Mecworks

>>> UPDATE Oct. 28, 2005: Check out the new leaked D200 picures!

With all the anxiety building around Nikon’s supposed offering that would fill the gap in their “prosumer” line between the D70 and the higher-end cameras and in doing so, counter Canon’s 20D, there has been all together too much speculation and rumor-mill work. The most often talked about possibilities include sensor size and type, ranging from 8.2 MP which would be the minimum in creating an offering comparable to the 20D, to a 12+ MP sensor. Most people are hoping for a magnesium body rather than the polycarbonate D70 version. All this talk has inspired (ha!) several people to make some touched-up photos of the new Nikon D200! Imagine that. Well, it seems that every one of these photos so far has been shown to be a fraud, albeit most are well done.

All of these pictures have been posted on www.dpreview.com as well as other sites. And, while impressive at first glance, the tell tale signs of a retouched photo can been seen.

According to the Dpreview forums, the image of the D200 on the left is fake and actualy a modified version of a Fuji S3 shown on the right. The camera bodies show many similarities - particularly the shape and size of the vertical grip. The differences include a few controls and placement there of. As mentioned in the forums, another one of the the give-aways are the smudge marks and highlights on the virtical grip which are identical in both photos. However, for the most part this is a very good effort an it is hard to tell if one didn’t have the two pictures to compare, that the D200 was not real.

The next fake along the same lines but for another possible Nikon make, the D90. The D90 image on the left shows a lens with the same lens and reflection used in an existing D70 photograph on the right. This could possibly be due to Nikon actualy retouching their own marketing photos with stock images of lenses however, no other official Nikon camera images share the same lenses that I am aware of (if you know of such images, please let me know). Forum members also noted strange placements of the controls which would lead one to beleive that anyone close to being famililar with the camera technology would not have created this D90. This fake marketing image was found on a Chinese web site. Overall, again, a good effort with the exception that the “D200″ on the camera body is slightly blurry and the letters which make up the string “INTRODUCING THE NIKON D200″ are unevenly placed, leading to the conclusion that they were placed by hand, individualy. Which is strange seeing that it would be easy to create the entire string in program such as Photoshop (r) or the Gimp.

Uneven Characters

“LEDGEND” misspelt

Regardless of what people are thinking and hoping for from Nikon, it’s generaly assumed that they need to do something to counter Cannon in the price/feature area now dominated by the Canon 20D. It will be interesting to see what happens as to a D100 replacement/upgrade (if anything) at this spring’s Photo Marketing Association Annual Show (PMA) which will be held February 20 - 23, 2005 at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando Florida. Many speculate that the convention is the time when Nikon will announce some new cameras including the D200 (or what ever they end up calling it).

Commetns Welcome…

>>> UPDATE Oct. 28, 2005: Check out the new leaked D200 picures!