by Veit on August 27, 2008
Last weekend, a couple of friends and I went to the Infineon racetrack to photograph the IndyCar Grand Prix of Sonoma. Both of my friends showed up with sparkling new Nikon D300’s — one recently upgraded from a D200, one switched from a Canon 20D.
Of course, the debate ensued whether to switch from Canon to Nikon, especially given Nikon’s recent release of great full-frame cameras (D3, D700) and Canon’s (almost unbelievably) continued absence of a successor to the now 3-year-old 5D. My position in the debate: No, I would not, even if all my gear was stolen tomorrow and I had to start from scratch again. The reason: Canon 24-105/f4 L IS and Canon 70-200/f4 L IS. I use these two lenses for at least 90% of my photography (in fact, I shot more than 2000 images at Infineon with just one lens – the 70-200/f4 L IS) While Nikon offers great f2.8 lenses, these are too big, bulky and expensive for my taste. I gladly trade one stop of lens speed for less weight. And Nikon does not have equivalent f4 lenses.
So the answer remains a solid “no”: I would not switch from Canon to Nikon and would not even consider switching unless they introduce a line of f4 VR lenses.
Below is a shot of Helio Castroneves during qualifying where he captured the pole. He went on to win the Grand Prix the next day. Canon 5D, 70-200/f4 L IS at 200mm, 1/200 sec at f/16, ISO 100.
by Veit on January 23, 2007
Do you remember the in-car telephone? The clunky handset between your seats or in the passenger seat’s legroom space, with the transmission unit mounted in your trunk? Mine even got stolen out of my car in the 80’s; the thief not only broke into the car to get the handset, they also broke into the trunk to take out the main unit and even some of the wires!
Of course, the cell phone totally obsoleted the car phone at an astonishing pace. When looking at pictures of the new C-Class Mercedes this weekend, which features a nice, retracting navigation system, I could not help but wonder whether the in-car nav is doomed as well? After all, there are a number of hand-held nav devices on the market today, plus most cell phones will soon come with GPS or are already equipped with it. So, will the in-car nav be obsoleted?
To a certain degree, this is already underway. There’s still a number of cars where you cannot get a nav, not even as an option. You have to get an aftermarket system, which is expensive. In addition, most navs are pricey. Add to that the up-to-date traffic service, which providers charge for in the U.S. and your in-car nav becomes a very expensive proposition over its lifetime. Worse, in situations where you most need your nav (when you travel to a new city), you cannot take it with you. Neither can you use it, if you have to park 6 blocks from your destination and have to walk by foot (not that the hand-held devices do a very good job in this situation, since they still try to direct you the right way through a one-way street).
Hand-held nav devices or cell phones equipped with GPS software overcome these obstacles. And I bet on Google to ensure that you will have access to free up-to-date traffic information, which you can already get on your cell phone. Of course, these devices feature much smaller screens, but they can provide you with spoken turn-by-turn directions, which works just fine for many users. And once you have them and have learned how to use them, you might even want to use them in your car (why learn another system?)
Will the car makers accept defeat? Not easily. Nav is a high margin option, so they and their dealers will try to milk it as long as they can. They might bundle nav with other, highly desirable options (no Mark Levinson audio without nav?), they might significantly drop the price or even make it a standard feature in their top-of-the-line models (Honda, Toyota, are you listening?). They might even smarten up and, similar to cell phones, offer a bluetooth connection, so the mobile device can utilize the LCD screen in your car, which might be there even if you do not have nav in your car.
In my opinion, the trend is not as clear as it was for the cell phone. At the end, it will depend on how much you value flexibility/mobility over convenience. But the end of the in-car nav will come — sooner or later.
