Digiscoping has long been limited to attaching bulky cameras to spotting scopes, using complex and expensive adapters to connect and align them. Meopta® changed the game by developing the revolutionary MeoPix® iScoping adapter, which connects and perfectly aligns an iPhone® to a binocular or spotting scope eyepiece. This simple, patent pending and relatively inexpensive solution allows everyone to capture incredible long-range images and videos.

“We are incredibly excited about this revolutionary product. Our iScoping development team has taken incredible photographs and video clips with prototype MeoPix® iScoping Adapters for several months and it performs flawlessly,” says Meopta® USA GM Reinhard Seipp. “There truly is no better combination for long distance photography than a MeoPix®, the iPhone® and our world-class optics. We feel that this promotion will inspire consumers to try our products and once they see our quality and value, they’ll return to the Meopta® brand again and again,” added Mr. Seipp.

Meopta’s limited MeoPix® iScoping Adapter giveaway rewards Meopta® purchasers with a 42 mm MeoPix iScoping Adapter absolutely free when they buy a MeoStar 42mm, 50mm or 56mm series binocular at a participating Meopta dealer.

The MeoPix® iScoping Adapter will be available for purchase wherever Meopta® products are sold and the MeoPix® giveaway will continue for a limited time while supplies last. Soon to be released MeoPix® versions will be optimized for the MeoPro® series binocular and the new MeoStar® S2 82 HD spotting scope. MeoPix® models to fit other brand optics are expected throughout the summer and fall.

“The Navigator series is the great choice for boaters, sailors and anglers who rely on their optics for recreation, navigation and safety,” stated Rob Siemers, general manager. “They offer the optical quality and durable construction that consumers expect from Steiner, but their affordable price makes them a great value.”

The 7×50 Navigator features offer Sports Auto-Focus for instant, sharp viewing in any situation, without the need to continually refocus on subjects at various distances. Once the binoculars are focused for your eyes, everything from 50 feet to infinity will be in clear and sharp. Also new for 2012 is the 7×50 Navigator C with its integrated electronically illuminated HD compass. Both models feature a tough Makrolon® polycarbonate body and durable construction making them the perfect companion for any coastal cruiser or open-water sport fisherman.

The 7×50 Navigator is fogproof, shockproof and waterproof down to two meters. The wide field-of-view (370 feet at 1,000 yards) and bright clear images from edge-to-edge make the 7×50 a great addition to the Navigator line.

This new marine binocular is available now at retailers nationwide. Suggested retail price for the 7×50 Navigator is $399, and the 7×50 Navigator C (compass) is $549. Both come with the Steiner 10-Year Limited Warranty.

Headquartered in Germany, Steiner has been widely acknowledged as a world leader in the manufacturing of high quality optics since 1947. In addition to the outdoor, hunting and marine markets, Steiner provides products to military and law enforcement worldwide. Allied forces around the world—including the U.S. Army and countless law enforcement agencies—have made Steiner their binocular of choice. For more information, contact: Steiner Optik, 920 54th Avenue, Suite 200, Greeley, CO 80634; call (970) 356-1670; or visit the company website at www.steiner-binoculars.com.

“Steiner’s reputation for its military-grade optics is known around world, and the new Military 5x-25x riflescope incorporates all the technology and expertise that we have developed over 65 years,” stated Rob Siemers, general manager. “It is the ultimate long-range sniper scope and one that we are proud to put our name on.”

The Military 5-25x-56mm riflescope features a rugged 34mm one-piece extruded aluminum main tube and world-class Steiner optical elements, featuring broadband Anti-Reflective coated optics for maximum light transmission. The G2B Mil-Dot reticle is illuminated and glass-etched, and it is ideally located on the front focal plane, so subtension remains unchanged over the magnification range for quick and easy target identification, ranging and accuracy. The scope can also be equipped with the popular MSR reticle.

The digital illumination offers 11 intensity levels (seven night / four day) and a battery-saver position between each level with two OFF-positions at each end. The digital illumination and parallax adjustment are combined in a left-side turret for comfort and ease of use, with or without gloves on.

The windage and elevation on the Military 5-25x-56mm scope are designed for precise adjustment. The windage knob, located on the right side of the tube, is calibrated for up to 5 mils of adjustment for both left and right adjustment. For shooting at extreme distances, the elevation knob on the Military 5-25x 56 riflescope offers up to 19.5 mils of adjustment over the course of two turret revolutions.

Fully waterproof to 10 meters and shock proof to 900 G’s, the Steiner Military 5-25x-56mm riflescope is also nitrogen filled to be internally fogproof. This new long-range military riflescope will retail for $3095.99.

Headquartered in Germany, Steiner has been widely acknowledged as a world leader in the manufacturing of high quality optics since 1947. In addition to the outdoor, hunting and marine markets, Steiner provides products to military and law enforcement worldwide. Allied forces around the world—including the U.S. Army and countless law enforcement agencies — have made Steiner their binocular of choice. For more information, contact: Steiner Optik, 920 54th Avenue, Suite 200, Greeley, CO 80634; call (970) 356-1670; or visit the company website at www.steiner-binoculars.com.

What can I say, sometimes change is good and sometimes it’s very good, and true to form for Swarovski it’s the latter always seems to be their reality. I read in one of their advertisements that they are calling the new SLC HD a “Classic Perfected” and I don’t see how a better description of this binocular could be made.  It is as near a perfect binocular as I’ve ever held in my hand, absolute magic.

Now there are lots of features to this binocular and you can find them all on the Swarovski Optik website, but here are some of my most important observations. First, a great binocular has got to feel natural in the hand, like the TV remote or a long neck bottle, you get the idea, and this binocular feels absolutely natural in every respect.  Second on my list is ease of function, and this is where Swarovski binoculars always seems to do it a lot better then most. The focus wheel is absolutely perfectly located and sized and even uses a combination of hard and soft materials which provides the perfect grip and feel wet or dry. Its buttery smooth and covers all practical focusing needs with a single turn, it will even focus down to an amazing short distance of 6 feet, so you can check out all the stuff near you that you’d rather not touch. Third, and very importantly they redesigned the dioptric compensator and expanded its capability. When it’s all said and done this binocular has an amazing vision impairment correction capability of 6 dpt. Just about everybody on the planet can optimize the view thru these binoculars. Swarovski was also thinking of my friends that wear eye glasses as they built a generous eye relief into this binocular, an amazing eye relief of 16mm in the 10X model and 18.5mm in the 8X model. At first you might think that all of this eye relief would come at the compromise of field of view, and in most binoculars it would, but Swarovski is using a very special wide angle eyepiece and the fields of view are just fantastic.

I know that shopping for a premium level binocular can be a bit overwhelming, and truthfully there are lots of really good options on the market, but if your thinking of buying one right now then I suggest you give these new Swarovski binoculars some serious consideration. They are simply magic!

Since there are so many rifles out there that shoot very well, you need a good rifle scope and shooting solution for greater distances. An easy solution for various distance shooting is what most shooters and manufactures are after. Almost every rifle scope manufacture has a solution for various distances shooting. Nikon, Leupold, Burris, Zeiss, Nightforce, Pentax, Schmidt and bender, Swarovski and many other companies have come out with one or more ways to compensate for shooting at various distances.

To explain what I mean, most of these companies’ solutions start with a busy reticle, or a custom made dial specific to one, very specific load. While these solutions are good, they aren’t absolute or perfect. The custom turrets can be a good solution for some people, and many guys like them but I’m not a fan of custom turrets. With custom turrets too many things have to stay constant, if there is even a slight variation in loaded ammunition, if you switch powders or bullets in hand loads, you have to get a new turret. This could make or break a hunt if change ammunition for any reason. The ballistic reticles are another good option. Most ballistic reticles are backed by online calculators supported by the manufacture. This can give shooters and hunters flexibility not offered by custom turrets. You can also change ammunition without any problems. These ballistic reticles are a great option. But what if you want a simple reticle, like a duplex or classic german number 4? Swarovski has a ballistic reticle, but Swarovski also has a system that I think is the easiest and most versatile to use for easy various distance.

It’s called the Swarovski Ballistic Turret system, and it’s the best system to date. Backed by a Swarovski’s ballistic calculator, the Swarovski Ballistic turret rifle scopes allow the shooter to use a simple reticle, and give the shooter the ability to engage targets at various distances. The way the system works is it allows shooters to zero the rifle, and then set up to 4 more zeros by using the calculator. Let me say it again, you only have to zero your rifle once, and then the calculator gives you the other 4 zeros. This allows you to have 5 different zeros and means you can have your cross hair dead on at a target and simply change the turret’s position to the specified colored tab. You can set your zero at any distance, and vary the distances your other zeros will represent. No busy reticle, no specific ballistic turret, just a simple reticle and solution. This system also allows you to shoot at various distances under stress, which is important if you stalking a trophy animal or in intense competition. Even under high stress it’s easy to choose the color and put the cross hair on the animal. Any shooter that uses this system will tell you how easy it is to engage targets at various distances with speed all because of this innovative system. It’s as close to perfect as a various distance shooting system can be. Check out the short video at the bottom to see the potential of this system. If you want the easiest various distance shooting system, get a rifle scope with Swarovski Ballistic turret system is the way to go. That’s the word from sportoptics.com.

However, I just had the opportunity to test out the new Leupold Golden Ring Switch Power binocular and I was surprised. I liked it. And I don’t think that I wanted to like it.

I thought that I would pick it up and just hate it from there. The binocular felt like quality construction. I thought it would be gimmicky and have shotty construction. It didn’t.

The 10x/17x model that I held not only felt like a solid piece of optics but weighed considerably less than the other brand’s switch power bino.

I used the other guy’s bino a few months ago and it was confusing because the switching happens independantly on each barrel. The Leupold center switch was very easy and effective. Next I thought that I wouldn’t be able to see anything at the high power because of the lower exit pupil. I was really surprised that the bino did not seem to dim.

If I had been looking at them at lunch I would have thought that the sun’s brightness was compensating, but it was twenty minutes until dark and the switch was seamless. Visually they were great with crisp focus, perfect contrast and beautiful color. The Leupold Golden Ring Switch Power binocular is a great binocular and is everything that they say it is. My world crumbled.

There’s a lot of potential in this product. Like anything else I’m sure that with more experience you’ll get better results. My limited time did show me the pro’s and cons of the camera. The pros are that it is relatively inexpensive to acquire, easy to set and operate, and produces decent results; even on the first try. I photographed some common birds on the top of a power pole 92 yards away (distance verified with a very high end rangefinder). I used the default settings and used it straight out of the box. I’d imagine that shooting later in the day and tweaking the white balance would give me better pictures but I didn’t have time to dive that deeply into it. Here is what I found…maxing out the zoom at noon on a windy day isn’t going to win you digiscoper of the year. If you back off the zoom to the lowest setting which is probably 20x…you’ll get a good picture and with experience and patience probably some to frame. Also, you could probably get closer to you subject than 100 yards and that would yield better results as well. Interestingly enough, the device comes with a remote control in lieu of a cable shutter release. A remote shutter is essential because the manual two second time delay and mother nature isn’t going to work most of the time. Also pressing the button manually will give you blurry pictures. On top of that, high magnification will always magnify vibration; even your finger daintily pressing a shutter can blur a pic. There was still a lag with the remote but not too bad. One thing that was nice with the remote was that it only has three buttons and can switch from pictures to soundless video instantly. You can even toggle between two set zooms during the video taping. You can step zoom while in the camera mode. If you had this thing pointed at a bird feeder in you back yard 50 feet away you’d get some awesome shots and video. When you put an SD card in there be sure to shoot away and play the numbers. Eventually a beauty will happen. The images are 5 Mega Pixel so that’s printable even at a larger scale.

As much as I like the product there are some disappointments.  One thing that bugged me was that it was hard to get on target and know I was spot on with the focus because I was seeing my own reflection in the display window. Some of this might be corrected by changing the time of day, type of sunlight and maybe using a straight spotting scope. Actually I wouldn’t recommend changing the spotting scope to a straight unless you are never going to look higher than the horizon; that’s just spotting scope 101 knowledge. I guess the way around it would be to march out there like an old timer with a black cloth and put it over the eyepiece and your head, That would probably fix a lot of issues; if you don’t mind being a little different around the other birders and consider yourself a slave to your artform. Another thing that bothered me was that it kept shutting off to save the battery every 60 seconds so I had to shoot the empty pole every 40-50 seconds just to keep it on. After the session I stumbled across the ability to turn that feature off. It would have been handy to know that earlier and saved me the aggravation of turning it back on when a bird showed up because I forgot to take a dummy shot and keep it on, so if you buy this thing be sure to find the battery saver feature and turn it off. The last thing I didn’t like, and this kind of applies to the battery save feature I just mentioned, but the instructions for this thing are at a Dick and Jane kind of level with no hard specifics as to things like where to plug in the USB cable; I had to call them for that information. I’m not kidding. There was a knob underneath but it didn’t want to come off nor seem like the logical place to plug in a cable and the last thing I wanted to do was remove a sealed knob and see a circuit board and wires.

All in all I’d give this device a four out of five based on performance to cost. If you are just starting off with digiscoping around the backyard and at the local state park…it is awesome. Really…it’s about time somebody put this out. You’ll have fun with it and have fun shots for your hobby and even a winner every now and then. However, if your planning a once in a lifetime trip to Argentina…maybe you should look at what your scope manufacturer has that matches your $1500 camera. That’s the scoop on the Minox Digital Camera Module 5.0.

“Both models are inspected individually for resolution, tracking accuracy, and point of impact shift after being subjected to a battery of impacts: side impacts from the 12, 3, 6, and 9 o clock positions on the objective bell (this includes the adjustable objective BR models), and forward and reverse impacts to simulate various types of recoil. Although they endure the same quality control checks both scopes were designed from the ground up for different and specific purposes. The NXS is a dedicated design for the tactical marksman and the BR is a dedicated design for the Benchrest shooter.

1. The NXS scope has quarter minute clicks while the Benchrest scope has eighth minute clicks.
- A quarter minute click is a good compromise between precision at distance and not having to count too many clicks to get on target. A quarter Minute Click will yield a click value of roughly 2.5” at 1000 yards. This is great for tactical use but the target shooter may want a finer adjustment to get impacts as close to center as possible.
- The BR Series of scopes has adjustments with eighth minute graduations. This yields a click value of roughly 1.25” at 1000 yards. This allows a shooter to take advantage of all of his rifles practical accuracy.

2. The Nightforce NXS scope has a side parallax adjustment and the BR has an AO(Adjustable Objective).
- A side parallax adjustment allows a shooter to eliminate parallax with a minimal amount of movement required. This configuration is safer for military marksmen and faster and more comfortable for competitive shooters engaging targets at varying distances.
- An AO allows less lens elements to be used in the optical design. This provides a scope that is less expensive to produce and has less air to glass surfaces inside that reflect or absorb available light.

3. The NXS has an internal rheostat and the BR has an externally adjustable rheostat for illuminating the reticles.
- The internal rheostat in the NXS is impossible to inadvertently activate at maximum intensity, giving away a soldiers position. It comes adjusted from the factory for low light conditions, but is end user adjustable by turning a small screw under the battery.
- The external rheostat on the BR allows the shooter to choose the level of illumination appropriate to the conditions instantly by turning an adjustment located on the scope’s ocular bell.

4. The NXS has exposed windage and elevation adjustments and the BR has capped windage and elevation adjustments.
- The NXS has exposed turrets for fast adjustments in the field.
- The backlash clearance in a Nightforce Rifle Scope is less than 1/30th the thickness of a human hair, but the use of capped windage and elevation adjustments on the BR series eliminates that entirely.

5. The NXS has a lock-ring adjustable eyepiece and the BR has a fast focus eye piece; for reticle clarity and definition.
- Once adjusted, the diopter adjustment on the NXS is protected by a lock ring preventing it from being out of focus when the operator needs it the most.
- The fast focus eyepiece on the BR allows the competitive marksman to have the sharpest reticle image possible with a quick and easy adjustment.

6. The NXS’s eyepiece rotates with the zoom ring while the BR’s eyepiece is fixed.
- The rotating eyepiece on the NXS allows a shooter to turn the entire ocular bell to obtain the desired magnification. Adjusting a small zoom ring is a fine motor skill and can be difficult under stress. The rotating eyepiece also allows for a scope body that is more rigid.
- The zoom ring on the Nightforce BR allows the use of the fast focus eyepiece and typical “flip up” lens covers. ”
To the best of our knowledge this is the best explanation you will find on the main differences between these two Nightforce Scopes. We hope this information will be helpful to you.