Nikon D600

Concept: 4 out of 5
Execution: 4 out of 5
Yeah, but: I'm not buying one.

Counter Opinion: The more is see and handle the Nikon D600 the more impressed I am. I'm having a hard time imagining a better entry into Nikon's world.

Yes, it's expensive, but not overwhelmingly so. Today the D600 and 24-85mm lens costs a little less than what my first SLR did, which was the Olympus E-1 with 14-54mm lens, and I used that for years with just the addition of a cheap macro lens. That's not a bad deal.

Alternatively, buy the D600 body and add the trio of new f/1.8 primes (28, 50, 85) for an awesomely capable set that's still not that big or expensive. Swap one of those fast primes for a macro – the 50/1.8G for 60/2.8G, or 85/1.8G for 105VR – and that base is covered; add an SB-700 flash, a couple of SD cards, and don't buy anything else for a half-decade.

As a D800 owner, I do still see the value in the heavier iron. The higher top shutter speed and flash sync speeds are things that I've used just this week, and printing 16x20" photos at a little over 300dpi certainly doesn't suck. I also already own an MC-30 ten-pin remote, so that's a cost savings right there. Although I am jealous of the D600's ability to use the non-astronomically-priced ML-L3 wireless remote – life's a barter.

In an odd digression from their recent design trend, the shutter button on the D600 isn't as aggressively sloped as on their other 2012 cameras. I'm not sure that it means anything, but it does suggest that the D600 was in development before the new ergonomics were nailed down for the D4/800/3200 designs. Coupled with the D600's quick availability it's fairly clear that Nikon was sitting on skids of these in anticipation of Photokina – and the hubbub over the D800 dying down.

There are a couple of clues that makes me think that the D600 is the FX companion to the D7000 rather than a D800-lite. One big one is that the D600 uses the MC-DC2 remote instead of the ten-pin connector of the 'pro' series. This suggests that the D800 also needs a 'pro' DX companion that could finally replace the D300s, in the same way that the D700/D300 worked together. I could see the difference in control layouts between the D800 and D600 being enough to discourage people from using those two as a pair. As it stands, though, the image zoom in/out buttons are reversed from the D7000, as they are on the D800 and D4 compared to their predecessors, so clearly a model bump in the D7X00 line is in order.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, IQ: I haven't scrutinized it but have no doubt that it'll be excellent. DxOmark has already ranked its results among the best in the world – pushing the top Canon camera out of the top twelve in the process – but in all honesty, there's hasn't been a truly bad camera made in many years. The Olympus E-510 is the last one that comes to mind for me, with its ability to record about one stop of highlight detail above the midtone; if anyone knows of any more recent than that, please let me know.

The biggest D600 news for me is that Nikon has finally included a half-decent a thumb rest. It's not as good as the 5DmkII, but it's a sign that perhaps someone at Nikon has picked up a second-hand F5 from eBay. I do find the hand grip a little narrow, but the thumb ridge makes up for a lot. Including a 100% viewfinder is a strong statement about how highly Nikon thinks of this model, despite its lack of a round viewfinder; Canon missed that mark on its upcoming 6D 'competitor'. The D600's shutter is even a bit quieter than the one on the D800, which is another nice touch.

Nikon has built themselves a very appealing little camera.

Counter Opinions are quick "sales counter" product reviews.
As always, viewer discretion is advised.
Last updated 25 sep 2012

Youtube Product Reviews

Concept: 3 out of 5
Execution: 1 out of 5
Yeah, but: Hey, internets.

The Long Version: Here's something I don't understand: the Youtubed single-take video review. I've been shopping for a new pocketknife recently, and these things are the dominant form of experiential information about it. Let me tell you, most of them are just plain bad, and many of them are much worse than that.

Coughing, bumping the camera, um, let's see, dropping things, focus hunting or locked on the wrong thing; um, background noise, hiss and wind noise; shaky camera, um, I don't know if you guys can see this; helmet-POV, hand-on-each-side demonstrations, um, webcam, hey youtube; missed framing, drifting auto exposure, fidgeting; dumb catchphrases, um, random backgrounds; bad video and worse lighting; scantily researched, improvised, self-indulgent and rambling presentations.

Seriously, I've seen considerably higher production values – and better scripting – from some very average efforts at amateur porn.

Writing a good review is hard work: look at just how rarely I accomplish it despite my many attempts. Taking photos is also an acquired skill, and one that most casual reviewers lack. That's usually okay, since the goal is description, not art, and a still photo can be puzzled out or skipped over as the viewer prefers. But when people take a video camera out to the garage because they think that it's easier than acquiring and/or combining those two other skills, bad things happen.

Making a good video is a lot of really hard work, which is why I don't do it. I can't say that I won't ever create a video review – they have their place and can draw a lot of attention – I absolutely promise that it won't be recorded with my cellphone.

last updated 24 sep 2012

Spell Tower for iOS

Concept: 3 out of 5
Execution: 2 out of 5
Yeah, but: Time flies. Seriously.

The Long Version: I encourage people to think that when things go quiet around here that it's because I'm working on something big, like world peace or a major camera-related review. Sadly, though, it often just means that I've found a new computer game.

These days I've been playing Spell Tower, by Zach Gage, which is a neat little game for iOS that Penny got me hooked on. It's a word-finder remove-the-blocks puzzle, with different gameplay modes that allow free play on a fixed board or various reverse-tetris don't-reach-the-top challenges.

I don't seek out stress, and usually play the "no pressure" game. I do terribly at Scrabble but reasonably well at Boggle, and I'm pleased to say that the technique is more like the latter with some of the odd not-really-words of the former. All told, a fair trade.

The user interface is good, but in my case is limited by the phones' screen size. I'll occasionally select words that I wasn't trying for, usually while on my way to building something that would have given me a higher score, simply because I have a hard time accurately hitting the little letter boxes on my iPhone screen. I'm pretty hopeless at dragging to select the letters, especially when doubling back and working on diagonals, but tapping is just a little better. An "undo" command would be a very, very nice addition.

Tapping is also good because it shows the points total before committing, and sometimes there are better combinations that aren't intuitive. I played one game where "hugs" was worth fewer points than "guns", so it's good to check.

The game has American overtones in other ways, too: "zed" isn't an acceptable word, despite being used in almost every English-speaking country, but the nonsense word "zee" is. "Jesus" is a recognized word, but my nephew's name isn't despite also being mentioned in the Bible. I accidentally discovered that Shri is an alternative spelling for Sri, which is an Indian honourific derived from Sanscrit; I still have no idea what a "bez" is despite it earning me sixty points. This is one reason why I detest high-level Scrabble games, but at least with Spell Tower these can be discovered by happenstance. I still feel better about completing games when I can use all of the words in a sentence, though.

I have to say that I really like the font that Mr. Gage chose for the display. It's very easy to tell "E" from "F" and "B" from "R" despite having all of the letters in majuscule. There's also a white-on-black "night colors" option that tames the screen brightness, which I prefer to the standard display. That's useful enough to let me forgive the too-loud-by-default sound effects.

A nice touch is the list all of the words found during the game, presented along with a link to the iOS dictionary if it's a legitimate one. I'm routinely surprised by just how few words there are when the game is finished – it always feels like there should have been more. I've yet to actually time myself playing a game, but I suspect that it's considerably longer than it feels like, as well. That, at least, can be a good sign.

All told, Spell Tower is a simple and enjoyable little game that easily justifies the price of the download. There is room for a little more refinement in the interface, but that's true for me, too. Highly recommended.


Updated 26 September: I just downloaded an update and now it has locked all of the levels until I go through the tutorial or score a certain number of points in various things, and it resets itself to the maximum effects volume. That's just obnoxious – I've marked its score down accordingly.

last updated 26 sep 2012