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Check out any of the Nikon sites at the moment and you'll see a variety of “teaser” adverts. Their UK site has a running countdown in seconds, their global site has a cryptic flash slideshow with “20 days to go” on it, their Japanese site has the same slideshow (or at least that's what my limited Japanese tells me). It's no secret that Nikon are going to launch something big on the 9th of August - the only question is how big? Here at ThinkCamera we have our invites to the press launch and until then can't really say any more - all of this has been gleaned from sources in the public domain.
What is clear from the adverts is that it will be a new consumer level DSLR with 10.2 million pixels or as their marketing department would probably want us to point out 200,000 more than the Sony A-100. The pictures in the slide show don't give much away but assuming they are of the new camera, it's clear that it is aimed at consumers rather than professionals. The shutter button is silver like on the D70 and D50. Nikon professional level DSLRs have black shutter releases - though so of course does the D200. In any case there are enough references to “value” to make it apparent this isn't going to be a multi thousand pound monster but something within the reach of many people.
The sensor will be 10.2 million pixels so it's a pretty safe guess that it's the same sensor that gives great detail and excellent noise control in the D200. It would be very surprising if this is the long awaited (much rumoured and much denied) full frame Nikon. Firstly it would be odd to introduce that in a consumer camera rather than the professional range and secondly if Nikon were ever to introduce a full frame sensor I would expect it to have more pixels than the D200.
Whatever the truth it's a long time since Nikon have hyped up a product announcement as this. Whether that's just gamesmanship now that Sony are stepping into the ring, whether it's because they really have something extraordinary or whether it's because it's a long hot summer and they want to whip the press up, who knows? But we'll find out in 20 days.
We told you about 5 new Panasonics yesterday, Samsung have announced two new ranges of cameras in the past couple of weeks (details on the second will be up shortly) and Photokina is 9 weeks away. It's going to be a busy summer and it looks like the reviewers for ThinkCamera are going to be putting in overtime.
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