This year’s show, held in the Exhibition Centre in Yokohama was much smaller than I – and many of my peers – expected. Nonetheless, all the big guns were there such as Sony, Canon, Nikon, Olympus and their like, but sadly there was nothing glaringly new in the way of dedicated video cameras that I could see anyway.

Having said that though, there was enough gadgetry and ‘stuff’ to keep even the most hardened videographer happy. If you ignored the “booth babes”, many dressed in the ubiquitous school uniform (and it was hard to I admit; I have to say there are many very attractive Japanese women in Tokyo/Yokohama), some gems came to light.

A showstopper was the tele lenses from a company with the wonderful name of Borg.  A new entry to the scene, these guys make bespoke lenses with all the necessary extension tubes and adaptors to nail onto a range of cameras and camcorders. I had a Sony NEDX 20 with me, and adding one of these lenses was a hoot!

The one I chose was about 18” long, and once added, you could fill the frame of the viewfinder with a full stop from a sign 10 metres away! Depth of field is shot, but the sharpness is epic to say the least. Other samples they had there were bolted a range of cameras from an Olympus E5 to a Q.

For around AUD$800? For shooting astronomy these would be tops. And motor sport (or any sport). There are no plans for Australian distribution at this point sadly.

Get the idea though? 4/3rds was BIG at the show (and the most popular was the new Olympus OMD with a wait time of 30 minutes + to get a hands on). All three of my travelling companions were dribbling at the mouth at the site of this little beauty, and it seemed the only decision was which colour to get!

Retro was big here with leather cases and other re-jigged accessories being the norm.

Other favourite was the Cokin stand. Regular Auscam readers will know of my penchant for the French company, and they had a monstrous range of filters on hand from the very sensible and usable to the extreme kitch. It’s lucky that the exhibitors were not allowed to sell off their stands I can tell you.

But I cannot let go without mentioning that as Nikon were my hosts for the trip – and damn fine ones at that (and it isn’t over yet with a visit by bullet train to Sendai tomorrow for a factory tour for the newly released D4) another star of the show was the D800 / 800E from Nikon.

This has been designed with video in mind, and as soon as I have had a physical play, I’ll give my initial findings and thoughts. A full review will be carried out by two of Auscam’s finest who have far more experience than me as soon as we can get review units. The same applies to the Canon 1D, which we had a quick play with at the show and was, photographically at least, mind numbing I am told by better people than me.

Earlier in the week we had been treated by a briefing from Nikon boffins as to the new range for this year and Nikon has certainly upped the ante with a swag if new compacts, the D4 and the aforementioned D800 series.

This space is going to be the next major battleground for video as well as still photography if the show is any indication, and the Big Boys are very serious indeed about getting supremacy.

Will the likes of Sony, Panasonic fight back with their traditional camcorders? Well Sony probably needs to enter the dSLR video fray with the alpha series to keep some presence and this could compromise their traditional camcorders and of course the NEX series. Panasonic is probably the best placed having dropped their LUMIX dSLRs a few years back and the other major, JVC ‘seems’ to be a bit of turmoil of late – at least in Australia with their new masters, Kenwood, seemingly not really that interested from the reaction I have received from them and what my peers also confirm.

Samsung could be a dark horse here; they are taking Apple on head-to-head and they are not noted for shyness. Their recent ranges of camcorders and cameras have not been particularly inspired, but they appear to be keeping their cards close to their chest.

We live in interesting times. I have two more days in Japan, and as I glean more, I’ll let you know!

I also have a bunch of video and will edit these and post them as soon as I can. There is some interesting stuff! And some funny things too.

(By the way, if you have never indulged in Japanese food – genuine stuff – you don’t know what you are missing. It is delicious)

By David Hague

David is the owner and publisher of AusCam Online. He has a background in media dating back to 1979 when he first got involved with photojournalism in motorsport, and went from there into technology via a 5 year stint with Tandy Computers. Following that, he ran a software distribution company on the Gold Coast and was one of the first to recognise the potential of Microsoft Windows.

Moving back to WA, David wrote scripts for Computer Television for video training for the just released Windows and Office 95 among others, and was then lured to Sydney to create web sites for the newly commercial Internet in 1995, building hundreds of sites under contract to OzEmail including Coates Hire, Hertz Queensland, John Williamson, the NSW Board of Studies and many, many more.

He went back into full time journalism as the Managing Editor for Channel 7's 'Gadget Guy', Peter Blasina's publications VideoCamera and Pixelmag, before starting Australasian Camcorder magazine when these publications were shelved. He lives at Sydney's Avalon Beaches nearly on the ocean front with dog Budweiser and in his spare time is a nut for motor sport, road safety, fishing, science fiction - especially Dr Who - and technology.

David can be contacted via david@auscamonline.com