We spent all of last week at photokina in Cologne. We’re very glad to be back in Wiesbaden though. As fun as it is to talk to all you visitors, and show off our great products, six days is a long time! Especially after several weeks of preparations.
Thank you all for coming by! We’ll definitely be back in 2 years!
We’re back from photokina2012 – a great show and a great success! As promised I headed over to the Nikon Booth, and tested our Unleashed Dx000 on the D600.
At first, my heart sunk: No GPS icon on the top LCD. Luckily, when I took photos, the GPS data was embedded in the EXIF data! I figured that Nikon might have simply not included a GPS icon at all on the top LCD. Looking through the manual (page 175 7) it is evident that this is not the case. – there definitely should be a GPS icon. Maybe I simply overlooked it, or the Model on display malfunctioned in some way. Sorry for this false information. Page 175 shows the INFO display, not the top LCD. Top LCD or “Control Panel” is shown on page 7, and definitely does NOT have a GPS icon.
The Unleashed will fit nicely on the D600, the only problem being that the rubberflap is in the way. While it is possible to use the Unleashed like that, the pressure from the flap will, over time, cause the Plug on the Unleashed to break off the PCB inside, which eventually result in malfunction. There are two nice solutions for this:
I misread the manual: Page 175 shows the INFO screen, not the TOP LCD. On page 7 one can see that the top LCD really does not have a GPS icon – in other words, the D600 is fully compatible with the Unleashed Dx000, no “odd behaviour”, no doubt about it.
Today, Nikon announced another full-frame DSLR, the D600. Read the reviews on dpreview, engadget or elsewhere.
Of course Nikon added GPS support, again it’s not integrated, but via an external Module, such as their GP-1 and of course our Unleashed. According to Nikon, the D600 fits in right below the D800 and is just as much a Pro DSLR as the latter. Rumor had it, that this was going to be the first consumer DSLR with an Fx sensor, and there was much evidence to back this. One example is that the D600 does not have the “pro” 10-pin port on the front of the camera, which would have fit our Unleashed D200+. Instead, it is equipped with the port found on all the consumer DSLRs, on the side of the camera, making our Unleashed Dx000 compatible with the D600.
In a couple of days, we’ll be at photokina, and will try the D600 with our Unleashed, just to verify it works, and get you some pics of how it looks.
Preparations for the worlds biggest photography trade fair are keeping us busy – just a little under 3 weeks left and a lot left to do!
Photokina starts on September 18th, and is open for 6 days – until the 23rd of September. Of course, we’ll be there in Cologne – our Booth is in Hall 5.1, Booth F006:
We’d love to see you there, show you our products, and answer any questions you might have.
We might just have something up our sleeve, that you wouldn’t want to miss. ;-)
Canon today announced the EOS 650D/Rebel T4i. You can read about all the other great features in the usual spots, as usual, we’ll concentrate on the geotagging features.
Just like I thought It seems they’re sticking to the same GPS Support via the hot-shoe, which they introduced with the 5D Mark III. That’s great news for us, as it will greatly increase the chance for us to create an Unleashed for Canon.
Here’s the corresponding paragraph from their press release:
“The EOS Rebel T4i is also compatible with Canon’s previously introduced GP-E2 GPS Receiver that can be mounted to the camera’s accessory shoe. The GPS unit was created to serve outdoor photographers; it records shooting locations including latitude, longitude and altitude, as well as camera direction. A Logging function can tell how far a photographer has traveled as well.”
As promised, I checked the possibility of modifying the Unleashed D200+ to make it fit the D800:
It is possible to get it to work, but you have to remove A LOT of the casing, and actually you would even need to remove some of the PCB (see how it sticks out of the cut case), which will quickly cause great problems if you overdo this.
(yes, that extra cut out is for the new “3D” white dot)
While some brave souls will attempt to do this and will probably manage, This is not a solution I will recommend to our customers.
Forum thread showing the modification
We’re working hard on a successor to the Unleashed D200+, and are redesigning it to make sure it fits the D800 properly. We will make existing customers some sort of an upgrade offer, be it trade in, or just a loyalty rebate of some sort, we still need to work out the details on that. So don’t hesitate to get the Unleashed D200+ for your current camera, while you’re saving up for that D800 – you’ll be able to upgrade the Unleashed as soon as we have the new version ready.
Sorry… I wish I had better news than this.
Today Nikon announced the Nikon D3200. With its 24 Megapixel sensor and high resolution LCD, it’s really quite a step up from the entry-level D3100. That’s probably why Nikon is claiming that it’s not a replacement for the D3100, but rather an addition to the lineup.
From our point of view, the greatest news is that Nikon is sticking with the socket for GPS devices they introduced with the D90, which they’re now including in all their consumer DSLRs. We’re happy to be able to tell you that our Unleashed Dx000 will be compatible with the D3200!
Apart from this, I’m also looking forward to how well the WU-1 wifi-adapter will work – and how it will differ from the excellent wft-e5 for the D4. The latter works remarkably well, and allows camera control including liveview from any browser. I’m glad the WU-1 is so small – that way it won’t interfere with the Unleashed Dx000, and both can be used at the same time.
More and more software is coming out with support for geotagged photos. Finally Adobe has caught on, and has released Lightroom 4, along with pretty decent geotagging features.
“Map” is now one of the main views available in Lightroom, in which you will see a big map, with markers in all the spots on the map in which you took photos. If you zoom out, markers too close together are merged. Instead of an empty marker representing a single photo, a number is displayed on that marker, indicating the number of photos taken in that area. You can also choose to load GPS tracklog files, and have Lightroom 4 display these on the map. These tracks can even be used to indirectly geotag photos that are not yet geotagged, by matching the timestamps.
Optionally, you can blend in extra panels. The left panel contains three subviews:
The right panel is your usual Metadata panel, in which you can see EXIF, IPTC and other Metadata, including the EXIF Fields with the GPS coordinates, along with button that will center the map to those coordinates. You can even choose to only display Location Metadata.
Along the bottom you have your film-strip panel. The photos in here all have badges in the bottom right corner, indicating whether or not they are geotagged. if you click on one of the markers in the map view, all the photos in that location are centered and highlighted in the film-strip view, so you can quickly see which photos were taken there. Instead of clicking on a single marker in the map, you can also apply one of three Location filters (along the top of the map view):
I have not taken the time to dive any deeper into Lightroom 4 (I use Apples Aperture – which has supported geotagging for quite a while longer), who knows what other gems I might have missed – so feel free to add your own finds in the comments!
It’s official – the long awaited Canon EOS 5D Mark III was released a few hours ago. Read the press release, or check out previews and hands-on details at the usual sites – I won’t re-iterate those here.
I must however mention the big news, that Canon seems to finally be embracing geotagging, and announced the GP-E2 GPS receiver along with the 5D Mark III.
Image by Canon
It has 3 modes of operation:
Canon’s GP-E2 will offer the following key features:
Here’s the relevant paragraph from the 5D Mark III press release about this new accessory:
“The EOS 5D Mark III also has an optional Canon GPS Receiver GP-E2, which can be connected to the camera via the accessory shoe or a USB cable. With a GPS logging function built-in, the GP-E2 will log latitude, longitude, elevation, and the Universal Time Code – and allow viewing of camera movement on a PC after shooting. With its built-in compass, the GP-E2 receiver will also record camera direction when shooting, even when shooting vertically. The Canon GPS Receiver GP-E2 is compatible with the EOS-1D X and EOS 7Di as well as the EOS 5D Mark III.ii”
i) When the EOS 7D is used with the GP-E2, the following restrictions will apply: a) geotagging function will not work for movies while recording; b) geotagging features will not work for movies when using the Map Utility; c) electronic compass information and automatic time setting is not available; d) transmission via the hot shoe is not possible.
ii) In certain countries and regions, the use of GPS may be restricted. Therefore, be sure to use GPS in accordance with the laws and regulations of your country or region. Be particularly careful when traveling outside your home country. As a signal is received from GPS satellites, take sufficient measures when using in locations where the use of electronics is regulated.
The EOS 5D Mark III requires a firmware upgrade to be compatible with the GPS Receiver GP-E2, which will be available soon.
One more image:
Image by Canon
A few days ago, Nikon announced the D800 and the D800E, and again they did not build in a GPS Receiver. While I’m sure this will happen in the future, Nikon do still have some work ahead of them to get this to work well enough for a pro camera! And contrary to what they say – it’s not (just) about the limited space inside the camera body. Read some of my thoughts here. Nikon did keep their 10-pin port for attaching external GPS devices.
Unfortunately, Nikon changed the physical design of the area around that 10-pin port in such a way, that our Unleashed D200+ no longer fits, at least not without modification.
The problem is that Nikon made the D800 smaller, the lens mount wider, and most contours of the camera more slanted. This results in less space near the 10-pin port to begin with, and that space decreasing even more as you try to push the Unleashed further into the socket – so much, that it is not possible to firmly plug the Unleashed into the socket. Electrically, it would still work, but physically it does not fit.
Illustration of the problem area – proportions are not exact.
We now need to wait until we get a D800, in order to evaluate whether it might be possible to make the Unleashed fit by modifying its casing (i.e. cutting or sanding off the one edge of the back of the Unleashed) to fit the slanted edge of the lens mount, and how we will need to redesign the next version of the product to account for the changes.