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Sea turtle plays star role in lost-camera saga

A videographer who also happens to be a sea turtle has become a media star for filming the journey of a lost digicam that traveled 1,100 miles by sea and is now on the way back to its owner.

The seafaring saga started last November, when Royal Dutch Navy sergeant Dick de Bruin apparently lost his red Nikon Coolpix L18 while exploring an underwater shipwreck off the coast of Aruba. Six months later, Coast Guard investigator Paul Shultz spotted the cam--encased in sea-debris-encrusted Ikelite waterproof housing but intact--when it washed ashore in Key West, Fla.

Shultz said his investigative instincts were piqued by the orphaned camera, which didn't contain shots offering any definitive clues about its owner. He started sleuthing by posting a message on the online forum ScubaBoard.

"This is a total shot in the dark," he wrote. "I found a digital camera and waterproof case washed up here in Key West. I am trying to identify an owner so I can return it." He uploaded images from the cam, hoping other divers could help identify the location, which they pinned as Aruba, an island in the southern Caribbean Sea.

One photo showed the side of an aircraft, which helped Schultz trace the flight history to confirm that the camera had, in fact, been in Aruba. He posted additional photos from the camera to travel Web sites Cruise Critic and Aruba.com. Within days, an Aruban woman contacted Shultz saying she recognized the children in the photos as classmates of her son (de Bruin is stationed in Aruba with his family for several years).

The woman then contacted de Bruin to hook him up with Schultz, and the rest, as they say, is history. The camera is now on its way back to de Bruin--this time, presumably not by sea. … Read more

First Take: Nikon Coolpix S8000

The Nikon Coolpix S8000 is a 14-megapixel compact megazoom with a 10x Zoom-NIKKOR ED glass lens on front and a 3-inch 921K-dot LCD on back. It's also one of the slimmest 10x zoom cameras currently available. Nikon was late to adding HD video capture to its compact cameras, but that feature is available on the S8000 as is a stereo mic, which is still a bit of a rarity. An HDMI output is built in, too, for quickly connecting to an HDTV or monitor for viewing photos and movies.

Other features include Optical VR image stabilization, macro shooting as … Read more

First Take: Nikon Coolpix L110

Nikon's Coolpix L100 and L20 were very popular models last year and actually continue to be well trafficked on CNET. That has a lot to do with their price tags and far less to do with their quality. I didn't review the L20, but the L100 was a fairly weak camera. (But it had a 15x zoom for less than $250!) Nikon is now announcing their updates: the Coolpix L110 and L22.

For the same MSRP as the L100 ($279.95), Nikon increased the camera resolution to 12 megapixels and the 3-inch LCD resolution from 230K dots to … Read more

Exclusive: Nikon Coolpix P100 reviewed

The P100 is Nikon's top-of-the-line megazoom camera, extending out to a questionably useful 26x. Along with that lens it has many features and capabilities, thanks, in part, to its backside-illuminated 10-megapixel CMOS sensor.

The P100 offers high-speed continuous shooting of stills at up to 120 frames per second and video at up to 240fps. It has a regular movie mode, too, that goes up to 1080p HD quality. There are also shooting modes for creating high-dynamic-range photos and taking handheld low-light shots.

Controls are easy to use and menu systems are clean and simple to navigate, making experimentation with … Read more

Nikon Coolpix P100 is like P90, but really it's not

So this is the Nikon Coolpix P100. It's a complete overhaul inside and out of the flagship P90. The changes include, for starters, the zoom on the camera's f2.8-5 26-678mm-equivalent lens now goes out to 26x (just in case you were still having trouble seeing into your neighbor's house or their neighbor's house). Though you really don't want to use a zoom like that without a support, the camera does have sensor-shift image stabilization, contrary to Nikon calling it Optical VR.

While I'm on the sensor, it uses a 10-megapixel backside-illuminated (BSI) CMOS … Read more