Nikon D2H: Digital Camera + 802.11b Option

k_stamour writes "Wow, the Holy Grail of Digital Cameras! -- the Nikon D2H. Considering the ever-dropping cost of 802.11b gear, it may not be too long before WiFi is found in lower-end Digi-Cameras. The remaining cost would be to get decent performance out of a small embedded Wifi antenna. This Nikon is Geared for Sport/Action/News Shots. Think about it: a photographer can be on a scene of a newsworthy event, and over the hours of attending, the publisher could already be printing/posting the photographer's pics before he removes the camera strap from his neck! With this cam, a WiFi access point, and Internet access, they could post their pics in real time on the web from anywhere in the world. Of course, the above conditions would need to be meet every time for real time uploads." The 802.11 access is through an optional external transceiver module, model WT-1.

Comments

Battery Life

[momerath2003]

802.11b takes up a lot of power (for a small device, anyway). The camera would either have to have some monster batteries or not be able to take very many pictures at all. Also, are CompactFlash cards able to read/write to different files at once? It seems like writing pictures would be hard if someone was trying to read one at the same time.

Unlimited Storage

[coolmacdude]

This would be awesome to use as an unlimited source of storage space. No more expensive 1 GB cards to buy.

Connecting to Car PC

[cosmosis]

I think another soon-to-be application is when you are on road trips, and as you take pictures during the trip you can just hit the download key, and it immediatley upload the pics to your car PC, which also just got released from Xenarc Technologies.

Planet P

the prices of digital cameras

[civilengineer]

Considering the ever-dropping cost of 802.11b gear, it may not be too long before WiFi is found in lower-end Digi-Cameras

Forget 802.11b gear and all that. The prices of regular digital cameras are themselves not dropping as much as I would like. The other day, I assembled a great PC for $150 and I'm sure two years down the road, I can build even greater one for that money. But, digicams are still priced at $150-$200 for a decent piece and I don't feel like spending that money knowing that $150 is powerful enough to get you a good computer.

Transmission on the go??

[whiteranger99x]

If said newsreporter was taking pictures where there happened to be a WAP, who's to say that he couldn't use connect his camera to a laptop and transfer the pictures from a 802.11b card on the laptop? I would think it wouldn't stress the camera batteries as much.

I must admit though, it seems like a nifty idea, nonethe less ;)

802.11b speed.

[james72]

Considering the size of an image from this camera (got to be over 3MB each, depending of JPG compression, or much large if RAW images), I wonder about the speed of transmission. If you've got a full 1GB microdrive to send, you're going to be waiting a while. Also, the module seems huge, and a sizeable increase to an already hefty camera. I would like to try one out though... -James.

This is not something new.

[rkz]

Sony has been making cameras with bluetooth for a while, the FX77 is quite a high spec camera which offers the ability to send pictures to other bluetooth devices. Such as a GPRS mobile phone so you can upload them to the internet. A bluetooth laptop so you can save directly to its hard drive, eliminating the need for expensive Memory sticks.

Some of Sony's digital cameras which don't have BT built in have the ability to support the CLIE Memory Stick Bluetooh adaptor.
This is not news.

Digital Cameras + GPS

[four]

When will they start putting GPS receivers in digital cameras?

I want to know the exact location of where I've been taking pictures!

Re:See, THIS is an example of an internet applianc

[Greedo]

A cheap touch-screen wifi webpad would be great.

I'm waiting on the internet-enabled clock radio. Never needs to have the time changed (thanks to NTP) ... alarms are programmable from anywhere ... plays your digital music that's stored wherever for wake up, or gathers news reports from around the world ... tells/shows you the latest weather conditions for your area.

Anyone seen something like this?

Imagine this...

[Saint Aardvark]

at the next G8 meeting or protest rally. How long 'til protestors -- or police -- are using this to keep everyone up-to-date on what's happening? And how much longer after that 'til police -- or protestors -- are using something like Driftnet to see what's being photographed?

See 4/3 for a holy grail

[arasinen]

While it is quite cool (in the gadget-gee-whiz-sense) to have wireless connection to a digital camera, it is not in my view even close to the Holy Grail of digital photography. The main reasons to use this feature are a) convinience (which is eaten away by the fact that you need an external unit) or b) people who really need to send pictures to somewhere else ASAP.

In the case b) the photographer loses his/her chances to edit the pictures later or even to choose the best pictures. Good for first impresssions, not much for anything else.

Holy grail for professional digital photography are for example cameras that use a full-sized sensor; then you wouldn't need different lenses for digital and film photography.

On the hobbyist front I'd like to see more standards. The Four Thirds -standard sounds promising, and I'm hoping Canon or Nikon would embrace it.

Re:Sounds like it's for studio

[Anonymous Coward]

the list price acording to the article is 3,500us but it doesnt say if that is with or without a lens. Since its a pro camera i will assume its without a lens. Also they list the WiFi module as an accesory so that would also add to the price of the camera.

but the reason why most would want this camera is because of the speed at which the sensor can operate, which is 8fps for 40 images. The D2h aparently has reduced shutter and view finder lag which would be great.

Missing the point

[angst_ridden_hipster]

It seems to me that a lot of people are missing the point on this one.

I think it's less targeted at "immediately beaming your pictures from the field" than it is targeted at studio photography.

The high-end Nikon digitals may be good enough for journalism, but most of the people I know who use them are doing studio work, like product shots, fashion, etc.

If this is well designed, it could improve the pipeline speed of a product shoot, as it's often different people doing the different processes: shooting, color correction, comping. layout, etc. Now, the initial stage of this process can be made (closer to) parallel.

It certainly is not a revolutionary change (like the introduction of digital photography was), but it could represent an evolutionary change, where the photographer doesn't have to interrupt work to carry the microdrive over to the server for image uploading.

Now, some people will say "but many pros already have their cameras hooked up full-time via firewire, so this won't change the process at all!" I almost agree -- this removes the annoying tether, so you can move the camera around without cable snarl.

Then, with Sony and others set to WiFi enable the entire known universe, maybe this *will* eventually be a take anywhere, shoot, and upload kind of thing.

We shall see...

Re:Missing the point

[Hawthorne01]

The studio I work at is all digital. We use PhaseOne backs on Hassies and Sinar for the big stuff, and D1's for smaller shots.

In the beginning, we tried moving files from the production Macs to ones in another room for client viewing during the shoot.

It failed miserably. There is no way the bandwidth of even 802.11g can keep up with the file sizes of even the D1. We ended up running Gigabit Ethernet between the client computers and the production stations.

Now, we have a client who carries an AirPort equipped PowerBook with him, and it was neat to shoot, edit and then transfer the final image over to him via wireless, and then have him walk out the door with the photo already placed in Quark.