New Nikon developments

According to Nikon Rumours, Nikon has confirmed major press events on August 24th; of course speculation is that potential offerings are D4, D400 and Nikon's new mirrorless offering. Seems like a D800 is unlikely till next year.

Thom Hogan discusses the probable new mirrorless format of 2.7 crop. He argues that it could actually be the perfect format between P&S and present DSLR and mirror less formats. If small enough and with the right lens support this camera format could be a great underwater entry level format.

http://bythom.com/

http://nikonrumors.com/

According to Nikon Rumours, Nikon has confirmed major press events on August 24th; of course speculation is that potential offerings are D4, D400 and Nikon's new mirrorless offering. Seems like a D800 is unlikely till next year.

Thom Hogan discusses the probable new mirrorless format of 2.7 crop. He argues that it could actually be the perfect format between P&S and present DSLR and mirror less formats. If small enough and with the right lens support this camera format could be a great underwater entry level format.

 

http://bythom.com/

http://nikonrumors.com/

Ah, 2**1/2 be or not 2**1/2 be? If it is a CoolPix, then it will likely not be an interchangeable lens camera. It’s hard to make really wide angle or fish-eye lenses on the very small format cameras. But, I agree it may be a good pocket rocket and travel u/w rig for the size consciences.

Bob

...Thom Hogan discusses the probable new mirrorless format of 2.7 crop. He argues that it could actually be the perfect format between P&S and present DSLR and mirror less formats. If small enough and with the right lens support this camera format could be a great underwater entry level format.

Does the market really need a format 'between' P&S and current DLSR/mirrorless? I seem to recall that 4:3rds got crucified by everyone for daring to drop to a 2x crop at a DSLR level, and now their micro 4:3rds cameras (at the same crop) are pretty tiny, plus they're allowing some lens distortion and correcting it in-camera to shrink the lenses. Sony E-mount NEX are pretty small for a 1.5 crop...and the A33 and A55 SLT cameras (neither mirrorless nor SLR anymore) are pretty tiny and light with most of the advantages of the better crossovers (PDAF, no shutter delay a la "live view" mirror flap as with a mirrorless) ... yet only Ikelite has bothered making a housing for them.

I mean, do we really need another intermediate step? Will it really be much of an entry-level offering for U/W if no one houses it (aside from Ike, which means they use an existing nearest-fit mold, so the housed system is no smaller than either the nearest equivalent P&S or mirrorless system)?

Disclaimer: I recently chose to abandon 4:3rds for the Sony A-mount, and have an SLT-a55 (see sig). I guess I'm of the opinion that it's the best current compromise between SLR and 'mirrorless' (I didn't want to give up true PDAF, but was willing to give up an OVF), and am a bit irritated that some of the high-end housing manufacturers are housing NEX but not the SLT series....the last thing I want to see is MORE market fragmentation.

I think for Nikon themselves it may make sense as a real intermediate step between their P&S sensor size and DX. Whether or not the market needs such a thing, who knows. I think ultimately whether or not some people go for it depends on whether or not it performs significantly better than P&S.

The problem with anything other than dslrs for nikon, is they have never had competitive contrast detect auto focus implementations.

Always years behind sony and panasonic.

I suspect that will be the achilles heal of any such mirrorless camera from them.

Though Oly surprised us, and finally got CDAF up with the market on the 3rd generation of the PENs.. Maybe nikon can do so too, before the 3rd generation.