Las Vegas woes

For anyone who loves nature and the outdoors a trip to Las Vegas is likely not the highlight of your year. Especially if you're stuck on the strip, that most artificial of all spots in the US. Recently, duty called and I was forced to spend a week here. The only highlight was that I was at least able to view a Flamingo regularly from my hotel window!

Flamingo Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas, NV

Of course, business is business and even though there were about 8 bazillion places I'd rather have been, I stuck it out and did what I had to do, working the show floor at the Las Vegas Convention Center and answering questions about Leica products and varying uses.

Leica product testing, Las Vegas, NV

Perhaps the worst part of this particular duty though was the thought of missing that great American tradition, the Superbowl! Yep, that's right in very unpatriotic fashion, someone went and scheduled convention hours right over the top of this celebrated American holiday. Not surprisingly, the show floor became a veritible ghost town after kick-off leaving only dedicated manufacturer reps to talk amongst themselves. It was with great relief that we discovered a visible flat panel screen broadcasting the event some 150 yards or so away. Ever conscientious about quality control, myself and a number of my Leica coleagues set to testing the resolving power of the new Leica Ultravid HD binoculars. In this way we were able to view the game in HD, and were not surprised a bit by the extreme high quality images delivered by these superb optics!

an impromptu digiscoping demonstration

Unfortunately, there were far more interested in testing this for themselves than there were binoculars available. I decided the best course of action was to set up a digiscoping demonstration as a distraction and to fully show the complete capabilities of the fine Leica equipment. I quickly trained my Leica APO Televid scope on an interesting subject (picked at random of course), mounted the tiny C-Lux 2 camera, and ran the included cable to a nearby monitor so all would be able to see my demonstration clearly.

another successful digiscoping demonstartion

In very short order, a crowd of would be digiscopers had amassed and were marvelling at my prowess as well as the quality of the imaging capabilities of the Leica glass. Many seemed even captivated by my demonstration and stood transfixed by the beautifully clear subject matter! Others refused to believe that the scope and little camera were producing the amazing image they were viewing. To prove it, I'd step in front of the scope, bringing immediate disapproval from some of my most engrossed digiscoping students ever. Shouts of, "Down in front!" and similar were uttered almost instantly. When the "battery save" mode kicked in and the subject disappeared momentarily (as seen above) there was a near riot until I deftly pushed the shutter release restoring the view!

Fortunately for all interested parties, we were able to leave in time to catch the final quarter of the big show! Our heart felt thanks go out to the players on both side of the field, who held all of the real excitement until the last 8 minutes or so. Those of us stuck at the show surely appreciated that. At any rate, it appears I've unwittingly discovered a brand new user group of digiscopers, and a new descriptive phrase has even been coined to boot. We now call this new approach "digipoaching"! ;p