Ok, I will compromise: if you care to know what Ken Rockwell has to say about the BIG ad go to NikonRumors Page2, otherwise ignore this post.

Fair enough for everyone?

In the future I will continue to post rumors from Ken Rockwell. From now on I will label them accordingly and if you can't stand him - it's very simple: don't read them. There are a lot of readers that do care what he has to say.

I also would like to know what % of our readers can't stand him. Based on those results I may decide to change my plans for the future. Here is the poll, let democracy prevail:

This is the message I received:

This discussion has been going on in the past few days (our regular readers will certainly know what I am talking about). This is not one of our trusted sources, so I don't stand behind this rumor. It could be a hoax. If the boxes for those lenses are already existing, I would expect them at Photokina which makes the above offer of pictures next week useless (Photokina is next week from September 23rd till September 28th).

Going back few post you will find this rumor: "You should carefully assess the upcoming newly to be released (prime) lenses and realize they cover more than strictly needed." MX again?

Thom Hogan is back from his trip in Alaska. He may not be happy about this, but I will again carefully read every single word in his latest post on his web site:

• "Meanwhile the A900 becomes the megapixel bargain (at least for a short period of time)" - is there something coming? Maybe Canon? Sony will be glorious only for a short period of time? Good!
• "In the Micro 4/3 arena, I suspect we'll see a Coolpix APS response in 2009". Good!
• "In the high megapixel count arena, it appears that Nikon's response is currently targeted for early 2009 (WPPI and PMA), though there's still an outside chance that it could be preannounced/leaked as early as Photokina." He mentioned D3x and D800 as potential successors with the new Sony sensor. Not so good!
• "I expect that high megapixel camera to be highly modular". Did I hear the word "modular" again? Very good!

NR received a forum comment made by someone who was correct before in terms of predicting future announcement. This individual is also known to be a tester for a major company. I agree not to reveal the country or the name of this person. This is what he/she said and I am quoting the translation submitted to NR by a reader:

Another one from dpreview:

Anyone knows more about this "open secret"?

Update: the reference was for the Nikon E2 model - I was not sharp enough to get to that model before.

I have to be very careful how I report this information, so here we go...

Somewhere, at some point of time, someone that works for an unidentified company talked about:

• the bulk of the camera body, especially the vertical grip. The remark was that a certain company had considered a square sensor, so that the user would not need to rotate the body. Shots could be processed later to result in vertical or horizontal final images.

• the fact that a pixel density and efficiency level would be reached in a roughly 6x4.5 sized chip of near 100 MP. When you look at some of the smaller pixel sized cameras, and how they perform, the capability is already there, though perhaps the failure rate has kept them off the market. Anyway, if you scale a roughly 100 MP 6x4.5 chip to nearer 36mm square, then somewhere in the realm of 40MP seems about the upper practical limit.

• MX may just mean Multi Format

The above info may or may not be related to the Otoji project (more info on Otoji can be found here, here and here). Of course all this could be just a plain product discussion that will never hit the production line, but this information somehow got to me and I decided to share it.

• automatic repositioning of the focal plane of the sensor unit when the adapter is mounted
• mirrorless design

Very busy day today. This is what happened in a nutshell (thanks to all readers that emailed us):

• I am still getting reports that there was a Nikon press conference in France on Sept 3rd. Anyone?

• "Nikon UK is pleased to announce the versatile Zoom-Nikkor AF-S DX VRIII IF-ED 18-165mm f/3.5-8G" - what is this all about? VRIII? 

• Nikon D800 is being actively discussed all over the place. Most of the info is old.

• A rumor came from Germany that the next D3s will be called D4 (the Germans are always right). Could this be the reason why the French web site changed their pre-order from D3x to D4? I cannot confirm anything yet (no reliable sources). If you remember Thom Hogan also predicted that the next D3 will not be called D3x.

• PhaseOne is offering an incredible deal (in terms of value, not in terms of price):

• Nikon D90 (kit) should start shipping next week. Get yours here.

• B&H is buying Google ads for Nikon D4 (link). I think this is standard practice of the big retailers - we reported something similar here. You can search for D800, D900 and any other weird future model and you will still get Amazon or somebody else buying those ads. Still, a thought-provoking development.

• Interesting observation from a reader (thanks SN):

I got this image as a follow up to this story which was based on the "Big" post. This is suppose to be a cell phone spy shot related to Otoji, but I do not know yet what does it say:

Here is another trackback on this topic.

Comments, translations, interpretations are welcome. This could be HUGE! I can't wait to hear what you have to say.

Translation:

M1 Development Plan

device MX format

device FX format

device DX format

right page (not related to camera)

about Frugality

how to save money

how to save Food expenses

how many time go to store
etc.

- the word otooji means "parent's younger brother; uncle"

This is a comment to our BIG post from last week. Very cryptic, but again it talks about the first week of September (or maybe March, 2009):

It is hard for me to believe that Nikon will have two announcements one week apart.

I could not get any more info from that reader, but hopefully with this post we will light the fire.

The above scan is from page 148 of the latest Rangefinder Magazine.

I wonder what will be so BIG about this event.

WPPI stands for Wedding & Portrait Photographer International. The next show will be in February 2009 in Las Vegas. In the event schedule they have listed a "surprise welcome party".

What?