In comparisons with other digital cameras, it seems that the Coolpix Product line is plagued by more Chromatic Abberation that some of its competitors (e.g. compare Coolpix 990 vs. Sony Cybershot 70). I would immediately go for the Coolpix 990 but for this deficiency. Since Nikon can produce better lenses, are there any chances that the Coolpix line will be extended with a model without this problem?

Thanks for any information!

-- Robert F. Tobler (rft@cs.stanford.edu), March 17, 2000

Answers

Sorry by I respectfully disagree.

What do you base the chromatic abberation of the 990. I have seen only prototype shots to date-with no problems. I get my final sample Friday.

Let me know please.

Michael

-- Mike Rubin, Product Marketing Manager Nikon (web@imaging-resource.com), March 23, 2000.

I haven't seen the problem at least with my 950, I even bought the tiffen hot mirror filter just to play around with and it was a complete waste of $40. Unless your comparing the 950 to a Kodak DCS or D1, I can't say you'd see much of a difference between most under $1200 cameras. They are consumer pieces. In fact the 950 has far less artifacting than most anything in the price range. The JPEG algorithm on some cameras is awful and the 950 is rather gentle to the pics in JPEG mode at the finest quality. Its like comparing a $1100 Umax Powerlook to a Epson 1200U for $250, the Umax is all about better mechanicals, and you have to pay for the good parts no matter how you cut it.

-- Cris Daniels (danfla@gte.net), March 17, 2000.

Hey, I like my Epson 1200U! :)

-- Defiler (defiler@null.net), March 18, 2000.

The 1200U is great, its just not a Powerlook or Expression 1600...

-- Cris Daniels (danfla@gte.net), March 19, 2000.

Mike Rubin, Product Marketing Manager Nikon wrote:

> Sorry by I respectfully disagree. > What do you base the chromatic abberation of the 990. I have seen > only prototype shots to date-with no problems. I get my final sample > Friday.

I understand that you have to defend your product, but please have a careful look at the CP 990 sample images here at imaging resource:

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/C990/C99PICS.HTM

All images which contain high contrast edges will result in dark objects having a red fringe towards the center of the image and a green fringe towards the border. This is especially visible in the following two images:

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/C990/C99FARLF.HTM http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/C990/C99REWLF.HTM

A discussion about this problem can be found at:

http://photo.askey.net/forums/read.asp?forum=1007&message=126034

Form this discussion it is also clear that this is a lens problem, and not a CCD problem with high contrast edges as some people suggest.

Now I agree, that some competitors are plagued by similar problems, but the comparison done by PC Watch:

http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/pc/docs/article/20000317/yama300.htm

suggests, that the Sony Cyper-Shot S70 is not plagued by this problem. None of the high contrast-edges towards the border of the sample images of this camera display any color fringes.

Since I owned a CP950 for about 6 months, I know that this camera also exhibited the same problem, but due to the lower resolution of the CCD it was not as visible as it is in the CP990.

All of this suggests that NIKON built the lens for the CP900/950/990 series for the resolution of the CP900 and didn't improve the lens to match the higher resolution of the 950 or the 990. This is very disappointing for me, as the problem was already heavily discussed for the 950. I can only hope, that NIKON does a better job for the next model in the series.

Robert F. Tobler

-- Robert F. Tobler (rft@cs.stanford.edu), March 23, 2000.

First, I'd like to thank Mike for all his answers.

Now.. I've contributed my fair share on this topic over on Phil's forums, but now I only have one question for Mike Rubin. WHAT IS IT?

Yes, the Nikon shows it. It shows it a lot when the contrast is high, and often even when the pixels are not blown. Some of the competitors show it more, some less, some much less. In the 2.X MP cameras, the Sony F505 exhibited much less of a fringing problem than the CP950. Now the S70 seems be a tad better in this respect than the CP990, even though the CP990 (IMO) has a sharper image. Sony's got the much vaunted Zeiss lenses so most people have assumed this is color chromatic abberation, but noone knows for sure.

My suspicion is that EVERY engineer designing digital cameras in the industry right now knows exactly what this problem is. I simply want to know what they know. It's obviously not an easy thing to get rid of, given how many cameras show the problem. I'd like someone to admit that it does exist (plenty of photographic evidence) to state outright what it is, and why it's so hard to eliminate. Every time we get an evasive answer, it just makes us distrust the manufacturer a bit more. Mike, who do you know who could answer this?

ian

-- Ian Frechette (frechett@houseofthud.com), March 24, 2000.